The 'Blue Peter' radiator kludge that saves money!
Yes, yes, this is all very low tech, but it's something I've done on all our main window radiators and I believe it saves real money. And the kludge itself costs almost nothing, so why not?
The problem is that radiators in our house are positioned underneath windows - which seems utterly crazy to me, but it's true all over the place. Why? Put each room's heat source underneath the biggest heat loss, etc?!
In the winter, with curtains closed, the situation's even worse, with curtains closed, since then they hang down 'outside' the radiator vertically, so heat rises and then ends up 'inside' the curtain and straight out the window, or at least into the window space, and not into the room!!
Bonkers. Anyway, here's my fix. A length of cardboard, with kitchen silver foil glued (and/or taped) on, splined onto the radiator wall supports, and bent at 45 degrees so as to channel rising heat out into the room and beyond the curtains.
A few photos are wort…
The problem is that radiators in our house are positioned underneath windows - which seems utterly crazy to me, but it's true all over the place. Why? Put each room's heat source underneath the biggest heat loss, etc?!
In the winter, with curtains closed, the situation's even worse, with curtains closed, since then they hang down 'outside' the radiator vertically, so heat rises and then ends up 'inside' the curtain and straight out the window, or at least into the window space, and not into the room!!
Bonkers. Anyway, here's my fix. A length of cardboard, with kitchen silver foil glued (and/or taped) on, splined onto the radiator wall supports, and bent at 45 degrees so as to channel rising heat out into the room and beyond the curtains.
A few photos are wort…
