Does anyone know why my radiator has gone like this?

[OfDragonsDeep]

We’ve had this radiator about 5 years in the cloakroom and over the last year or so it has gone rusty at the bottom.

I assumed that there would be a leak somewhere, but there is nothing, all pipe work is completely dry and there are no drips/puddles anywhere. It feeds from upstairs and this is all fine too. The boiler keeps steady pressure. The room/house have no damp issues.

Does anyone have any idea? Or whether I can just rub it down and paint it, or if we should get it replaced?

Thanks

I had a radiator a bit like this ( but not as bad) and it was a very small leak that evaporated quite quickly.

I found it by putting kitchen roll around the valve and joint ( as I suspected that was where the leak was) and checking it every day and then found that the connection between the valve and the radiator had a tiny leak that ran along the bottom of the radiator and caused it to rust.

It may be possible to tighten that joint and repaint the radiator, although I had ours replaced.

Mine went like that in the bathroom, though not quite as bad, I think it was the general steamy atmosphere that caused it, I painted the bottom with Hammerite direct to rust paint to cover it up.

Thanks for this tip, we have a peeling one in the bathroom too

Depending on the colour of your radiators and if you don't want to paint the whole thing, I got a small tin of white and small tin of cream, mixed a bit and got a good match, my radiators are quite old so not that white. I also touched up the kitchen one as well

Happens in almost every bathroom due to condensation running down to the bottom. And the paint along the bottom edge is often damaged during installation or when cleaning the floor.

It certainly isn't common in bathrooms. Is it getting wet coats hung against it?

We've had this across several radiators. No leaks. They're just crap quality and not fit for purpose really.

Thanks all, I’ll wrap the valves in kitchen roll to make definitely sure of no leaks, but otherwise just looks like one of those things.

No wet coats on it, but the towel rail is just round the corner, so that could be an issue. I think I’ll try and rub down and paint the best I can for now and replace it when we do the upstairs bathroom next year.

The 20 year old ones in other rooms certainly seem better 😂

If it's a pressurised system then if it was leaking the pressure would be dropping. It looks more like a pub toilet radiator thats situated under a hand dryer so gets wet from external water a lot!

DH suggests wirebrushing where it's rusty and then monitor closely to see if there are any tiny pinhole leaks

It looks quite bad, almost as if something is rubbing it.

The way to deal with it is to not let it get that bad in the first place.

Mine did get a small rusty strip developing at the bottom. I don't know whether it was a leak or condensation. I think that radiator was close to a sink. I think that people might have washed their hands in the sink, the water splashed on the radiator and then ran down to the bottom where it stayed on the edge as droplets and rusted the radiator.

I sanded and painted the small strip at the bottom that was turning rusty with radiator paint. It is now hardly visible.

Our bathroom one is like this, had 2 now and both the same (2nd one rusted in just 6 months).

The bathroom is horrifically damp, the roof leaks and the shower drains into the wall and floor because the sub frame collapsed but the landlord refuses to fix it. Its always visibly wet round that area so I figure thats why.

No other radiator in the house has any issue.