With your central heating, do you...?

[spudcounter]

Have something called a drain pipe on one of pipes on your radiators? We've had new raditors installed and the plumber has left an inch of pipe which looks ugly..something to do with having to drain the radiators if the system ever needs it.

Yes, very important.

does it matter which radiator it's on..it looks really ugly and obtrusive?

Where is this inch of pipe?? We too have a drain pipe, which is off our dining room radiator. But it goes through the wall to outside, so is not visible from the inside. If the system every needed draining we just put a washing up bowl or some such in the flowerbed and off we go. The rest of the time the pipe bit outside is obscured by shrubs, so not visible

Mind you, I have no idea if this is the norm or not, our house had a complete overhaul by some crazy builders in 1980 (before we bought it) and we are still marvelling at some of their exploits

It has to be on one of the downstair radiators. Ours is in the kitchen - so any drips would be onto the har floor. If wethe plumber needed to drain it, we he would connect a garden hose to it.

my dh used to drip ours onto a load of towels

Yes a drain valve is important. It's usually fitted to the lowest radiator in the house (i.e one of the downstairs radiators)to make it easier to empty the water from the central heating system should you need to (e.g if you're adding a new radiator). Connect a garden hose to the drain valve, open the valve, and the water will drain out.

Ours is in the hall by the front door

oh, well I guess it IS on the lowest one..but it does look ugly..if you can imagine the main radiator pipe going from the radiator and bending at right angles into the wall..which looks ok..at the bend there is this inch or so of pipe sticking out at about 7 o'clock angle IYSWIM..guss I'll have to get used to it..btw, does everyone paint their radiator copper pipes then?

sounds very similar to ours. Our pipes are au naturel

mine is in the hall by the front door too