Preparing the home or office for the cold weather is a good rule that should be noted on your personal organizer every year. Heating systems, which have been stopped during spring and summer, need some small adjustments to guarantee the best results in terms of performance and also allow good energy savings.
Why take care of your heating system during fall season?
Autumn is the right time: with a few more sunny days, this season allows us to complete small interventions before the heating systems are officially switched on, perhaps even dedicating ourselves to small DIY interventions.
The advantages of preparing the house for winter
The following tips will allow you to spend the coldest months of the year in a warm and welcoming home, preventing any damage or breakdowns, and limiting any technical interventions, in times when the inconvenience would be greater. In addition, good insulation and good maintenance also allow for significant savings on bills and greater attention to the environment.
The 10 tips from the comfort experts
- Maintenance of the heating system: before switching on, we recommend to consult a specialized technician to check the boiler and the emission fumes. During the summer, in fact, pressure drops can occur inside the pipes and pumps, or episodes of deterioration, which would limit an efficient circulation of water inside the radiators. This check is required by law in Italy, but it is always better to bring the deadline to before switching on, so as not to risk being left in the cold!
- Bleed the air from the radiators: the air in the radiators can prevent them from heating up evenly. To do this, simply loosen the valve, let the air escape and then close it again, to prevent it from dripping. In case of absence of the valve, you can have it installed by a technician, with a small expense that will be very useful over time.
- Clean the flue: even if the boiler is running, the flue can be congested. Schedule its cleaning every other year, entrusting yourself to a professional. This precaution is also valid for wood-burning fireplaces: a correct draft will prevent smoke from invading the rooms at the first ignition!
- Setting the room chronothermostat: a correct programming of the chronothermostat can significantly reduce consumption. As we have already told, install the most suitable chronothermostat for your type of heating system and program it taking into account that, with a classic system and in optimal operating conditions, a room is able to heat up even in less than an hour, but the situation can be very different in the case of floor or combined systems. In any case, during the day, the temperature should be set around 20°C, while at night also at 16°C. To purchase a new IMIT chronothermostat, click here, or if you have lost the instruction manual, we remind you of our dedicated site man.imit.it, or if you want to replace the old thermostat, we recommend this blog post.
- Dehumidify environments: it’s not so much the temperature as the humidity that gives us that bad feeling of “cold”. The water particles present in the air, in fact, take heat from our body faster than what would happen in a drier environment. For this it is useful to dehumidify the rooms, even if only by placing a container with coarse salt inside the rooms where you spend more time, even in the office!
- Check windows and doors: an icing draft while watching television or while working at your desk can be really annoying. To avoid this, check that the windows close perfectly and that the protective sheaths are not broken or worn, even under the doors. On colder days, a one degree drop in temperature in an environment can increase consumption by up to 8%.
- Insulating the roof: one of the functions of the roof is to prevent heat from being dispersed outside, avoiding excessive humidity. However, the tiles can move, break, there can be infiltrations… So check that the insulation is really efficient and that the roof is not damaged. You could even take advantage of incentives for a work to the highest standards!
- Insulate the back of the radiators: to ensure that the heat spreads properly in the room, it’s now known that you should not cover the radiators with heavy furniture or curtains. But, for the same reason, contact with a cold wall, especially in old houses, can create heat loss. If you have good manual skills, with some insulating panels and a few hours of do-it-yourself, your home will heat up faster!
- Install flow reducers: storage boilers have a limited tank, especially in condominiums and apartments, and it seems that hot water is never enough! We recommend a little trick: install a flow reducer on the taps. Apparently, the water will go down as before, but it will be mixed with air, reducing actual consumption by up to 30%.
- Drying the pellets: if you have a pellet stove it is useful to check the status of your stocks, because, in the event of rainy periods, it’s likely that the fuel has absorbed too much humidity. This can cause problems with ignition and efficiency of the entire system. Instead, buy a new package and leave the one open near a heat source so it can dry and reuse without waste.
We hope you follow our advice, and if you have others, write to social@imit.it!
IMIT is committed to promoting new climate comfort technologies that can guarantee energy and economic savings while respecting the environment. To stay informed on the latest news from the world of thermoregulation, follow the IMIT LinkedIn page and browse our blog. To find out more about our products, browse our website or download our catalogue. For further requests, send an email to info@imit.it. Our staff will reply as soon as possible.