Moving radiators

Patrick North

Sure this has come up before, but my searches didn't turn up anything. Installing new flooring (including new subfloor in one room) in two rooms and will need to move the (one pipe) steam radiators to do the job. Unfortunately, it's not going to be an option to just work around them.
My question is, their weight aside, is this a task I should leave to a pro? I'm an avid do-it-yourselfer who (so far) also knows when to step aside. The kicker- we just bought the house so I'm planning on a thorough pre-heating season checkup. Think I can just have the pro "check my work" before the radiators see steam and save on the service call?

Mike T., Swampeast MO

If you just mean move them while you do the floor work then reinstall in the same location, really not difficult. Worst part can be adapting to a different finished floor height, but since this is one-pipe there's probably a good chance there's enough "wiggle room" unless there's a drastic change in floor height.

Rads connect with unions (the hand valve forms half of the union) and they're brass, so they don't tend to corrode and are usually quite easy to undo. The "free nut" of the union stays attached to the radiator side so that will tell you which way to turn as they use normal right-hand threads.

Good to plug (say stuff with a clean rag) or cover (say black tape and stiff paper) the connections if you're doing lots of dirty word as there's no sense to get unnecessary gunk in the system.

When reattaching the rad, make sure that both of the union mating surfaces and all threads are nice and clean. No need to use pipe dope or tape as unions seal strictly by metal-to-metal contact.

If you're moving the actual location of the radiator, it's a different matter. You have to pipe properly plus threaded joints in old steam systems can get awfully stubborn leading to collapsed pipes or other such things that make you say, "I wish I'd hired a pro!"