Central Heating Checks to Run Before Winter
An hour spent running your heating in autumn finds the faults that would otherwise ruin the coldest week of the year.
The best diagnostic tool for a heating system is running it properly while the weather's still mild. Do it now and a fault becomes a planned repair. Wait until the first freezing week and it becomes an emergency.
The checklist
Run the heating for a full hour — short bursts hide problems that an hour reveals.
Touch every radiator, top and bottom: cold at the top means air (bleed it); cold at the bottom means sludge (needs a flush); stone cold with others working normally means a stuck valve.
Watch the pressure gauge — it should sit around 1-1.5 bar cold and rise slightly when hot; steadily falling pressure means a leak somewhere.
Listen for banging, kettling or humming.
Test controls — check that the room thermostat actually switches the boiler, and that TRVs turn freely after a summer left untouched.
Run it in September or October
Run through this in September or October and you'll have a system that's ready before the first genuinely cold week arrives, not during it.