Continuing our series on designer radiator valves, we are today looking at the Ellipse Oval Valve Set, a striking pair which suits the most popular radiators our industry manufactures – find out more today.
WHY OVAL?
Oval shaped radiators make up a large proportion of the designer radiators sold in our market, in fact they are so popular that most of our manufacturer’s will have some version of an elliptical tube radiator.
Some, like DQ Heating, have a base oval design like the DQ Cove and have made it into the Cove Horizontal and Cove Vertical, Cove Stainless Horizontal and Vertical, the Cove Mirror, Cove Towel Rail, Cove Stainless Towel Rail and so on! Because they are so popular, and they make this oval shaped for so many designs, they have become extremely efficient at it and they are priced tremendously well.
As a result, it is one of the only designer radiator styles to have the perfect 100% matching valves made to go with it, and the resulting visual flair is tremendous.
THE ELLIPSE OVAL VALVE SET
The set itself is made from high quality brass, and is available in either shining Chrome to suit bright living spaces, or a Satin Nickel finish for a softer, more contemporary look. Due to its oval shape the Ellipse set is a manual valve only because the head can only be flush with the body if it is either on or off position. If it was thermostatic and you turned it to setting 3 for example, the oval head would be completely the opposite way around.
With an inlet and outlet suitable for 15mm pipework, the Ellipse valve set is suitable for all modern radiators. Even if you have smaller 10mm or 8mm pipework, by using microbore reducers you can still combine your designer radiator with these wonderful valves to achieve an enviable effect.
You can find all of our manual valves including the Ellipse Oval Valve Set right here. If you would like any help in picking your valves or designer radiator, don’t forget that we are always available to help, just contact us on 01257 452879 or email us at sales@designerradiatorshowroom.co.uk
This week we are going to look at the Milan Valve Set, and the flexible finishes and variations which are available for it making it ideal for most rooms in the house, especially bathrooms.
The key here is the Milan’s discreet size, neat appearance and simple operation; find out more about each of these today!
MILAN VALVE SET – SUBTLETY FOR SIMPLICITY
Compared to the Realm TRV sets we looked at last week, the Milan Valve Set is a minuscule valve which both saves on space and looks remarkably clean at the bottom of any radiator, whether in the living room or in the en suite.
While attractive and well made in a brass body with finishes of Chrome, Satin Nickel, Black Nickel, Antique Brass and Antique Copper, the real benefit of the Milan’s size is that you can use it for towel rails without the worry of the valve protruding further forward than the front of the radiator.
In very specific cases, the larger, thermostatic valves like the Realm would be every awkward to use if you were trying to make a dual fuel towel radiator – sometimes you would need one angled and one corner valve with a large set, but with the Milan set you can have matching valves without the need to split two sets just to make it look neat.
ATTRACTIVE QUALITY
Valve size and shape are the key factors in the Milan’s pretty little success story. A lot of manual valves, even the basic designer manual valves like our Apex sets are how should we say? Nutty. Yes… Nutty.
These basic valves are jagged, industrial looking things with nuts of varying sizes and bits that protrude; they aren’t so pretty. The Milan set on the other hand is smooth from top to bottom, the head is slender yet well-proportioned, the nuts are the same size and small enough to be subtle. Overall there isn’t a reason to choose a nutty, basic manual valve over the smooth Milan valve set .
EASE IS KEY
The main functional reason to go for a set like the Milan valves is so that you only need to choose between on/off settings. A thermostatic valve lets you turn the temperature up and down, but if you think about a room in the home where you have literally NEVER adjusted your thermostat once it was on full blast, that’s a room that you would have been better off using a manual valve in.
Simply put, you turn your Milan valve set one way and hot water can flow through it when the heating comes on, and you turn it the other way to close it. No fuss.
While it might not be the most complex valve on the market, often-times that isn’t needed, and when that is the case the trim shape and smaller size of the Milan is the best option on the market, and it’s a nice little saving when compared a thermostatic alternative.
To see our full range of manual valves, including the Milan Valve Set, click here.
Two designer radiators from the Aestus bathroom radiator collection complement one another very nicely, but if you can only pick one, which would it be? That’s why the main event today is… Aestus Sigma vs Aestug Fog!
Like always at DRS we make things easier for you, and this time we’ve put together a comparison of these two excellent bathroom heaters to help you choose.
Both the Sigma and the Fog feature what we call ‘fingers’ which are used in different ways to create very unique shapes.
AESTUS SIGMA
This radiator is a good one for the imagination, do you see a radiator? A moustache comb? Turn it one way and do you see a post-modern interpretation of moose antlers? Turn it the other way and are you now looking at icing dripping over the top of a cake?
Whatever it looks like, it’s both stylish and practical. It comes in three sizes; 1088mm tall, 1400mm and 1712mm, all at the same width of 600mm. Standard towel rails are at 500mm wide, but the extra width of the Sigma allows you to hang towels onto its fingers with the ample space you would expect. To give it the flexibility you would expect with a designer towel radiator, the Sigma is available in both Matt White and Matt Black to suit different themes.
The heat outputs produced are reasonable as well despite the flat shape, with the largest size producing 2668 BTUs. Not only is it an attractive radiator, it comes with a 15 year long guarantee, which for a steel radiator is absolutely phenomenal.
AESTUS FOG
Contrasting to the long, open shape of the Sigma, the compact style of the Aestus Fog is a lovely distinction. The Fog’s appearance is an artistic interpretation of a pure white mist forming or fading in front of you – starkly the contrasting to the Sigma’s design.
The slightly oblong proportions of the Fog give it a satisfying overall appearance, with its two sizes coming in at 592mm high x 800mm wide and 790mm x 1100mm. It’s also available in both Matt White and Matt Black just like the Sigma, with the finish choice having a more dramatic effect due to the solid shape of the Fog.
Functionality was the main consideration for the final design of the Fog, and with 7 separate places to drape your towels to dry you have a large surface area where you can hang smaller towels, and even a large one completely unfolded if you felt so inclined!
While the heat output of the Aestus Fog is able to reach a higher total than the Sigma (2873 BTUs), the shape of the radiator might limit which bathrooms and where in each bathroom it can be placed. It requires a lot of space to install it, but if you do have that space it looks neat, warm and makes a wonderful design statement.
OUR VERDICT
The dream choice between these two radiators would be to fit one into two separate bathrooms and have them quaintly match with one another. If your bathroom is very substantial then have them both within the same space, perhaps with the Sigma as the stand-alone towel radiator, and the Fog over a bath.
If you must choose between the two, then first you must consider whether you can actually fit one or the other in your home at a size big enough to give you the heat you need. If you could fit either of them, which will be more practical for the function you need.
They both look fantastic and have 15 year guarantees, as well as coming in the same black or white finish options, so the final deciding factor would be which one suits the space available for it the best without looking crammed in or lost.
The Realm TRV set is the perfect accessory. Like a brand new Mercedes Benz, BMW or Audi, designer radiators are luxury products which fill you with satisfaction. You are treating yourself in style as a reward for your success. What you wouldn’t do while selecting your new high performance car is have it fitted with some big, tacky hub-caps.
Equitable to this is letting your plumber fit your stunning new designer radiator using their normal, unattractive stock. At DRS we believe in better, so join us today for a look at our main designer TRV and a chance to win 10% off your next DRS order!
REALM TRV SET – COLOURS
The Realm TRV has a simple design. What it lacks in ornate detail it makes up for in clean, attractiveness and fantastic utility. It is available in 4 finishes:
- Chrome – Lovely and shining, the Realm TRV set in Chrome is bright and matches very well with Chrome radiators, light fixtures, fittings and door handles – The standard choice
- Satin Nickel – Modern and sleek, the Satin Nickel finish is a brush treated silver which is a little quieter than Chrome, but quite a bit more refined – If you can match this to your them then you’re onto a winner
- Black Nickel – Visually similar to Chrome, just as reflective except with a very dark coloured nickel as a base, the Black Nickel finish has an almost oily visual quality, perfect to match with dark flooring, radiators and granite worktops
- White – Exactly the same as the Chrome version, but with a long, white band around the TRV head’s middle section, coordinating it nicely with White radiators while still accentuating the Chrome features present near by
SHAPES
Function is the name of the game when it comes to valve shape, but appearance is a part of it too. For some designer radiators the pipework which your valves need to connect to is coming up from the floor, other times it’s coming out from the wall, and beyond that depending on the radiator design you might need to connect to the side or the underneath of it.
For all of these possible outcomes we have a valve to suit each case;
- Angled – Perfect when you have floor pipework and side connections on your radiator
- Straight – Perfect when you have floor pipework and underneath connection on your radiator
- Corner – Perfect when you have wall pipework, and either side or underneath connections on your radiator
SIZES
Our Realm TRVs are one size only and made to fit 15mm pipework, which is the standard in most homes today, however if you have an older property it can be common to find that you have 10mm or 8mm microbore pipework instead.
To fix this there is a neat accessory which discreetly fits into your valve named a Microbore Reducer. These constrict the size of the valve’s opening for the pipework to connect into, making it fit correctly without having to buy a specially sized valve.
If you do have either 10mm or 8mm pipework just specify in the notes which you have and if you have ordered valves with us at DRS we will include a set of Microbore Reducers with each valve set on your order.
See our full range of Realm TRV Valve Sets here today!
