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The nice thing about radiators is that for the most part they heat the objects in a room through radiant heat and the air is heated by those objects being warm, put a box around it and it will heat that box an then heat the air and that will make the air feel warmer but not the rest of the house, adding reflective insulation behind them is most likely one of the best things you can do, even a sheet of tin foil will help a great deal.
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the previous owner already installed some reflective film covered foam,
but as i understood their function and backed by some info in the web, a radiators main heat delivery is nog trough radiation, but trough convection. where cold air close to the floor is heated by the "radiator" and than rises and circulates troug the house, cooling and falling as it moves away from the radiator.
this is also why these type of tradiators tend to suck up dust and circulate it trough the house... a collegue of mine who build something similar said one could really feel the hot air being expelled with reasonable force at the top exit opening when the rad was on.
what i meant with a thermostatic valve is that each radiator has a manual valve, sort of like a water tap, to open close the water supply, but these thermostatic valves have a bimetal or similer inside them that opens and closed this valve automaticly depening on the set value... the whole system is controled electronicly from a small wall console that allows one to set the main water temp of the boiler... in my case this is a simple affair with a single twist know, but it will be replaced with something more modern that allows us to program day and night settings etc... when we replace the water boiler wich now runs on oil, but we'll likelt convert to natural gas wich is much cleaner and maintenance free with the option of hooking up some solar boilers on the roof.
but back to the encaseings. lost examples i've seen have a "grill" in the front wich makes sence to allow the radiation heat to exit directly. but what if i where to cover the front panel on the inside with a reflective insulation as well? this would bounce the radiation back and forth in the radiator, heating the internal air faster perhaps.
what i would mainly like to know is how i can improve this natural convection effect? could a larger or smaller intake or exit have an effect on airflow and temperature exchange?