I live in an apartment complex where my water baseboard heating is 100% controlled by the complex staff. This year has been particularly tough, as it's been very warm since winter started and even with 18+ inches of snow outside there's little relief. Landlord says the boilers' thermostats are working, but I'm super uncomfortable.
I've been reading up on how to block air flow but am a bit confused. Previously, I've shoved towels into the top of the baseboard lining where the hot air comes out (horizontally), and whatever spilled over gets stuffed underneath where the cold air goes in (if I'm reading correctly).
Would it be more efficient to stuff towels under the baseboards to block air from flowing upwards? I've also read about tin-foil, but where would I stuff it into, or would I create some kind of shielding?
I hope I explained everything correctly — it's 2AM and I have a sick fiancee from all the dry air coming from the windows, and I myself can't get to sleep because it's so damn warm. Thanks for any help.
Edit: Here's a picture of what I'm trying to do to block airflow from under the baseboard. Is this correct?
Best Answer
Since this seems to be an ongoing problem for you, I might suggest a somewhat more formal approach to it. For instance, use magnets to attach toweling to the top of the radiator shell and let the duble-thickness of that towelling (magnet inside the fold) drape all the way to the floor - that should basically shut-down air flow through the radiator from top and bottom and be a bit neater besides. If you need to step it up a notch from there, remove all those, unroll a sheet of aluminum foil from one end to the other, and replace the towel over the top of that.
In both cases, do not try to "stuff things into" the radiator shell, but rather, cover them over completely from the floor to the top-exterior of the radiator shell, all the way to the end-caps (don't limit yourself to the "active area" with fins.)
If you have to buy supplies for this, the roll of aluminum foil would be cheaper to start with than a bunch of towels. Flannel sheets or whatever is cheap in the fabric store may be cheaper than towels as a source of long strip fabric.