Half a croissant, on a plate, with a sign in front of it saying '50c'
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Secundum tepidus fabrica wotsit

  (+13, -1)(+13, -1)
(+13, -1)
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Dear Bakers

Today, I have been decorating a new bedroom for my daughter. I ache like I've not ached in a good long while and have paint splatters everywhere but there.

In the course of today's painting, I had plenty of time to engineer solutions to my decorating woes with particular focus on the age old issue of getting rid of wallpaper from behind a fixed radiator without removing it -- Secundum tepidus fabrica as the latins would have said.

The wotsit is a hyper-porous calcium carbonate (or silica) framework or skeleton that is capable of absorbing large quantities of water. Once the wotsit is fully quenched, it's placed behind the radiator so that it touches both the warm surface and the wall. As the radiator heats, the water held in the mesh warms too, and gently soaks the wallpaper, easing the glues. It's no effort!

After an hour or so, remove the wotsit, place a bucket under the radiator and squeeze out the wotsit at the top of the radiator. The warm water will wash the wallpaper away, caught in the bucket below.

[Note to 'Bakers: This is decidedly, firmly not an idea for a warm sponge behind a radiator. Uh uh, no way. That's a ridiclously under-engineered idea.]

Still not a warm sponge.

jonthegeologist, Oct 31 2010

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       I -hate- warm sponges, but this idea is something else entirely. Ita vero, a work of classical genius. [+]
pocmloc, Oct 31 2010
  

       I'm not sure I really understand it but (a) I'm just glad you're doing the painting instead of me and (b) I'm a sucker for Latin. Bunnius maximus.
hazel, Oct 31 2010
  

       I think it involves soaking a very large lagomorph in warm water, & then jamming it down between the radiator and the wall. The water losens the glue, and the kicking action of the clawed hindlimbs removes the wallpaper.   

       [+] in atonement for the above.
mouseposture, Oct 31 2010
  

       who looks behind the radiator anyway? if I didn't like you so much, I'd bone you for a waste of good baking time.   

       btw, how do you re-paper behind the radiator?
po, Oct 31 2010
  

       I like the name
dentworth, Oct 31 2010
  

       I applaud the general concept. +   

       Some years ago, I solved a similar situation by papering around the radiator, then mounting a trimmed reflective panel slightly larger than the radiator so as to effectively cover up the old paper and reflect the IR heat away from the wall.
csea, Nov 01 2010
  

       [po] //btw, how do you re-paper behind the radiator?//   

       You kidding? That's the easy part.   

       Couldn't you place a mirror behind the radiator? Reflect both the heat and the lovely image of the radiator; two radiators, in effect.
Boomershine, Nov 01 2010
  

       A "wotsit" sounds like something you're not supposed to feed after midnight, or something.   

       I'd be very careful hanging around that radiator, if I were you. Scary, very scary.
blissmiss, Nov 01 2010
  

       Excellent idea, much easier that closing the valves, undoing the nuts at either end of the radiator and the bleed valve at the top, draining the radiator and then lifting it off the wall, probably.
hippo, Nov 01 2010
  

       No bun due to lack of reckless indoor use of combustion.
8th of 7, Nov 01 2010
  

       Who wallpapers these days? Just paint radiator-shaped designs on the walls, and celebrate the antiquity of your heating system.
RayfordSteele, Nov 02 2010
  
      
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