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I was wondering if anyone has an idea how to cover the corners of a base heater. My granddaughter has just started walking and she keeps falling down. I am so worried she is going to hit her head or eye on the corners.

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    Heaters are rather dangerous to "cover" -- it's probably better to put a fencing of some sort around them so that the heat can flow and the granddaughter is kept safe by not being able to get near. Oct 24, 2014 at 4:29
  • We used stacks of newpapers/books, chairs tipped on their sides, and pillows to build "fences" to keep our kids out of the kitchen when they were first walking. This strategy worked much less well with the third child, since his older siblings constantly demolished the fence and made a game out of him "escaping"... but it was terrific for a single kid :)
    – Acire
    Oct 24, 2014 at 11:15

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This is a very good question.

I think you might be able to find some product you can use year-round in many of the larger baby stores, like Babies-R-Us.

During the months that the heaters are not working, there are corner cushions you can buy and self stick to corners. This is a picture of Prince Lionheart Cushiony Corner Guards:

wedge shaped cushion made to fit three sides of a corner

If you look at them, I think they would be fairly easy to make out of thin foam padding or heavy cotton batting (which you can buy in a large fabric store). The problem comes when winter comes. Maybe someone else will have a better idea.

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    I think this is an excellent solution, and I don't see a heating hazard as long as the corner guard is relatively small. You could probably cut out a useful shape from a pool noodle or similar item you already have that can be partially sacrificed. Oct 24, 2014 at 9:57
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    I can confirm that heat shouldn't be a problem. I just measured the temperature of the corners of my baseboard heaters, and none of them is more than 15 degrees F above room temperature.
    – Mark
    Oct 27, 2014 at 7:05
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My wife and I largely resisted any of the corner guard things. It was simply not possible to cover every possible edged surface and in the end we just ended up covering none of them. We're approaching age two and no brain trauma or major blood loss so it seems to have worked out okay.

If you're really feeling like you need a cover for those things when they're going to be warm I am reasonably confident you can just use any old edge cover. Baseboard heaters don't get as hot as radiators - it's why they have to cover so much of the room rather than the 1-3 feet a radiator does. Even then, though, the standard advice is that if your cat isn't sleeping on the radiator then it's set too hot. If you're not scalding skin you're not going to harm rubber.

Your biggest issue is likely that they will get warm enough to make the adhesive less effective. My solution for anything like this always comes down to nylon pull-ties. If they're not long enough to go all the way around the heater you can daisy-chain them.

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