What you should know about radiant heating in bathroom and kitchen floors
Radiant heat is a popular and comfortable way to head a room. It is used in many of the fancier hotels, ballrooms, and spas. The way radiant heat works is that pipes or wires are laid out underneath the floor of a room. When the pipes or wires heat up, the heat radiates out of the floor and fills the house. Because of the properties of conduction, objects and people in a room will be warmed by contact with the ground. This means people can feel warm in rooms that are actually quite cool. This is a great feature when you need to have the door or windows open.
There are comfort advantages to the use of radiant heating. However, it is quite expensive to replace an entire heating system with a radiant heating system. Generally, new homes are built with radiant heating rather than replacing an existing system. However, adding a radiant heating system to a room or two in your house is an affordable way to enjoy radiant heading. Two of the most common rooms to add radiant heating to are kitchens and bathrooms.
Hydronic and electric radiant heating
There are two different kinds of radiant heating, hydronic and electric. Hydronic heating systems use hot water, which is pumped through pipes beneath the floor of the house or the room. This system requires a water boiler and a water pump as well as the network of pipes used to move the water. The installation is quite involved and although the warming effect is lovely, the price of a one-room installation isn't that hot.
If you are thinking about using radiant heat to your kitchen or bathroom, you might want to consider electric heating. Electric floor heating works with wires that heat up underneath your floor. If you think about placing an electric blanket beneath your floor, you will have the idea behind electric radiant heating. Heated car seats use a similar technology. Basically, giant electric panels are placed the floor. The panels contain wires that heatup to warm the room.
An electric panel is relatively cheap and easy to install (or have installed). For a bathroom sized electric mat you will probably spent between $500 and $1000 dollars to buy the whole thing and have it installed. Once installed, the price of heating a bathroom will be about ten cents per day.
To add electric radiant heat to a kitchen will cost more because of the larger area involved. There are price calculators available online where you can enter your flooring type and dimensions and get an online estimate for cost in a matter of minutes.
How to maintain a radiant heating system
Hydronic and electric heating systems require different kinds of maintenance. If you have a hydronic system, you will want to give the water boiler or heater a visual once over at least once a year. Check the pH levels in the glycol system. As your system gets older, you will have to increase the inhibitors to keep the pH levels high. You will need to do a flush and re-fill about every 5 to 10 years.
You can also expect that your pump will only last about 10 years. Once this starts to go out you should replace it immediately. It will generally not be repairable.
Electric systems require much less maintenance. These systems are hearty and might last the life of your floor. If your electric system does go out call the installer or the manufacturer. This will not be something that you can take care of yourself. In fact, if your electric system goes out you will probably have to replace the whole electric pad since there are no independent parts.
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Tags: radian_ heating floors bathrooms kitchens electric hydronic floo_ heating boiler maintenance
