How to Install Radiant Heat Flooring
There are many ways to heat up a home. Some people use space heaters and radiators, but spreading the heat unevenly around a living space can be quite uncomfortable. To save on heating bills and optimize the heating capacity of your home, you may want to consider radiant heat flooring.
What is Radiant Heating?
A conventional radiator or space heater works by heating the air from a particular location, and spreading the heated air across a space. While conventional heaters are useful, air heated from just one source or direction cannot spread evenly across a room. You may need more heaters to keep a space warm, but the room can get very uncomfortable in a hurry.
Radiant heat solves the problems brought about by conventional heating by placing the heating source inside the floor. Instead of heating just one space and spreading heat unevenly, radiant heating keeps all the parts of the room warm through a series of heating tubes and pipes embedded directly in the structure of the room.
Radiant heating has many advantages over conventional heating, including the following:
Comfort. Radiant heating ensures that the heated air circulating around the room maintains its temperature all throughout the space.
Cost. Conventional heating can be costly because of the energy needed to heat up a space evenly. With radiant heating, you can save much money on your winter heating bills.
Maintenance. Radiant heating is a very low-cost way of heating a space. While it can cost a lot of money to install radiant heating, you don’t have to maintain or replace the components as much as you would a radiator or a space heater.
Floor Types
Radiant heating works best on the following flooring material:
Laminated wood. Unlike conventional plank flooring and parquet, laminated wood evenly distributes weight better than conventional flooring.
Hardwood. Some wood types like chestnut, walnut, cherry, and teak do not warp from moisture and heat.
Floating floors. Floating floors are designed specifically for radiant heating. Instead of building the floor directly on top of the subfloor, a gap is created to allow the heating tubes to be installed.
Types of Installation
There are three ways to install radiant heating on a floor:
Stapling: In this method, staples are used to secure the pipes to the subfloor.
Frame: A frame, usually made of wood or other material, is used to secure the pipes on the subfloor. The floor is then built on top of the frame.
Masonry: Masonry is the most common way to build radiant heat flooring. The subfloor is propped up by joists, and the floor is redesigned so that the floor is insulated by both gypsum and fiberglass. The tubes are then under the new subfloor, and the floor is installed.
Radiant heating is usually installed as the house is being constructed, but you can have professionals disassemble your existing floor and install new radiant heating devices. With radiant heating, you can save a lot on your heating bills and give your home a new sense of warmth.