Radiant System Relative Output

Supply House Rick

This thesis submitted to the Faculty of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science In Architecture.

That's some pretty heavy credentials.

Rick

Supply House Rick

Helpful information when selling e true energy efficient system

This is from a study at Virginia Tech University...

*Based on 110'f water temperature

Rick

WV EGBERT_2

?

Rick,

Was the Raupanels tested @12" o.c also to fairly compare with Warmboard @ 12" o.c. Is it the assumption that all methods had the same amount of insulation below?Finished floor r-values above Why no extruded plates in joist tested?
Seems like a flawed test, imo. Until more details are given, the graph by itself means little. What happened to methods 1 and 2 ?

Devan

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Supply House Rick

Devan, Here's the independent testing

Let me know what you think...

Rick

Glenn Sossin_2

misleading interpretations

Apparently there are no coverings involved - not the real world situation, a potentially mis-leading picture to the untrained reader.

A useful graph would have been with various R-Value coverings, say at R.35 R.90, R 2.0 and R 3.0 . These would allow for some useful interpretive data to simulate laminate floor, 3/4 wood, and a range of carpeting.

The Rehau panels would naturally score very high because of the aluminum across the entire surface - its a great conductor. Not knocking it, its just a logical conclusion. Wouldn't really need the test to figure that one out.

What was the R-Value of the material underneath? Partial information can be very misleading to people who don't know how to interpret what they are looking at. At what time point were these measurements taken? Was it where the rate of heat transfer is steady both upwards and downwards? Now you have a good idea how it would perform.

This graph would be great if it had the output numbers based on different R-value coverings.

Who sponsored the test - not who did it? That would be interesting to find out.

None-the-less thanks for the post. I've added the graphic to my collection of great information from the wall.

The back up documentation was just posted while I was writing this. I am going to read over. Thank you again for a great post of information. I look forward to learning something from it.

My $.02
Glenn

singh

Rick

The test was well documented, and it appears every attempt has been made to achieve accuracy.
However, being that it was sponsered by rehau makes it suspect,
I do find a few flaws, mainly with the warmboard test and the results. Which of course has been glanced over.
That being said, rehau appears to be a very good product and I can't wait until I have the opportunity to install the rehau panels. And if they were available to me at a very special price ; )


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Unknown

this study is total bunk.

the person who did it was a student, and acknowledged himself that it was flawed.

it has been discussed on this board several times.

DennisU

I have to disagree...

I've read the study and commented on it at length in a previous thread - all in all a good start to developing a testing method but flawed in many respects, most of which the author acknowledges and suggests solutions for.

I don't want to knock the author because from the paper he seems pretty bright. But I would like to point out in general that I wouldn't consider those credentials anything close to "heavy". #1, he has an architecture background, not engineering. #2, while Masters students tend to be pretty capable having shown the desire and ability to continue school beyond the undergrad level, this might be only a year or 2 after his undergrad degree with no real-world experience in between. I cringe when I think of some of the work I did when I was a year out of school.

Again, I don't want to pick on the guy and I think intrepreted correctly it is a useful study. However, if I was going to use such a study for any design, I'd want the participants to have extensive field experience. Or at least an engineering background.

I've been on the industry side of masters/undergrad thesis projects several times, and the work is always heavily influenced by the engineers on the industry side - after all, they are setting the goals, providing a lot of the information, and of course the funding. I'm not saying that it was unduly biased - I think it's very likely that Raupanel does indeed have the best output for a given temp of the systems tested. The issue I have is that they take what is essentially a student project with acknowleged flaws and then let their marketing department run with it as gospel data.

badgerboilerMN

The numbers look reasonable to me. I don't know how floor covering would change the output. It also seems that any one of the products would serve the vast majority of new home designs I look at save the "big glass" homes I design out west.

Higher output means lower water temps. but once your condensing, the ModCon is happy and so am I.

MA