Radiant Floor Heating Troubleshoot

Steve Garson_2

From my personal experience, the room with the cathedral ceiling may need baseboard for the real cold days.

The heat loss calcs don't always take into account the blockage of heat radiation from parts of the floor covered by carpet, throw rugs and stuffed furniture.

Harvey Ramer_2

I have been called in to troubleshoot a Radiant Floor heating

system. The installer has 3 rooms with dramatic heat loss differences not only on the same manifold but also has them on the same loops. The homeowners are fussing because their Library feels like a Sauna and their beautiful Great Room (complete with a cathedral ceiling and a gable full of windows)feels like an igloo when the cold west wind blows. I think if I reinstall the tubing and keep all the loops to their individual rooms and install Thermal Actuators so I can have each room on a separate Thermostat it may fix the problem. I am a new on the field and it is a high dollar home so any helpful tips will be appreciated.

tim smith

The tubing may not be able to heat the high ceiling room.

Make sure to run load calcs first before taking on a reinstall.

Harvey Ramer_2

Thanks I will run the calcs.

Harvey Ramer_2

The room does have a fireplace. It only has only the gable wall

exposed. The actual Radiant load is calling for 17.2 Btu/ft/hr. Would it be advisable to step this up to 20. I have hardwood flooring.

Mike Thomas_2

Leaky Windows

Sounds like the windows are leaking. Blower Door test will tell you. Will also firm up your heat loss numbers..

kpc_54

fireplaces

are huge heatlosses... maybe some air tight doors for it.

Harvey Ramer_2

Another thing that raised a question in my mind is that the zone

calls for 2.7 GPM and there is 5/8" Multicor S/R lines 50'feeding the manifold. Does this tubing support that flow rate with 130 degree water?

heatboy_21

Is the radiant...........

........joist bay, gypcrete or something else?

Rich L.

Flow

2.7 GPM through 5/8" pex is no problem.

Harvey Ramer_2

The Radiant is joist bay. It is one of those systems where they

tried to get room control by using suspended tubing some places and heat emission plates other places.