Unheated room too hot due to hot water and heating pipes running underneath it

Cécile

Hello,

We recently did a full renovation on our house, including new radiators and boiler (located in the utility room on the ground floor).
Just underneath the bedroom located on the first floor and just above the ceiling of the utility room is were all the pipes converge. That bedroom has parquet flooring. The pipes have all been insulated as per our plumber.
The issue we're having is that summer like winter that bedroom is too hot and the air is very dry. I once slept in it and it very quickly felt oppressing.
The floor is warm in places and the radiator is always turned off.
I've asked both our plumber and builder if they had an idea as to how to address the problem to make that room fit for sleeping and they said that there's always a room hotter than the other ones (but that's too much, really!). Their only suggestion is to open the ceiling of the utility room to lower the pipes, resulting in lowering the ceiling of that room obviously. There'd naturally be a cost to doing that but also no guarantee it would solve the problem, which they don't fully understand since the pipes are insulated...
So yes, I could live with a high-end humidifier in that room but it's not satisfying and is a hazard to my 2 young children.
Any other suggestions would be really helpful.
Thank you!

DZoro

Can you spray foam the floor joists above the pipes? Move air via fans out of the boiler room. Better insulation, or more of it on the piping.

Zman

Describe the room in a little more detail. How is it heated? Does it have exterior walls and windows.
Did you actually see the pipe insulation on the heat lines? Have you seen the mid floor insulation?

pecmsg

What R Value on the insulation?
I've asked both our plumber and builder if they had an idea as to how to address the problem to make that room fit for sleeping and they said that there's always a room hotter than the other ones Unacceptiable answer, maybe they will change there tune if the final payment isn't made.

Have the ceiling opened and inspected, if little or no insulation then someone in trouble.

nicholas bonham-carter

Is your system steam or hot water?
How could the room overheat in the summer? If the boiler makes hot water for washing, the pipes should not give off that much heat. Can you measure the temperature difference with an indoor-outdoor wireless thermometer? They can also tell you the extremes of high and low temperatures.
The reason they gave: ”always a room hotter than the others” doesn’t hold much water. I think there’s always one plumber who doesn’t know enough about heating!—NBC

rick in Alaska

I had the same problem on a job I did. Owner finally cut open part of the ceiling on the end of the joist run and had insulation blown in to give it more insulation. The room still overheated. He was convinced it was the heating lines, even though I told him it couldn't be that. I tried proving it to him by completely valving off the heating lines going to the bedroom and it still overheated.
At that time I finally proved to him it was not he heating system, but was heat migration from the living room. The living room was always on the hotter side, and since the bedroom did not have a door on it, the hot went to cold, and overheated the room. They never did put a door on it, just learned to live with it.
That is the problem with zoning. If you don't have doors closed to each space, eventually they are all going to be the same temperature.
However in your case, you might try having an insulation contractor blow in insulation in to the cavity.
Rick

Brewbeer

Can you post photos?

insulationsyd

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Cécile

Hi everyone, thanks very much for all your replies. I didn't know they were there until I came back on the site just now to double check as thought I would get email notifications with any reply (only so you understand I wasn't intentionally rude!).
I will go over each of your response this evening once back home, send additional info and photos.
Thanks again, really appreciate your input!

Cécile

Hi everyone,

I've taken a few photos to add to the story and maybe give you some of the information you were missing. Please see attached document. Happy to take more photos as needed.

Also, to answer some of the questions you asked:
- We have central heating, except for the kitchen dining which has underfloor water heating.
- The kitchen underfloor heating runs constantly in winter and is set to 20C (68F).
- We didn't see the pipes or the mid-floor being insulated, we were told aftermath when I started talking about the overheating problem. I trust our builder though and the insulation was part of the schedule of works.
- We haven't opened the ceiling.
- The room that is suffering has half a wall that is exterior, one wall shared with our neighbours, the rest is internal.
- In the summer the room was overheating too, in fact you couldn't stay in the room had the door stayed shut. The temperature was averaging between 26-31C (78.8-88F) but what made it hard to be in that room too is that the air was extremely dry, oppressingly. Having the door shut always makes it worse, in winter too.
- It is winter in the UK at the moment and the external temperature at the moment goes down to 0 to -2C (32 to 28F) in the night and the bedroom temperature is between 19.5-21C (67-70F) and doesn't seem to vary much between night and day except over the weekend with the heating running all day and washing machine and tumble dryer run more often, the bedroom temperature averages more 20.5-21.5C (68.9-70.7).
- There is no heating or water tank on from 8pm until 5am every day, except the weekend where the heating runs until 9pm.
- When at home, I often open the bedroom window to lower the internal temperature but it will go back up quickly once the window is shut again.
- Leaving the window vent doesn't seem to really help lower the room temperature strangely but you can feel a draft (it doesn't make sense that the temperature wouldn't go down when it's colder outside and the vent is open, does it?).

Thanks,
Cécile