DIY Wall Radiant Panel?

pete0007

I'm looking for a wall radiant panel to supplement heat in few sections of the house where we could not do floor heating. I searched for off the shelf panels but most of them would not fit well in the wall space/size available and are at least 2" deep.

So I was toying with idea of making one with combination of 1/2" and 1/4" copper pipes and Ts. Main motivation is to keep the depth less and make the shape/dimension fit the wall space.

Is it worth undertaking this effort or make do with an off the shelf radiator?

How to calc the btus for the copper pipe so as to adjust the length?

Thank you.

hot_rod

bare copper without fins or a cabinet to induce some convection currents will not give you much output. What temperature supply do you have?

I build a few with copper and welded steel for bathroom towel warmers, the work well for that as the towels are in contact getting conduction transfer.

I have some bare tube heat loss tables, somewhere?.

hot_rod

This table is used to calculate heat loss from bare copper tube in DHW recirc, I think this will give you some starting point.

So if water temperature is 170°, air temperature 70° 170-70 = 100

On the bottom axis 100, 1/2" copper 35 BTU/ft