radiant, staple-up or suspend

joekats

I am installing a radiant system, under 3/4 wood,which is under 1/4 luan, under laminate, I am 1/2 finished, now my plumber friend, says that I should have suspended it, and not stapled it up , citing concern for the wood buckling. I have read a lot on this and thought I would have no problem, whats the real answer, I can still retro fit if I have to

kevin

it depends....

if you have done homework(heatloss, checkw/ flooring installer & moisture content) It should not be a problem. How are you controlling it? what water temp. are you running thruogh it? What will the floor temp. be? What /how much insulation are you using underneath. What are you using for tubing? The wirsbo CDAM book addresses a lot of these concers. kpc

John Felciano

Staple up

When you say you stapled it up do you mean you attached the bare tubing to the underside of the subfloor?Or did you use some type of aluminum plate or track?

If you did staple it up without track you may have hot spots where the tubing is in direct contact with the floor and cooler spots where the tubing sags away from the floor.Pex has a very large expansion rate so the only places you are likely to have floor contact is where the mechanical conection is.

Regardless if it's suspended or attached without plates or track you need to insulate with a reflective insulation and a 2" air gap.Your water temperatures will be higher than if you used track and be sure your floor surface temperature doesn't exceed 85*.

Good luck!

To Learn More About This Contractor, Click Here to Visit Their Ad in "Find A Contractor"