Icynene and plates

bruce pirger

Hey hr,

Geez, I know its obvious...but becareful with the stack so close to that stuff! Not sure of the chemistry, but it seems like it must burn....Is that insulated pipe? Looks like it...still gets pretty hot.

joel_14

Icyneen and plates

Redoing my dads beach house We would typically do climate panel as it's was better but... I've got some plates and tube hanging around here already. He's going to Icyneen the whole place and we where talking about the floors has anybody done that right over the plates?? FYI I don't care about an air space gap that some would put under plateswith fiberglass.wW've measured temps with and with out gap and seen no appreciable difference so lets not go there. I'm interested in the Icyneen only . Thanks!!!!!!

John Felciano

What

This may be a dumb question,but what is icyneen?Is it some type of sprayed on insulation?

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ChrisL

Concerns

I have no firsthand experience, but I would be concerned about rubbing and noise between the insulation and plates+tubes. Also make sure there is no adverse chemical reaction between the foam and pex.

Chris

joel_14

john

No dumb questions my friend ,but I've been known to give dumb answers!!! Icyneen (sp?) is like the spray in exspandy foam you use to seal around doors or whatever it is unreal !!! takes the place of fiberglass bats. It seals every nook and cranny around the framing, electrical boxes etc. Best insulation I've ever seen. we've done some houses with it and it's neat they spray it on it exspands past the studs then they saw it flat.

hr

Takes heat!

I used it in my shop. Here is a pic of my wood boiler flue. It gets pretty hot. Especially whenI burn cardboard I asked the insulator to stay 6" away, oh well.

Check with the manufacture for temperature ratings, and chemical compatiabilty.

hot rod

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kevin

wouldn't the..

icyene prevent the entire width of the bay/pipe to conduct the heat from the plate to the part of the floor that it is not in contact with? To me it would be cutting down on the efficiency of the transfer. You say you don't care about the air gap, but i thought that was an integral part of a staple up ,regardless of using plates or not? kpc

hr

Swampy Mike

used ridgid foam to insulate between the plates, against the floor. I think> Maybe he will share the results.

hot rod

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Mike T., Swampeast MO

Two radiant loops off common \"mainfold\"

Both for small baths, one internal, one with exterior wall w/2 windows.

3/8" copper tube in Thermo-Fin. Tube length and amount of plates on both loops nearly identical. Both have same number of bends and floor construction is identical. Installed reverse return.

Constant circulation, reset on system. Ball valves only means of control--valves before the "manifold." Supply temperature varies from about 90° to about 130°.

EXTREMELY low flow--can't measure it exactly but calculated <½ GPM for BOTH.

Internal bath floor UNINSULATED. Exposed bath floor has 3/8" styrafoam between tubes/plates and 5/8" styrafoam tight between joists directly against first layer. Attached with cheap latex caulk. Very little air space in this insulation.

ON COLD START insulated floor extracts nearly every available BTU from the system for MANY hours. (Return temp essentially room temp.) Return temp on uninsulated floor is appreciably WARMER. As the floor temp of the insulated floor rises, so does the return temp (delta t gets smaller).

Once things approach equilibrium, the delta t of the insulated floor remains significantly higher than that of the uninsulated. BOTH though produce nearly the same floor surface temperature and BOTH result in nearly the same increase in room temperature--about 5 degrees above the temp of surrounding rooms. This temperature rise varies little with changes in either outside temp or inside temp.

Floor surface temperature does vary a bit with supply temperature but not as much as you would expect--average tops at about 88 degrees in both baths (this when outside temp is below design temp). Both have a temperature variance across the room of about 4-5 degrees.

Sorry to keep using "about" and "around". I have some exact numbers, but given they nature of the system they are only valid for a very specific set of inside/outside/supply temp numbers. Since the "real" rooms of the house all use TRVs on iron rads the flow is certain to be changing as well. The thing I find amazing is that while all of these variables change constantly, the end result stays quite constant within a large range.

Both of these baths are on 2nd floor. Ground floor under remodel and currently very cool--about 55 degrees.

I'm left with the idea--at least for copper in Thermo-fin--that the greatest heat transfer is achieved by keeping convection in the joist space to the ABSOLUTE MINIMUM, i.e. making as little air space as possible.

This contention is further verified by an ASHRE study (I don't believe it's been released yet and I have very limited data). In this study bare pex "staple-up" was compared with pex in Thermo-fin. Two insulation methods were used. Both used rigid insulation. One placed the insulation as tight as possible against the heating assembly, the other two inches away.

When the insulation was moved away from the pex-in-fin, two things happened. The time to reach equilibrium increased greatly AND the ultimate temperature of the floor decreased--not a huge amount (around 8%) but it DID decrease. When the insulation was moved away from the plain pex staple-up, the time to reach equilibrium increased wildly but the ultimate surface temperature DID NOT change. I'm not aware of other data elements of the study but it seems to concretely demonstrate that when using heavy plates convection not only slows the process, but reduces the ultimate transfer. When using plain staple-up it seems to show that you want as little air space (but still some) as possible.

I have a much more detailed (but not scientifically verified) writing on the effectiveness of different forms of joist bay heating--particularly as modified by convection in the joist cavity. Write me if you're interested.

Mike T., Swampeast MO

From an Icynene FAQ section

Will Icynene burn?

"Yes, but it will not provide fuel for the fire. It is rated as a Class 1 product similar to the fire rating of many other insulation materials. Very few foam products have ever achieved this Class 1 rating. It can be applied directly to electrical wiring with no concern about over heating or corrosive action."

I've also heard of this stuff being recommended in OLD home renovation as a way to stabilize less-than-perfect structure.

Only problems I've heard of have to deal with bowing door/window jambs--but this is with ANY expanding foam (and even those overly zealous with fiberglass). Cost though is quite high and it's not available everywhere.

Can't find mention of the actual temperature where it burns, but it seems certain to be higher than water in a hydronic system.

Only potential problem I can envision using it underfloor with PEX in plates (other than very difficult service access) is from expansion of the PEX. Don't think it would/could harm anything but it might make noise if temp changes rapidly. Smooth plastic moving against rigid foam would likely make an obnoxious squeek. But then again the Icynene seems to stick to everything so it may be utterly silent. Just don't know.

Stef Davis

alternate insulation

I am going to be using RFH in my new house and had planned to use the one inch board (I thought it too was icynene) with foil facing up toward the finish side. Is that as effective and easier to maintain the air gap?
Stef

Stef Davis

I'm new to this board, and so, posted my message the wrong way. I'll try again.
I am planning on RFH in my new house, pex with plates, and was going to use the one inch insulation board (I thought it was icynene) with foil facing toward finished surface. Is that an adequate way to maintain the air gap, and is that stuff as effective, inch for inch, as the foamed icynene?
After subsequent plumbing and wiring I'll put fg bats below that.
Also, are there opinions as to quality, efficacy,etc of Radiantec's system, vs. using the more complex and sophiticated systems such as Wirsbo advocates?

Bob W._2

1\" ridgid board?

Sounds like polyisocyanurate, not icynene. I believe icynene is a proprietary foamed in place product.