Radiant around pool deck

Mike Lampkin_2

I have a customer who originally wanted to pour concrete
over the tubing around the pool deck,but now has changed
his mind and wants to use a sand bed over the tubing with
a layer of flat field stone set into the sand bed. Is this
a really bad idea? I had originally planned to use 110
degree F to warm the deck, but I'm not sure as to how the
heat is going to transfer through the sand bed.Any help
greatly appreciated.Thanks.

steve_38

wow

never seen or heard of that being done.
i hope you get some help with that... i know the sand at the beach gets pretty hot from the sun lol... i guess it could work, it would also depend on how thick the stone is on top of the sand. good or bad idea, how about taking a really small loop of tubing and circulate the temperature desired hot water through it and put sand over it and the stone, maybe just try to test it out if possible first.

Tombig_2

Wirsbo

Wirsbo has design data for pavers on sand.

Constantin

Hah!

The recovery rate on something that thick should be interesting. Reminds me of a job I read about (IIRC, Dans Radiant Book) where the tubing was 6" below surface in a concrete slab (manufacturing environment). The recovery rate was months, apparently.

Uni R

Sand at the beach

That got me thinking about when the sand is so hot you can't walk on it. I am always surprised by how little you have to dig down before the heat is tolerable. Sad to say, but it seems like too effective of an insulator to be putting between the tubes and the surface, even if it's a fairly thin layer.

hr

Seems like

the sand would make a mess in the pool? Surely some would sift up through the cracks and adhere to wet feet and end up in the pool?

And I agree it is not a great conductor, however it has been used in paver applications on many ocassions. I remember the entire Deer Valley ski lodge deck is a brick paver installation for a snowmelt install. A pre sloped deck was poured with floor drains installed, then sand and brick pavers installed.

It actually provides a nice drainage path for the melt waters. Kinda tough on ski boots however, the coarse finish on the pavers would grind the plastic toe and heels off rather quickly. Which in turned caused binding malfunctions.

hot rod

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Mike Lampkin_2

Sand vs Concrete

I just found a great article by John Siegenthaler in the
last issue of PMMAG (under radiant forum), which discusses
the sand vs concrete debate.John explains the thermal
conductivity of sand as being 1/6 th, compared to concrete.
He also shows a comparison of the sand slab only having a
43% output to that of the concrete slab. Now that I have
some facts, I should be able to convince the customer to
going back to the original plan.Thanks for the responses.