Radiant snow melt

Bob Daros

After sizeing a driveway for snow melt (9000' of tubing and 1,100,000. boiler) I can't get a good answer on driveway material. What is best and what other options can work?
I have done other home radiant jobs, but never done a driveway. The customer is serious about the job but concerned about the cost of the driveway if it is to be all concrete. It is about 7-8000 square feet.

kevin coppinger_4

well I have never....

had the joy of doing one...however from the post here concrete would be best....that's not to say that you can't do it w/ asphault. When doing that you MUST have cold water flowing through all the tubing constantly for obvious reasons...kpc

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Jerry_7

what are the obvious reasons

Why do you need cold water flowing through at all times for asphault?

Mark Eatherton1

He meant...

during the actual laying of the asphalt. It keeps the tubes from being melted by the hot asphalt.

The material around here is concrete. There are two things concrete is guaranteed to do. One is lye there, and the other is crack.

Done correctly, cracking can be controled to a minimum.

ME

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Bob Daros

would the asphalt flex with the loaded oil truck or some other heavy vehicle on it. Will it damage the tubes under it.

Mark Eatherton1

Not so long...

as the sub soil below the asphalt is properly prepared and compacted, settling shouldn't be an issue. One problem with asphalt is that you can't put XPS insulation underneath it.

We insulate every job we do, unless the HO requests that we not insulate, then we get his John Henry on a peice of paper saying he requested said elimination...

And we havve had people request that we leave it out. Seems certain pave stone driveway contractors don't trust the insulation to keep their bricks from shifting. Beauty over function...

ME

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