C/I wall rads on ceiling

Joe Furfaro

I am a homeowner and I first want to thank everyone on this forum for all the information that you offer.
I have created a loft style attic and was hoping to hang some old traditional C/I wall rads on the ceiling. (flat side up)
Have a couple of reasons,1) think they will look good against the open joist ceiling and thought that they may provide some sort of radiant heat. The flat roof has been insulated to a r-20 value from above.

My contractor disagrees. He is in the process of installing a new condensing boiler (Vitoden) and says the heat will just accumulate in the ceiling. The ceiling height is 11 feet.
The two rads are both 5 sectional and measure 24" by 65".
All my other rads in the house are traditinal C/I
Any thoughts or opinions on this would be greatly appreciated.

Wishing everyone Peace in the New Year

Steamhead

The only time you'd want to do this

is on a steam system where that was the only place you could mount the radiators above the boiler's water level. If you're using hot-water, it's far better to mount them low on the outside walls. This puts the heat where the people are.

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jerry scharf_2

might not work

Joe,

The idea of radiant ceiling heat is a fine one. People who have it love it and it is largely independent of the height of the ceiling.

The problem is that traditional radiators only put out a part of their heat via radiation. They still count on convection for a fair amount of the room heating. You need a fair anount of square footage of radiant panel to heat the room, and those radiators don't have near what I would expect. There are cases where an entire floor is not enough square footage to heat a room.

I would expect that your contractor has done a heat loss calculation and is trying to tell you that you can't get enough heat out of such a situation to heat the room. I can assume from the numbers that the walls and floor are even less insulated than the ceiling (R20 isn't that much.)

Ceiling mount radiant panels tend to be large, modern extruded aluminum panels with copper tubes in the back to pass hot water.

jerry

Weezbo

might want to bring the insulation in the roof up ro r 40 or so

and persue that means of holding the heat in ....a bit longer...

Joe Furfaro

Thanks for your replies everyone. Will go with the traditinal wall mounting I'm sure.
Again, big apprciation for your help.
Joe