Hello Forum Participants!

Our interest/intention is to install radiant heating in our old house (100 years), located in northern NJ, which is in pretty good shape. The steam boiler is gone so we need to decide what to do and get make decisions shortly.

The house has about 1900 sq. ft. on two floors. Instead of just buying a new steam boiler, we think a gas boiler/high efficiency water heater to distribute the heat via new flooring/tubing may be the way to go. We would like to remove the existing radiators as they take up valuable space in the small rooms, especially upstairs. Nice flooring to replace some of the beat-up flooring is an expected benefit to the project too.

The flooring component of the project is a vexing part of our design planning at this point. Would the existing hardwood floors have to be removed for a new subfloor/tubing and new engineered flooring? Also there is an upstairs bathroom with an existing radiator, but tearing up the existing tile/install new pex, etc. isn't something we would like to do now.

Some of the other forums on this site debate electric/hydronic approaches to the radiant distribution. We're leaning toward hydronic but if an electronic solution makes sense, we would like to understand the factors that could apply to our situation. The new flexible electric mats/strips  seem to offer a simpler installation vs. the hydronic requirements, however the low temperature hydronic configurations appear to be the standard approach for most houses.

Has anyone been involved in a project like this? Any information or advice would be appreciated!

Unfortunately (or probably fortunately), I won't be able to do much work myself due to the timeframe and the work load at my job.

Thanks, Scott

Hi Scott:

Since we only install electric, I will only speak to it.

If you want to use a line voltage product (i.e. wire mats) it MUST be in a mortar or thinset of some kind. Just installing it over your parquet flooring will not work unless you are planning on pouring a mortar. Since you are planning to use it as your primary source of heat, as Badger mentioned, a Heat Loss Calculation is manditory to correctly design any radiant system, whether electric or hydronic.

The only electric system that is compatible with all wood flooring installations with out any concerns is a product called Zmesh. It can be installed directly under any type of floor covering without effect to height. It can be nailed through anywhere without effecting the system or the element itself. You can install it under tile, carpet, solid or engineered wood, wide or short plank.

As with all in-floor radiant installations, water or electric, the main concern you should be keeping in mind when installing solid hardwood is that there is no moisture input to the areas that it is installed in. The heat and dry winter air will cause the wood to crack and/or shrink so you will need to humidify the space to maintain the manufacturers required moisture content.

Also keep in mind that radiant heat always "goes to the colder area first". If you install radiant heat in a floor over a basement that is not heated, you will loose a considerable amount of the heat generated downward if you don't insulate VERY well.

That's just a nutshell. If you have any more questions, don't hesitate to post them.

Yup, my mistake. I thought I read that you were looking into another similarly named electric radiant product to Easyfloor.

Good luck!