Hi everyone,
This is my first time on this website and appreciate any help.  I am an extreme DIY'er with an engineering background.

I have recently bought a house from the mid 70's and it has all original radiant heating system.  It is a fuel oil boiler with all copper piping throughout the house and using baseboards with copper piping and aluminum fins.  Upgrading to better baseboard heaters worth updating? 

Switching to floor heating I believe placing PEX in basement under the wood floor? (I am Learning about the other type of heating systems by radiant heat). 

The house is 1700 sqft with a full basement ranch style house.  In north Ohio.  Nice thing is that the copper piping also runs through a wood burner in the basement since fuel oil is so expensive it is nice having an alternative. 
I plan on remodeling the house one room at a time and seeing if I can upgrade the baseboards and see an improvement in efficiency or just upgrade the trim  on the existing floor boards for appearance?

Since I already have the boiler, wood burner, and pump upgrading to floor heating worth doing?

We have been in the house for just over 2 months (Jan and Feb 2012) and the previous owners had the tank filled in Sept 2011 and we have gone through 420 gallons since Sept. so very expensive but next year we will be using the wood burner.
Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated and please excuse me if I sound ignorant since I am learning about radiant systems as I go.

Thanks,
Brad

What kind of insulation does the home have and how will you be upgrading it?

For the comfort factor, yes radiant floors are both efficient & super-cushy, but the efficiency aspect has no real economic payoff on a net-present value basis of the marginal fuels savings, give the considerable cost of the upgrade. (Not that it stopped me. :-) )

Radiator-type baseboards (cast-iron or euro-style steel ) offer far more comfort than fin-tube at a much lower cost than retrofit-radiaant, but also won't dramatically improve system efficiency in an cast-iron oil boiler.

From a cost/benefit point of view, in a N-OH climate installing a better-class heating & cooling ductless mini-split air source heat pump to handle the lions share of the heating load would likely pay for itself in 2-4 years on reduced oil use, even at 15 cents/kwh electricity. It's often cheaper and far less of a PITA than doing a large fraction of heating with bulk fuels like cordwood/pellets/corn. The same equipment gives you VERY high efficiency cooling in the humid OH summer too. Key to their efficiency is the inverter-drive fully modulating compressors and no duct head to overcome, no air-handler driven outside air infiltration either. In N.OH you can expect an annualized heating COP of 2.5 or better- even higher if you use wood for the lat-night/overnight hours when the heat pump runs at lower efficiency due to lower outdoor air temps.

A blower door tested round of air sealing & spot insulation is also usually a sub-5 year payback even with cheaper fuels like natural gas or heat-pump.

If the foundation is not insulated, putting R5-R10 rigid XPS or unfaced EPS or fiber-faced iso (no foil or plastic facers) against the foundation wall, seams sealed trapped in place by a 2x4 studwall with UNFACED R13 batts will reduce fuel use by at least 10%, in some instances 20% , for less money than retrofit radiant, but its still going to be 5+ years to NPV+.

So it sort of depends on your design goals here. Radiant is nice to live with, but if fuel/cost savings in double-digit percentages would only come from other factors. Bumping up the indoor temps a few degrees for comfort and heating with a mini-split is cheaper to implement and a much higher ROI.

Thank you very much for your responses. I am planning on insulating the attic better as well as close off some air leaks that are existing this spring. The basement I need to seal with foam insulation or caulking between the floor joists along the perimeter of the house and than stuff it with some insulation.
I just checked my electric bill and it is 6.2 cents per KWH. If I heat with electric they will actually put me on a lower rate for the winter time. This is a home that we see ourselves hopefully retiring in so I want to remodel and do it right the first time and not have to worry about it. I am 29 years old so I have a ways to go. I just briefly looked at the mini split air source and that looks interesting. If I could I would like to keep the radiant system but just make it more efficient and upgrade the radiant heaters them selves to something more pleasant looking. I really do like the radiant heat especially when we heat with wood but with fuel oil it will be at least $300 a month at today's prices.
If I switch to an electric water heating source will that be cost effective?
The mini split looks attractive as well since we do not have air conditioning in the house but the nice thing is that we are at the top of a hill and from what the neighbors say it is very windy all summer long so that is a big plus.

Again thanks for you responses

6.2 cents per kw
yikes, that is a great fuel price, 1 gallon of oil =148000 BTU or 43.34 KW . Your electric cost is about $2.25 for 148,000 BTU.
So it is logical to simply swap the boiler for an electric one, or put in a by pass and keep the oil as back up.
If you like the radiator look, the copper fins have a good bang for the buck and in your case they are paid for plumbed right in copper,
I would consider spending my $ on insulation, keeping the hydronic as it is and place electric a boiler in line.
You will need electrical panel capacity, 18-20 kw (70,000 BTU ) 2 60 amp breakers will probably get you in the right neighborhood.
Alternately you could place a small electric boiler in line if you did not have the breaker space and use the oil as assistance when needed.
Dan

I believe I have a 200 amp breaker box with two open slots. I would have to see if it could handle 2-60 amp breakers. Looks like I will just concentrate on insulating. Currently most of the attic has two layers of 6" pink insulation except for over the bathrooms it is one layer. The other issue I have is the stove vent is open to the attic and I can feel a lot of air leaking through there. I was thinking of putting a 4" hose on it and take it to the side of the house and vent it with a vent with flaps. I will start remodeling next year and I just really think way ahead and have it all planned out before I start but the insulating part I will start now.
Thanks,
Brad

Whatever your costs are heating with resistance electricity (electric boiler, hot water heater, etc), it'll be something on the order of 40% of that (a 60% discount!) with a mini-split. Even at 6 cent/kwh there's a strong economic rational for heat pumps over resistance electric. Setting up the baseboards to run off an electric HW tank as the backup on a mini-split would offer a lot of margin for the extreme-cold though. So at 6 cents/kwh heating with a mini-split would be cost-equivalent to heating with 2.4 cent electricity in an electric boiler.

Wind on a hill doesn't remove summertime moisture (the latent load), which is considerable in OH.

Fix all the air leaks that are obvious, but DO dig deep for a round of blower door testing and remediation before putting up the finish layers on any renovation, since fixing air leaks after the gypsum siding and paint go up can be expensive, where as hitting it when there are more options can be downright cheap.

Dan/Blueridge: Where can I buy some of that 148KBTU/gallon oil? Around here we can only get that cheap 138KBTU/gallon stuff. ;-)

We don't have access to 100% efficiency boilers either- they're all stuck in the mid-80s. So we only get 85% of 138K, or ~117.3KBTU/gallon as heat inside the house, or about 34.4 kwh-worth for our $3.50. That makes heating with $3.50 oil like heating with 10 cent electricity in an electric boiler.

At 6 cent electricity you're getting a 40% discount to go to resistance heating, relative to oil which is pretty good...

... but with a mini-split you'd be getting a ~75% reduction in the heating bill relative to oil, and you wouldn't have to upgrade the electric service to handle the peak load.

Looks like the mini split is the obvious upgrade and down the road upgrade the boiler to electric to it off. Of course though first thing is first and fix all the air leaks and than do a blower test and than start the remodeling process. First year in the new house will simply be buttoning up and insulating.

Thanks for your guys help it has been great.
I assume there is no energy credit for buying the mini split system?
Thanks,
Brad

There are a few things to think about with the mini split that are different than radiant. More noise from air movement (inside and out). That ugly stuff on the wall! They may be efficient but they have there downsides.

Posted By bradmiller29 on 12 Mar 2012 05:47 PM
Looks like the mini split is the obvious upgrade and down the road upgrade the boiler to electric to it off. Of course though first thing is first and fix all the air leaks and than do a blower test and than start the remodeling process. First year in the new house will simply be buttoning up and insulating.

Thanks for your guys help it has been great.
I assume there is no energy credit for buying the mini split system?
Thanks,
Brad

It depends on your  state and local subisidies, and whether the subsidy still applies when switching from oil to electricity as your primary heating fuel.  I recently had a 1.5 ton mini-split installed at my mother's place in WA, and there was $1200 in direct rebate subsidy on a $4400 installed cost. But she had previously been heating with an electric hot-air furnace + wood stove.

My brother lives in the same town as her, with the same electric utility, but heats with propane furnace + wood stove. He's thinking seriously about dropping a 2-ton mini-split into his place, but since his primary heating was propane that subsidy is not available to him but a lesser subsidy for it's high-efficiency air-conditioning may apply (he's checking into it.) FWIW they're paying about 2x what you're paying for electricity.

In my own state of MA there's only a $500 subsidy for mini-splits, and only if it exceeds 15 SEER on cooling efficiency. But  at current oil prices they pay for themselves in under 3 heating seasons if you get one with a decent heating efficiency despite electric rates averaging 15 cents or higher.  That may change soon.

There are significant federal subsidies for ground-source heat pumps ("geothermal" or "geo" to some), that may or may not run at higher efficiency than a better-class mini-split, but it's 10s of thousands to install rather than a few thousands. There are design risks too, unlike mini-splits where the engineering is already done- a cookie-cutter system rather than full custom the way geo systems have to be.  Air behaves pretty much like air everywhere, and the only relevant parameter on the air end of an air-source heat pump is the local air temperature at which it needs to operate, which determines its ultimate output and average efficiency.  But groundwater temps and thermal conductivity of soils vary widely and the system needs to be designed to the site-conditions. There are many geo systems out there costing 4-6x as much as mini-splits running lower average efficiency than a mini-split, which is why I tend to encourage people with $25-35K to spend on efficiency to put the bulk of it into making a high-efficiency building bringing it's heat load into the range that can be handled (mostly) by mini-splits rather than a full-custom high-efficiency heating system.

Posted By jmagill on 12 Mar 2012 06:31 PM
There are a few things to think about with the mini split that are different than radiant. More noise from air movement (inside and out). That ugly stuff on the wall! They may be efficient but they have there downsides.

The wall-tumor aspect can be visually screened off in a remodeling effort, or ceiling units can be designed in.  Rare is the home that can't accomodate it on the aesthetics if one considers that aspect during a rehab. (Beautiful they're not though...)

If you make the building tight enough the interior air blower is usually going to be about as loud as a refrigerator during the coldest weather, but with inverter-drive blowers they back off to a whisper at average temps. 

The outdoor units are GHOSTLY quiet compared to old-school heat pumps, due to scroll compressors that have rolling action rather than a reciprocating action.  Its possible to have a normal-volume conversation standing right next to a 2-ton mini-split compressor running at mid-speed- with any bird/wind/traffic noise you may not even notice that it's running unless you're standing right in the air flow.

Good information everyone I really appreciate the help.
Another question I have is what is the best way to route a stove top vent outside with as little air loss as possible same with the bathroom fans? Since the attic has two layers of 9 inch insulation would you suggest going another layer or will that be adequate?
Another thing that I will be doing as I upgrade each room is to buy new windows since they are originals from the 70's not really efficient at all.
Again thanks for the responses.

Dana you are right, my error on oil BTU.
Good point about cooling load, perhaps, but considerable more work/cost than an in line electric boiler.
And there is the comfort of radiators, but who enjoys the humidity in summer?
We are luck in America, so many choices.
Dan

Swapping out the fin-tube for panel radiators and installing an in-line boiler is the same order of magnitude cost as installing a 2-ton mini-split/multi-split and bumping up the indoor temp 2-3 degrees buys quite a lot in the way of comfort.

If the electric service needs upgrading to be able to accommodate peak loads the electric boiler option would be more expensive to install. A 2-ton miniisplit is ~$5-5.5K. A 2-2.5-ton 2- head multi is ~$6.5-7K.

A no-frills electric boiler is going to run ~$2-2.5K installed, assuming you don't swap the fin-tube for radiators, and don't need to bump the power service to accomodate the boiler. For the difference it installed cost you get higher efficiency, and air-conditioning. AC + dehumidification as a separate system would would be more than the cost-delta between a bare-bones electric boiler install and a mini-split unless you went with 2-3 window-shaker units and 70 pint dehumidifier drained into a sump.

Keeping the fin-tube and running it a hydronic loop off the hot water heater as the Hail Mary auxilliary heat backup for those hours/days when the mini-split doesn't keep up with the load may make sense, and would probably cost less than $2K above of the water heater.) A 6kw water heater would likely be able to deliver more than half the design heat load of a house that size once it's tightened up, so when it's 0.001 percentile -10F outside and the mini-split can only source 60-70% of the load having ~-3-6kw (10-20KBTU) of reserve from the water heater should be able to handle it. Alternatively, a few of 1500W mini-radiator style space heaters can keep a few rooms cozy enough for those "cold-snap of the decade" periods.

The 99th percentile design temps for N.OH are in the low to mid (but POSITIVE) single digits F. Most 1700' houses can be retrofit-tightened & insulated to under 30KBTU/hr @ 5F by bringing it up to current code-min (or a bit better, where it's cheap to do so.) A 2.5-ton Mitsubishi H2i puts out ~32KBTU/hr @ +5F, as can several Fujitsu & Daikins. At -13F (-25C) the Mitsubishis still put out ~70% of the full rating, so a 2.5 ton is still putting out more than 21K @ -10F, and if the heat load was ~30K @ +5F, you're looking at a heat load of only ~25% higher, or 37.5K, for a shortfall of ~16K (which is less than 5KW.)

Of course this is just an example- doing careful heat load calculations as part of any building upgrades to decide which upgrades make sense and which don't is necessary before picking a heat source. If the siding is coming off there's a pretty good comfort-rationale for adding at least R10 foam to the exterior under the new siding, even if there's minimal or no payback on heating & cooling savings. The low hanging fruit and potential will be different for every home & project, but there is ALWAYS something. Using pretty-good freebie tools like DOE2 or BeOpt to model the energy use of the house and cost-compare different building efficiency upgrades is useful when looking at extensive rehabs, more useful than Manual-J type heat load calculators:

http://beopt.nrel.gov/

http://doe2.com/

Posted By bradmiller29 on 12 Mar 2012 07:20 PM
Good information everyone I really appreciate the help.
Another question I have is what is the best way to route a stove top vent outside with as little air loss as possible same with the bathroom fans? Since the attic has two layers of 9 inch insulation would you suggest going another layer or will that be adequate?
Another thing that I will be doing as I upgrade each room is to buy new windows since they are originals from the 70's not really efficient at all.
Again thanks for the responses.

The insulation type and the quality of the installation makes a difference on whether more is needed in the attic.  If it's low-density fiberglass batts  a 3-5" of overblow of cellulose would improve actual performance well beyond the extra R11-R18.  If if the second 9" layer is blown celluose or blown rock wool, you might just defer the decision.  With low density batts they lose a large fraction of their R value when the top side is more than 25 degrees colder than the bottom side due to air freely convecting through the fiber.  A top-coating of 3"+ cellulose blocks those currents, restoring that original ASTM C 518 labeled R to the batts, and adding it's own insulating value.  In summer it helps too:  Fiberglass is somewhat translucent to infra-red, so the highest temp in the insulation layer under a hot roof deck ends up being a couple inches below the top, and higher than the attic air temperature(!), so you're effectively insulating against a higher temperature with less insulation.  Cellulose is opaque to IR, and the top surface of the cellulose becomes the warmest layer in the fiber, and convection-cools to just a bit above attic-temp.

Houses with vented attics, even 1-story houses have a real "stack effect" infiltration drive in winter, pulling air in a the bottom of the house, and sucking it out the top. Before adding any insulation to the attic, take the time to air seal every electrical & plumbing & flue penetration at the ceiling with suitable caulking (acoustic-sealants tend to be the best) or one-part can-foam.  To air-seal around flues you need to use sheet-metal and fire-rated caulk, but the flues themselves can be insulated with R13 unfaced rock-wool batts in direct contact, at which point the blown-goods can be in direct contact with the rock wool.  Recessed lighting fixtures can be huge air-leaks, and you may consider getting rid of them, or replacing them with gasketed air-tight insulation-contact rated versions. Alternatively cardboard boxes with 3" of clearance to the fixture, with seamed taped with housewrap tape and sealed to the ceiling with can-foam would air seal them and allows you to insulate right over them. Insulating and weatherstripping the attic access is also important, and sometimes difficult.

When you think you've nailed the air sealing at the attic AND the basement, and any obvoius places in the middle it may be time to blower-door test it to find & fix the other 100-300 square inches of air leak that you had no idea was there.

If the windows are double-pane and relatively tight, low air leakage, installing very tight exterior hard-coat low-E storm windows with  is an option that would bring performance up to better than code-min at a fraction of the cost of replacement windows.

If the windows are really coming out for replacement, consider which ones need to be operable vs. fixed (non-opening).  Fixed windows have FAR less air-leakage than any window that relies on weatherstripping for air sealing.  Also, casement and awning windows are inherently tighter than single/double-hungs or sliders, and offer a larger ventilation & egress cross-sectional area.  The wind-driven infiltration of a house at the top of a windy hill is going to be much higher than the average house, so window tightness is more critical for you than for most.

Also, take a look at the orientation and overhangs, etc. before choosing windows. If you have reasonable exposure between SE<=S=>SW  it may be more energy-efficient (even if it adds a bit to your peak loads) to go with a lossier U-value if it has sufficiently high solar heat gain coefficient (SHGC).  RESFEN is a reasonable freebie tool for doing the quick & dirty analysis, but if you have a lot of south facing glass a more details passive solar analysis is in order.  You definitely DON'T want high SGHC windows on the E & W sides, since the summertime solar gains from rising  & setting sun are a load, not a help.  High SHGC is OK on the south side in your latitude since the summertime sun is high enough that a large fraction of the heat is reflected on the exterior due to the angle, but during the winter more gets transmitted in, lowering the heat load on your house.  It's trickier if the house isn't roughly aligned to the cardinal directions though- a SW facing side is tougher in particular, since overheating can be an issue during the late summer/early fall with the lower sun.

Ohio code-max U values are pretty loose at U0.35, (achievable, even beatable retrofitting a cheap '70s U0.5 double-pane with a low-E storm window), but from a comfort and window-condnsation point of view it's worth setting your own upper-limit to U0.30, and shop around for reasonable options in the ~U0.25 range or even lower.  A U0.25 window is effectively R4, and you can stand next to them reasonably comfortably even on a windy 10F day, and you won't have many days when indoor humidity condenses on the glass.

When installing the new windows, DON'T just wad shredded fiberglass insulation around them to seal them to the framing the way your grandma did back in the day.  Fiberglass does not air seal and barely insulates without good air barriers on each side.  One-part expanding foam both seals and insulates.  Buy a foam-gun that screws onto the 18-24oz foam cans,  and buy a few cans (or even a case) of low-expansion foam designed specifically for windows & doors.  Once you've used the real tool you'll never go back to cheapie box-store throwaways.  The valving on the foam guns are at the tip, the flow is adjustable with a knob on the gun,  and you can leave the gun on the can for literally months without it clogging.  With the 12-16oz box store cans with the cheap  soda-straw applicators you pretty much have to use it right away (although a section of coat-hanger inserted into the straw after every use can give you at least a couple of partial uses before it's hopelessly clogged and you have to toss the rest.)  If you have much air sealing to do you end up making up the cost of the gun in lower foam costs by the 5th can.  You get a lot more foam per can, and you waste less of it, getting less of it on you, other materials, your clothes, etc.

Thank you very much Dana a lot of good information. My house is on 5 acres at the top of a high hill surrounded by farm fields, but there are trees right outside of the house in all directions nice large mature trees. The sides of the house go north and south and there are two three season rooms one in the front and one in the rear that have screened windows but instead of glass they are plastic. This also protects the front and back doors as well as some of the windows in the back. There are only 9 windows on the house that actually has contact to outside air the rest of the windows are part of the three season rooms. They are Pella double paned and in good shape they I can remove the pane that is on the inside of the house so they are not very efficient windows.
Luckily no recessed lights just a few ceiling fans mounted from the ceiling. Only question I really have is on the flues are you saying that the insulation can cover the opening going in the attic and still let the air through or insulate around the flue and direct it out the side of the house and just use a vent with flaps?? (Please excuse my ignorance really have not dealt with them very much).

Flues need 3" clearances from combustibles, but masonry flues are usually allowed to contact framing where it passes through floors. You can use sheet metal trimmed to fit to seal any gaps where it passes through ceilings/floors etc, and seal the seams & edges with fire-rated caulk or fire-stop foam. To keep the clearance between flues and non-fire rated insulation you wrap the flue in rock wool batts where the flue passes through the attic insulation. (Rock wool is made from iron-making slag, and is completely non-flammable.) R13 rock wool is designed for 3.5" deep cavities, so a single wrap provides the necessary clearances from the non-rated fiberglass or cellulose. If you can only get it with facers, put the facer on the outside, not in contact with the flue.

On the windows, (even the 3-season room outer windows) low-E storm retrofits are a real possibility for a low-cost high-performance upgrade. The removable-pane Pellas are already something like U0.40-U0.50, and a low E storm would cut it to about U0.28-U.30, which is better than code-min. Under a current DOE program qualified vendors offer a discount for "volume buys" of 20 or more, but because of their box-store high volume distribution Larson extends that discount to buys of as few as 6 windows, if you click on the link for a printable voucher on this site:

http://www.larsondoors.com/storm_windows/vpp

If the existing 9 outer windows are in reasonable shape this is about the most cost-effective window upgrade going. If the plan going forward is to heat with high-efficiency heat pumps like mini-splits, wih your very low electricity costs payback on full replacements is likely to be longer than the anticipated lifecycle of the replacement, whereas the payback & performance on low-E storms is still very reasonable.

If you still plan to replace them rather than add storms, the same DOE program offers discounts for volume buys on U0.20 windows too. See:

http://www.windowsvolumepurchase.org/

http://www.windowsvolumepurchase.org/search.aspx?ct=1&sr=37

Going with U0.20 windows would cut your heat loss from the windows with the removable pane Pellas by about half (compared to cutting it by ~1/3 for the low-E storms).

The stove vent I am talking about is the vent above the stove that just vents to the attic. The stove is electric.
Sorry if it seems like I am asking the same questions over and over again.
I will have to see how much new windows are and if they are in my budget the storm covers maybe the better option overall.
Thanks,
brad

Posted By bradmiller29 on 14 Mar 2012 08:47 PM
The stove vent I am talking about is the vent above the stove that just vents to the attic. The stove is electric.
Sorry if it seems like I am asking the same questions over and over again.
I will have to see how much new windows are and if they are in my budget the storm covers maybe the better option overall.
Thanks,
brad

I'm not aware of any clearance restrictions from combustible for cooktop ventilation.  Be sure that it has a backflow preventer or damper that's only open when the fan is active though, or it's potentially a rather large air leak.  Sometimes uninsulated vents passing through unconditioned attics have condensation issues in winter, but insulating the stack usually takes care of it.  Even an R6 wrap would probably work in OH.

A proper heat load after adding a foot of cellulose to the attic. Electric boiler with ODR. Sub-floor radiant with plates if the heat load allows. Comfort first, then off the the mini-split as Dana suggests.