No Need For Slippers In My Bathroom! I Have Under Floor Heating!
A friend recently fell in love with my bathroom after a nights sleep-over!
I have underfloor heating in there, and she just loved stepping out of the shower and onto a lovely warm floor! The heating was installed in the bathroom and the kitchen after we moved in, and I love it!
We originally had it installed when we moved into an old Victorian terraced house - with little space for a modern kitchen - and no discernible bathroom! The bath was sitting in a lean-to at the back of the property, with pipes running down the wall for taps and a creaky and gappy wooden door out to the garden!
We had to re-design the back of the house to fit a real bathroom and didn’t want to waste an inch of what space we had with radiators - so did a bit of research on our options for heating the 2 rooms.
I was very pleased with the result, and have not regretted it at all.
So, How Did We Do It?
Firstly, we consulted a plumber as we were needing to fit a new condensing boiler at the same time. He said that he had been fitting more an more underfloor heating systems in the past few years - and he even had it in his house too!
It’s really simple to do as well if you are laying a new floor - as we were - and you just need to lay enough flexible cable under the surface to create an even spread and then lay the floor as usual. We had tiles in the bathroom and bamboo in the kitchen - not a problem he said.
It also turns out that there are many other benefits to underfloor heating other than not needing to cover your walls in radiators when you really need another cupboard there!
The Main Benefits:
Where shall I start - there are so many?
Well, for starters it is more energy efficient to run this type of heating over conventional central heating, and the average home could increase efficiency of the whole system by between 10-25% - this can rise to around 60% more efficient in offices with high ceilings.
Think of the money and energy you could be saving - plus being warmer in your own home or office!
The main reason for the savings is because radiators heat the room by convection; that is all their hot air is forced out of the radiator and then it rises up the wall towards the ceiling. It only descends into the room after it has cooled slightly - and then heats your head while keeping your feet cold!
Added to this, it is standard practice to place radiators underneath windows to counter the draughts - but inevitably helps you lose heat out of the windows before it even hits your ceiling in the first place!
Also, the pipes leading to the radiators are usually running along your walls are boiling hot - losing heat as they go (well, if the pipes feel hot, then they are releasing that heat before they get to the radiators)! Finally, your radiators need the temperature of the water inside to be around 60-70 degrees to be effective - a temperature that can only be reached by burning gas and fossil fuels.
The exact opposite is true of underfloor heating. Firstly, the heat rises slowly out of the floor creating an ambient temperature and no draughts. It doesn’t move warm and cold air around the room, taking dust and allergens with it - it just creates a warm room and warm toes!
Secondly, all the pipes are under your floor so are only ‘losing heat’ up into your home - which is just where you want it. And, there is no risk of children or the elderly scalding themselves on the pipes or radiators - all the heat is safely underground.
And thirdly, underfloor heating can run at a much lower temperature, therefore can be powered by energy sources such as solar and both air and ground source heat pumps instead of burning coal, oil or gas.
Further Benefits:
There are other benefits to this form of heating other than just more efficient heating and money saving running costs, and they include:
Reduced Allergies - With no convection currents circulating around your home, you will have less trouble with floating allergens and dust.
Better Design - With no bulky, hot radiators around your walls and hallways, you can change the layout of your home to suit you - not to simply ‘fit’ in.
Reduced Maintenance - With no fiddly radiators and pipes to clean, dust or paint, you can keep your home clean and tidy - or even repaint it - without having to spend extra time, energy and resources working around these space-wasters!
Less Stress On Your Boiler - Running at lower temperatures will be better for the life-span of your boiler.
So, don’t put ‘new slippers’ on your shopping list for gifts - put ‘underfloor heating’ instead!
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November 13th, 2009 at 11:48 am
The only reason why radiators would not heat up your house properly, is if they were not sized correctly for each room and you dont have sufficient air circulation.A radiator stuck behind a couch will only provide about 50% of it’s capacity due to lack of air passing over the radiator surface.
It’s a bit difficult to heat up your bath towel with under floor heating, a nice heated towel rail looks good and will provide you with a hot towel coming out of the shower !
November 18th, 2009 at 5:05 pm
Under floor heating seems to be an excellent idea. Thanks for your extremely informative post. It sure sounds like a very useful, effective and efficient way to heat the room instead of going the conventional route. There seem to be so many benefits. An excellent alternative indeed! We run a global sustainability directory called Climatarians where we highlight such innovations.
November 23rd, 2009 at 4:34 pm
I’m not saying that correctly fitted radiators wouldn’t heat a room sufficiently - but you yourself hightlighted the key problem with them:
‘A radiator stuck behind a couch will only provide about 50% of it’s capacity’
What if that is the only place that the couch can go in the room? The family have to be colder or have the temperature higher to compensate?
And the warm towel thing? I’m not 100% sure, but there is probably an easy way to plumb a towel rail into the piping under your flooring.