plonk

with a bit of luck and good weather the roof should be going on our extension tommorow so i was wandering what experience if any, has anyone had with underfloor heating or am i best just to carry on with central heating ?

Dracoro

If you have it done, have it done PROPERLY and PROFESSIONALLY as it'll be a bugger to access if it goes wrong Nearly EVERY house will have problems with heating at some point. Many have simple solutions, many not. What are you covering the floor with? Floorboards that can be opened up to access all the pipework?

RON

We have underfloor heating in the whole house, up and down.... it would depend on the size of the extension as to wether i would advise ot or not.... if you have a room with a lot of outside walls, sometimes the amount of pipe in the floor isn't enough to cope with the losses ..........

Apart from that, we find it amazing, no matter where we are in the house it's the same temp allover.... mind you, we have 11 thermostats aswelll....

edited to add, i laid over a mile of pipe in this house on my own...... the pipe is one piece from the manifold, right round the system till it gets back to the manifold the other end, each 'zone' is one length of pipe. no joins, no risk of leaks....

like this....

SCOsazOBY

Underfloor heating is a big NO NO!!!!

Its the worst thing ever, costs a lot to run, takes ages to warm up and takes ages to cool down

In this busy day and age where we like to come and go and want gadgets that are faster and faster to help ease our lifes, then use another form of heating such as radiators or a fan heater

RON

And your experience of this is....???

Christ

Id say a big Yes, Yes!!

We have it upstairs and downstairs too, and find it great, particularly downstairs where the pipes are in a concrete screed...

As for response times, you shouldnt let the concrete cool down below a set temperature, that way response times are lowered and efficiencies increased.. It does take a while to get everything set correctly though...

A well designed system will cost a similar amount to run as radiators (possibly less) but you will always have a warm house, its a much "nicer heat" (difficult to explain), and no radiators everywhere you need to put furniture..


Did someone say fan heaters

Edited to add pics after seeing Rons!

RON

We have ours under timber downstairs aswell as upstairs, i wish we had had a screed, but, i'm not sure wether it's more or less controlable with a screed or wood.... the wood doesn't hold the heat the same as a screed would, can't decide if thats good or bad though.....

Underfloor heating rocks!

SCOsazOBY

Self explanitory really seeing as i posted it is expensive to run, takes ages to heat up and ages to cool down

SCOsazOBY

Just another option to consider

Ah and thankyou for removing the "uneducated" part of your post

I personally don't like it but you guys have fitted it yourselves and are obviously proud about it thats why you took pictures

Christ

It'll prob be more controllable under the timber (i.e. quicker response), however I think the screed makes for a more efficient system.. Both great though

RON

So, you haven't got it in your house then....????

SCOsazOBY

No, one of the reasons i moved into a central heated house

I suppose i could be biased as i do like the heating on 28*C

Christ

lol no worries, it seemed a bit harsh when i read it back... I think you'd be pleased with yours too if it was properly set up..

SCOsazOBY

lol on the plus side you save a fortune in not having to buy slippers

abbiesdad

waste of time buy yourself some new slippers

RON

So, why is that that the developers put it in their own homes, but radiators in the houses they sell?? cos radiators are cheaper to install, but underfloor is better....

CLSII

We have under floor heating in our conservatory......it is absolutely fantastic ..I can't recommend it highly enough. Doesn't cause draughts like convection radiators either. Anyone who criticises it obviously hasn't got a system like ours.

I only wish I could put it in every other room.

I'd give it 20 out of 10.....illogical but true

CLSII

Oh and it's really cheap once it's in too D

CrisPDuk

It's actually much better for your health too. Any doctor will tell you that the majority of the sore throats & coughs experienced over winter are due to blazing hot central heating radiators drying the air in houses too much. Underfloor heating is a gentler & more even warmth.

I'm told also by people that have fitted it, that most of the problems associated with it are (as usual) down to bad installation and the screed being too thin, rather than any fundamental problems with the systems themselves.

kbsub

We had under-tile heating installed in the kitchen last year , and I think its brilliant , set the thermostat at 60 C and its just right , definitely recommended

Dracoro

One place I would have it is in the bathroom. All tiled bathroom floors are freezing in the morning without underfloor heating not matter how much radiator heating there is.

richardg

i'm about to put elec underfloor in the hallway, kitchen and conservatory (on different thermostats of course). just want enough heat to warm the tiles as we have rads anyway

we've never built a new house with underfloor heating as far as i am aware. always used rads, even in commercial buildings (except where there is an air handling unit). we haven't shyed away from it for any particular reason other than it's not really the "norm". great idea, but i'd like to speak to someone who's had it installed and running for about 5 years with no problems and a notable decrease in heating bills before we start altering our standard specification for new homes

Gordo

what about electric underfloor (thinking about fitting it in a bathroom), as opposed to the water based ones being talked about here?

davegtt

Slate tiles in our bathroom but theyre nice and warm if the heating has been on for a while but there is quite alot of pipe work underneath them for the bathroom radiator its downstairs where its fully laminated and the kitchen floor being tiled where I need it. Bl00dy dog attacks your feet if you leave your shoes on or wear slippers so I have to live with cold feet

T4molie

Just had it installed in the bathroom (all tiled) - wouldn't be without it now

Added bonus of having toasty warm feet in the morning when you're on the can

SJ_Skyline

Having the bathroom redone very soon and underfloor heating is going in.

I was surprised at how inexpensive it was - under £100 for 4 square metres!

Simon K

There's two types.

There's one where you lay pipes, concrete over, you have zones + manifolds. There's the other type were you lay a fabric like sheet with elements over the floor, tile adeshive over it, laying floor tiles on top.

Type one is the best, but takes time to heat up, not as simple to just do i.e. needs design and considerations but a very good system. Type 2 is dear to run, easier to lay but you have to be careful as movement in the floor is worse which can cause cracking in the tile grout.

Again, you really need to measure the heat loss of your room, exterior walls, lots of glass, really do make a differences and will leave it cold. I totally gutted my house and rebuilt it, put a new heating. plumbing, roof, electrical system. However, I totally underestimated the heat losses and my house is freezing due to lots of glass, big rooms. Im still having to put more and more rads in. (www.myson.co.uk)

So, learn from my ***** ups. Never trust the sliding scale measuring thing, rads are cheap so make sure you have some good high BTU producing ones. Make sure your boiler can handles the required output. Also, dont buy screw fix under floor heating, poor quality.

If your going for unfloor heating, over a wooden floor ?? make sure you use a thick ply first, using screws every 2 inches to ensure no movement at all, then use a wood / movement happy type adhesive (normal powder mixed with a special milk fluid), laying the floor heating elements in to it. I would then use a epochy grout afterwards.

£120K / 2 years later my house is finished, I can now bore away about tiling, damp, plastering, roofing, heating, plumbing, :-)

SBK