Living with carpet and pad over RFH
Have done enough research on radiant floor heat to conclude the best way for me to accomplish would be “sandwich” type using aluminum fins, sleepers, and pex tubing on top of subfloor, with tile or hardwood over that.
DW, however, has her heart set on carpet and pad in bedrooms and at least extensive area rugs if not carpet and pad in great room. Tile in bath and entryway, hardwood in kitchen-dining room.
I know all this about carpet and pad being insulators, higher temperature water probably being required under carpet, etc….but some of you certainly have successfully gotten through this dilemma.
Is there a certain type or method of carpeting (type of pad, perhaps carpet W/O pad?) that lends itself more to RFH? Should I plan for fin tube radiators in the carpeted areas and tubing under the tile and hardwood…knowing that the radiators will require a higher operating temp and a return water mixing system for the right final RFH temp on the tubed areas?
Ball-park heat loss calcs indicate I’ll need 30 – 40 BTU/sq ft output on the coldest days (MN winter, large glass on South side of great room, R-19 walls, R-30 ceilings, etc etc) with 1632 sq ft heated area.
Edited 7/14/2003 3:11:51 PM ET by johnnyd
Edited 7/14/2003 3:12:17 PM ET by johnnyd
Replies
johnny,
Good of you to consider this now, before the installation.
Carpeting can work fine over RFH. Usually, though the carpet pad can have more of an impact on the total r-vallue than the carpet itself.
For the carpet, here are some rule-of-thumb numbers foor varying thicknesses...they're not linear, since carpeting isn't uniform in its makeup:
1/8"
R-0.6
1/4"
R-1.0
1/2"
R-1.4
3/4"
R-1.8
1"
R-2.2
Those numbers are for synthetic carpeting. Increase by 50% (multiply by 1.5) for wool carpeting.
For the carpet pad:
Group Two pads have a higher density and a lower R-value, and may be more suitable for RFH. If yo go with rubber, ake sure it's a high quality rubber. The manfacturere will usually offer a lifetime guarantee on a good rubber pad. Lesser quality rubber pads have a lot of clay filler in the rubber, and increased temps (RFH) can make the pad brittle or crumbly over time.
Cushion
Density
Thickness
R-value
Thanks, Mongo.
This will give us alot to go on. I'll give DW the project. Gave her the windows to spec out...she did well, and is starting to realize that there is more to it than just looks and color when specifying methods and materials. One way, maybe, to help a marriage get through this HO GC project.
Johnny,
The best way for your marriage to survive the HO GC process is to always give into your wife and acknowledge her superior taste in all things. :-)
If only I could get my husband to buy into that. :-)
Good luck! We'll be doing carpeting over RFH and we were told it would work as long as we were careful about our choices. We are doing gypcrete which we were told would work better with carpet and our high ceilings.
Paula
always give into your wife and acknowledge her superior taste in all things. :-)
I've tried that. Fortunately, we've compeleted several other projects where NIETHER of us was right, and both ended up paying the consequences. We get a little closer each time, though, almost to the point where we need to point out our mistakes to visitors.
Should start a thread called "Marraige survives HO GC house"
" I'll need 30 - 40K BTU/sq ft ouput"
I hope that is a typo or that you are really a mid-east oil barron and hve a fuel oil tanker just to deliver oil once a week <G>
yeah, I should have dropped the K.