Radiant heat both upstairs and downstairs in a remodel.
Upper floor needs additional subfloor support to remove flexing (currently just ¾ inch T&G). I plan to install hePex tubing into the new plywood subfloor. My idea is to loosely copy quicktracks but use whole sheets of plywood. I’ll need to either dado or route the tubing runs. (I’m a gluten for punishment what can I say).
Lower floor slab is not in yet so my question here is whether to install the hePex into the slab or not. I’m kind of partial to installing the tubing above the slab. I’ve read stories of guys who have problems with their radiant in-slab and had to jackhammer the slab to fix it (not something I would like to do). My alternative to in slab would be to install the hePex over the slab similar to the upstairs method.
Any suggestion or words of caution on either?
Location of project is near San Francisco bay area (no real freezing problems)
Replies
I'm soooo not an expert here so hopefully they will weigh in soon, but it seems crazy not to take advantage of all that thermal mass in the slab for heat. It is so much more efficient that way. I'm very inexperienced in this area but it seems to me that if you use good pipe (we used Kitec), you won't have to jackhammer it out.
Also, the installation of the pipe was easy....really easy. The place we bought the kitec from layed it out in auto-cad for us using our floor plan. All we did was lay it out and clip it to the 6" x 6" mesh.
Be sure to insulate under the slab.
John,
Put it in the slab. PEX tubing is very strong. Cut off a 6" piece and try to drive a 16 penny nail through it. Very difficult. I've put 8 or 10 miles of tubing in slabs over the last ten years without a single problem. An in-slab install is the easiest and the mass of the concrete makes for a very even heat. Definitely do not forget to put at least R5 under the slab.
Kevin