Anyone out there got underfloor heating

[rgriffiths]

Might be a bit of an unlikely option but does anyone have experience of underfloor heating on a boat?

[nipper]

Largo had it installed in the shower room!

 

But i don't think it ever worked properly, and I have made sure that it will never ever work again!

 

Thats one of the two things that don't work on this boat.

 

The heating in the shower room and Samy the Cat, she just sleeps!

 

Nipper

[Dyertribe]

I've got underfloor heating but only in a house!

[David Mack]

Might be a bit of an unlikely option but does anyone have experience of underfloor heating on a boat?

 

Trilby Tim has:

 

http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=19521&page=3#entry1621685

[MtB]

Underfloor heating is an excellent concept for a NB as cold air at floor level is a common complaint from boaters in winter.

 

It isn't the perfect solution though as the heat loss from a NB is high, and the exposed floor area is small. To heat a boat effectively I'd guess the floor would need to be maintained at about 40 degrees C, far too hot for comfort.

[John V]

I have a small area of "sort of" underfloor heating. The heating in the wheelhouse is a large industrial type radiator (12 x 22mm tubes 2metres long) mounted under a wooden grating at the steering position, standing at the wheel in the winter the warm air drifts up your trouser legs in a most delightful fashion

 

I should add that it ain't so good at warming the rest of the space, I reckon the efficiency is pretty dire.

[magnetman]

Largo had it installed in the shower room!

 

But i don't think it ever worked properly, and I have made sure that it will never ever work again!

 

Thats one of the two things that don't work on this boat.

 

The heating in the shower room and Samy the Cat, she just sleeps!

 

Nipper

I have been considering putting underfloor electric heating in the bathroom and laying non slip tiles over. We're on the mooring with electric for winter these days anyway.

 

Maybe it's not worth it ? What was the problem with yours Nipper? Was it electric or a wet system ?

[MtB]

The point of bathroom electric underfloor hearing is not to heat the room but to make a tiled floor warm and comfy to walk on in bare feet.

 

I installed it in my bathroom at home and had to fit a radiator too as the heating effect on the room was negligibe.

 

 

(Edit to clarify a point.)

Edited August 9, 2015 by Mike the Boilerman

[nipper]

I have been considering putting underfloor electric heating in the bathroom and laying non slip tiles over. We're on the mooring with electric for winter these days anyway.

 

Maybe it's not worth it ? What was the problem with yours Nipper? Was it electric or a wet system ?

Good morning,

 

Yes, it was electric.

 

Having bought Largo nearly three years ago, I looked at the underfloor heating with a view of getting it working, I spent 2 hours checking this and that , then decided that it wasn't ever going to work and if it did, would only use mega amounts of precious electrikery!

So decided to disconnect the wires and chop them off with a sharp Chisel at floor level. Job sorted and no worries!

 

My take on this type of heating is, it maybe ok if your connected to shore power, but it would probably be expensive to run.

 

If you want your tootsies to be warm when in that room, then buy a bathroom rug to stand on!

 

I must also say, that the microwave oven, that came with the boat was also launched into a skip on the same day and never replaced!

 

I'm not much help really but I'd stick to my Multifull burning coan nuggets and with a small USB desktop fan to woft some of the heat to the back of the boat if necessary. Largo is 70ft. We never turned our central heating on last winter at all!

 

But we were CCing and moved every two or three days all winter!

 

Nipper

[Justme]

This is not my specialised subject but a brief think about it leads me to this.

 

Under floor heating in a building relies of heating up the thermal mass in the floor as a heat store to keep the temp stable.

 

As the thermal mass under a boat is huge (all that bothersome water) & moving away it will be a heat sink not a heat store. You will need a thick layer (think 4-8") of insulation under the heating to stop losses to the water. I doubt you can afford to loose that much height. Even just the bilge air gap is going to cause issues. Especially with condensation (warm air cold surface).

[RLWP]

OFF-TOPIC

 

This underfloor heating, does it work in houses? I know it's very fashionable in those expensive make over programmes, is it actually a practical method of heating

 

Richard

[MtB]

OFF-TOPIC

 

This underfloor heating, does it work in houses? I know it's very fashionable in those expensive make over programmes, is it actually a practical method of heating

 

Richard

 

 

Yes, provided:

 

1) your room has a large exposed floor area not covered by furniture.

 

2) You house is very well insulated.

 

I've yet to see a house with underfloor heating everywhere (but they exist apparently). It's usually those enormous kitchens some people have were it works best, as there is cooking heat too.

 

I'd be very wary before commiting to it as adding radiators should it not work well enough is one helluva palava, when the floors cannot be lifted due to the underfloor heating.

[RLWP]

Carpets? Laminate flooring?

 

Richard

[MtB]

Strangely, said not to make any difference last time was I looking at the subject ten years ago.

 

Not sure I believe it though.

[Justme]

Only if you keep the house at a constant or very slowly altering temp all day.

 

You cant rapid heat or cool.

 

Leave one for a week with the heating off & it can take 2 days to heat back up fully.

[David Mack]

Carpets? Laminate flooring?

 

Richard

As I understand it stone or ceramic tiles are best, timber laminate is OK, thicker timber not too bad, but carpet, especially thick carpet will significantly reduce the heat output. Edited August 9, 2015 by David Mack

[Dyertribe]

We have underfloor heating on the ground floor of our house. Upstairs we have radiators (not our choice that was how we bought it).

 

The underfloor heating is set to 16 degrees C all year round as it is the warming of the thermal mass that takes the time and energy.

Each room has its own programmer so the room can be set to achieve the temperature you require when you know you will be using it, for example we want the kitchen warm for breakfast at 7am on weekdays and 9 am on weekends. Similarly whe living room(s) will want to be at 22 degrees in the evenings and possibly all day at weekends.

 

We have all hard flooring downstairs, a mixture of tiling and laminate flooring, we have occasional rugs for decoration.

The laminate is ok but not ideal, the plan is to replace all the flooring with the same tiling throughout but this is a big. Disruptive and expensive job which we won't consider until we need to replace the kitchen.

 

It is oK to have carpet, but it should be of a low tog value.

 

Now that we have learned to regulate it properly I would recommend it in a new build, I would combine it With a ground source heat pump which would reduce the fuel bills further and I would build with a beM and block first floor and have underfloor heating upstairs too.

 

I would recommend using an expert installer not just the builder laying the base to lay the piping, this was not the case in our home but one of these companies is based just up the road from us and has been invaluable in teaching us how to use the system and balancing the system for us.

 

Alyson

[Detling]

My friends boat has a water pipe coil/zig/zag under the bathroom floor over a thick chunk of foam insulation. this runs as a rad off the central heating and is also in parallel with the coil in his calorifier works a treat he claims he also has a rad in the bathroom to heat the air and the warm floor is good but would not keep the room at the 20 deg C demanded by his boss.

[David Mack]

I would combine it With a ground source heat pump which would reduce the fuel bills further

A ground source heat pump will reduce the amount of CO2 pumped out to the atmosphere to heat your house, but won't make much difference to your fuel bills (unless your heating is all electric). A heat pump typically puts out around 3 times as much energy as it takes from the mains. But the electricity it uses costs abour 3 times as much as the gas or oil you would use otherwise for heating. So not much difference in running cost, but a substantial capital cost for the system.

[Robbo]

I'm planning to add UFH and Under Wall heating to my boat using the pipes in insulation method from a drip fed diesel stove and diesel heater (mikuni).

 

My barge is 12ft wide and have deep bilges so insulation under the floor isn't an issue. The pipes in insulation with a spreader plate is quicker at reacting than the screed method, which can be better or worse depending on how you use the boat.

 

Still planning to have a towel radiator in the bathroom, and hidden fin rads in the bedroom, these will be gravity fed from the stove.

[Trilby Tim]

I like it, it's in the front half of my boat, in the showeroom and bedroom area. A couple of inches of sprayfoam over the baseplate, pipes clipped to that and then concreted over and the floor's the same height as the rest of the boat. Everyone carries loads of ballast in the bottom of the boat anyway, it makes sense to use it as thermal mass to store heat. I don't think it wastes excessive amounts of heat into the water, it seems to hold heat reasonably over night. Also on the occasions the canal has frozen up I've not noticed any difference in the rate the ice melted around the front of the boat (with underfloor heating) to how it melted round the back (without underfloor heating), and I was looking out to see if I could see a difference.