I'm looking to replace the radiator in my upstairs bathroom and I'm
considering under floor heating.

Is it possible to remove the radiator and attach a long length of
plastic piping in its place and coil this under the floor? Would this
give the same affect as under floor heating?

Cheers

On 04/08/2008 11:23, tvmo wrote:

I'm looking to replace the radiator in my upstairs bathroom and I'm
considering under floor heating.

Is it possible to remove the radiator and attach a long length of
plastic piping in its place and coil this under the floor? Would this
give the same affect as under floor heating?

Think "cat on a hot tin roof" ...

On Mon, 04 Aug 2008 03:23:08 -0700, tvmo wrote:

I'm looking to replace the radiator in my upstairs bathroom and I'm
considering under floor heating.

Is it possible to remove the radiator and attach a long length of
plastic piping in its place and coil this under the floor? Would this
give the same affect as under floor heating?

Yes, providing it's not too closely coupled to the floor surface otherwise
it would overheat it since the temperature of water through rads is higher
than that used un UFH systems. However bathrooms often need a greater heat
input than UFH can provide since they tend to have relatively large
amount of outside wall area for their floor area, some of which isn't
usable being covered by the bath etc, and bathrooms also want higher
temperatures than other rooms to be comfortable in.

You'd need to do the heatloss calcs on it - see the DIY wiki for links.
See the UFH article there as well. http://wiki.diyfaq.org.uk IIRC

I'd be inclined to bung some 15mm pipe under the floors to warm them for
comfort and have a proper radiator and/or towel warmer for space heating.

--
John Stumbles

If we'd known how much fun grandchildren are
we'd have had them first

In article ,
tvmo writes:
I'm looking to replace the radiator in my upstairs bathroom and I'm
considering under floor heating.

Is it possible to remove the radiator and attach a long length of
plastic piping in its place and coil this under the floor? Would this
give the same affect as under floor heating?

I've did this a few months back in a bathroom I was plumbing for
a friend. The thinking was that the radiator pipework runs under
a bit of the floor and generates a very nice effect. They wanted
to get rid of the radiator, so I basically snaked more heating
pipework under the floor. I used a couple of runs of 10mm copper,
and because of copper's poor emissivity, lightly sprayed the top
with black paint. A TRV was fitted poking out of pipework boxing
(also a bleeding point). A run of the heating system seemed to
indicate it is likely to work, but it wasn't cold at the time,
so I need to wait and see.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

In article ,
(Andrew Gabriel) writes:

I've did this

Oh dear, one of those days...

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

In article , John Stumbles
writes
On Mon, 04 Aug 2008 03:23:08 -0700, tvmo wrote:

I'm looking to replace the radiator in my upstairs bathroom and I'm
considering under floor heating.

Is it possible to remove the radiator and attach a long length of
plastic piping in its place and coil this under the floor? Would this
give the same affect as under floor heating?

Yes, providing it's not too closely coupled to the floor surface otherwise
it would overheat it since the temperature of water through rads is higher
than that used un UFH systems. However bathrooms often need a greater heat
input than UFH can provide since they tend to have relatively large
amount of outside wall area for their floor area, some of which isn't
usable being covered by the bath etc, and bathrooms also want higher
temperatures than other rooms to be comfortable in.

You'd need to do the heatloss calcs on it - see the DIY wiki for links.
See the UFH article there as well. http://wiki.diyfaq.org.uk IIRC

I'd be inclined to bung some 15mm pipe under the floors to warm them for
comfort and have a proper radiator and/or towel warmer for space heating.

Surely a pipe in the ceiling void below the floor boards will heat that
space and since wood is quite a good insulator, very little will get
through the floorboards.
I thought UFH worked best when cast into a solid floor?

--
John Alexander,

Remove NOSPAM if replying by e-mail

In article ,
John writes:
Surely a pipe in the ceiling void below the floor boards will heat that
space and since wood is quite a good insulator, very little will get
through the floorboards.

I think you can easily show that's wrong by standing on a wooden
floor which has heating pipes running under it.

I thought UFH worked best when cast into a solid floor?

That's quite different, and more complex due to the time lag
and the improved thermal coupling between the water and the
solid floor requiring running the pipework at lower temperatures
than radiators.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

tvmo wrote:
I'm looking to replace the radiator in my upstairs bathroom and I'm
considering under floor heating.

Is it possible to remove the radiator and attach a long length of
plastic piping in its place and coil this under the floor? Would this
give the same affect as under floor heating?

Cheers
Actually the quick answer is yes...

John wrote:
In article , John Stumbles
writes
On Mon, 04 Aug 2008 03:23:08 -0700, tvmo wrote:

I'm looking to replace the radiator in my upstairs bathroom and I'm
considering under floor heating.

Is it possible to remove the radiator and attach a long length of
plastic piping in its place and coil this under the floor? Would this
give the same affect as under floor heating?
Yes, providing it's not too closely coupled to the floor surface otherwise
it would overheat it since the temperature of water through rads is higher
than that used un UFH systems. However bathrooms often need a greater heat
input than UFH can provide since they tend to have relatively large
amount of outside wall area for their floor area, some of which isn't
usable being covered by the bath etc, and bathrooms also want higher
temperatures than other rooms to be comfortable in.

You'd need to do the heatloss calcs on it - see the DIY wiki for links.
See the UFH article there as well. http://wiki.diyfaq.org.uk IIRC

I'd be inclined to bung some 15mm pipe under the floors to warm them for
comfort and have a proper radiator and/or towel warmer for space heating.

Surely a pipe in the ceiling void below the floor boards will heat that
space and since wood is quite a good insulator, very little will get
through the floorboards.
I thought UFH worked best when cast into a solid floor?

Oh, wuite a lot does get through,. DWood isnt that bad a condictor.
You want to put insulating UNDER the pipes to stop it losing heat
downwards..

In article ,
Andrew Gabriel writes:
In article ,
tvmo writes:
I'm looking to replace the radiator in my upstairs bathroom and I'm
considering under floor heating.

Is it possible to remove the radiator and attach a long length of
plastic piping in its place and coil this under the floor? Would this
give the same affect as under floor heating?

I've did this a few months back in a bathroom I was plumbing for
a friend. The thinking was that the radiator pipework runs under
a bit of the floor and generates a very nice effect. They wanted
to get rid of the radiator, so I basically snaked more heating
pipework under the floor. I used a couple of runs of 10mm copper,
and because of copper's poor emissivity, lightly sprayed the top
with black paint. A TRV was fitted poking out of pipework boxing
(also a bleeding point). A run of the heating system seemed to
indicate it is likely to work, but it wasn't cold at the time,
so I need to wait and see.

It was back in August when I wrote that.
Now that the heating has been on, I'm told it's working very well.
Ceramic tiled floor doesn't feel hot, but it's not cold either,
and the bathroom temperature feels comfortable.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

Andrew Gabriel wrote:
In article ,
Andrew Gabriel writes:
In article ,
tvmo writes:
I'm looking to replace the radiator in my upstairs bathroom and I'm
considering under floor heating.

Is it possible to remove the radiator and attach a long length of
plastic piping in its place and coil this under the floor? Would this
give the same affect as under floor heating?
I've did this a few months back in a bathroom I was plumbing for
a friend. The thinking was that the radiator pipework runs under
a bit of the floor and generates a very nice effect. They wanted
to get rid of the radiator, so I basically snaked more heating
pipework under the floor. I used a couple of runs of 10mm copper,
and because of copper's poor emissivity, lightly sprayed the top
with black paint. A TRV was fitted poking out of pipework boxing
(also a bleeding point). A run of the heating system seemed to
indicate it is likely to work, but it wasn't cold at the time,
so I need to wait and see.

It was back in August when I wrote that.
Now that the heating has been on, I'm told it's working very well.
Ceramic tiled floor doesn't feel hot, but it's not cold either,
and the bathroom temperature feels comfortable.

Thats pretty much what you always feel with UFH. No hot spots,
occasionally warm spots, and generally comfortable.

In article , The Natural Philosopher wrote:

Thats pretty much what you always feel with UFH. No hot spots,
occasionally warm spots, and generally comfortable.

Unless you have Nu-Heat's old stuff, in which case you repeatedly
feel ****ed off at fixing yet another leak until you replace the
whole lot.

Alan Braggins wrote:

Unless you have Nu-Heat's old stuff, in which case you repeatedly
feel ****ed off at fixing yet another leak until you replace the
whole lot.

Oh dear... how old is "old stuff" ?
... Actually, looking at their site they still use the same stuff they
were using when I did ours.

My mate used Nu-Heat a year or 2 before us (well, his builder did) and
said they provided brass manifolds for the floor lops which the builder
just cemented in with the rest of the loop. He's sold that property now.
:¬)

So far, touch real wood floor we've had fault free operation for the
last 3 years. Thankfully.

www.GymRatZ.co.uk wrote:
Alan Braggins wrote:

Unless you have Nu-Heat's old stuff, in which case you repeatedly
feel ****ed off at fixing yet another leak until you replace the
whole lot.

Oh dear... how old is "old stuff" ?
.. Actually, looking at their site they still use the same stuff they
were using when I did ours.

My mate used Nu-Heat a year or 2 before us (well, his builder did) and
said they provided brass manifolds for the floor lops which the builder
just cemented in with the rest of the loop. He's sold that property now.
:¬)

So far, touch real wood floor we've had fault free operation for the
last 3 years. Thankfully.

Well I followed advice, and had no underfloor joins at all, and
pressurised the lot to a bloody high pressure before screeding, and
absolutely nothing bar a motorised valve going on me has gone wrong in
the last 6 years.

In article , www.GymRatZ.co.uk wrote:
Alan Braggins wrote:

Unless you have Nu-Heat's old stuff, in which case you repeatedly
feel ****ed off at fixing yet another leak until you replace the
whole lot.

Oh dear... how old is "old stuff" ?

Based on http://www.ebuild.co.uk/forums/messages/3322/6281.html
they were still using it in 1997, though mine is a bit older.

Downstairs mine is still okay (so far), I now have radiators upstairs.
(The alternatives were put new underfloor heating on top of the existing
floor then a new floor on top of that, or remove every downstairs
ceiling.)


.. Actually, looking at their site they still use the same stuff they
were using when I did ours.

You'll be okay then. Or at least if you aren't okay, it'll be a different
problem.