Hydronic Heating

Posts Tagged ‘radiant heat’

i am about to hook up my in floor radiant heat system. there are 5, 100 foot loops that go thru the slab. i made the manafold myself, and when i tested it for leaks it seemd like the first fitting closest to the feed direction had the most flow, then less and less till the last one. a freind sugested hooking up the first feed to the last return? kind of mixing up the tubes to make a beeter mix? any thoughts on this would be great. thanks john

An associate of mine loaned me a book a few years ago on hydronic heat.

Not very thick, but very informative about how radiant heat actually works. Included common piping strategies.

The author made several references to Levittown, Pennsylvania. He apparently did a lot of service work on those home's heating systems.

For example, he related how he was trying to find a broken pipe in a Levittown home. After explaining to the lady of the house what he was looking for, she showed him were the pipe was broken by mopping the floor and pointing out the big spot that dried quicker than the rest of the floor.

Wasn't a very old printing either. I believe there was an entire chapter on PEX piping.

He has at least one other book published. A reference book that listed BTU capacities and other specifics on old cast iron radiators.

Can anybody put a name to this author and/or the book's title?
Thanks dadcat, but no, that isn't it.

It wasn't an engineering or text type book. It was more of an informal discussion of the author's experiences and observations of hydronic heat mixed with technical references and schematics thrown in for practical applications.

Siegenthaler as the name doesn't ring any bells either.

We are in the market for a new house. We recently toured a house that we liked and it had radiant floor heat. The owner has alzheimer’s and his son did not have any answers to our questions.
The house was built in the 50’s. It is a concrete slab and has hydronic radiant heat. We don’t know if the radiant heat is original to the house or was added at a later point. Since the lime in the concrete likes to eat away copper, is there any way to figure out what type of tubing was laid in the floor? I know that we can do an air pressure test to make sure there are no leaks, but I want to know the material of the tubing so that we can work replacing it in to our offer/bid if necessary.
Thanks!

Hello: I am looking at buying a home with hydronic radiant heat in the floors. It was built in the 1950's. I was wondering if adding a programmable thermostat to cut back the temperature before retiring would save some $$$. I realize that these types of heating systems heat up or cool down fast.

Thanks, in advance, for any and all replies.

Cheers,
Steve/OHIO