Warmzone Blog

This can fit everyone. Whether you’re building a new home, or remodeling your existing home, radiant floor heating is a great way to add comfort and efficiency to the rooms in your home that are traditionally hard to heat. For those homeowners just setting out on a home improvement or renovation project, large or small, we think it’s worth looking into what radiant floor heating can do for you and your home.

We’ve lost count of all the potential uses for radiant floor heating in homes. Bathrooms, Kitchens and Entryways are ideals places to incorporate radiant heat. Tile, marble, slate, and even hardwood are floor coverings that are cold to step onto with bare feet during winter or summer. A radiant heat product can be installed under these surfaces throughout the home and take the cold bite out of these areas. Just think: you’ll never have cold floors or feet again!

Basements are another area of the home that radiant floor heating makes sense in. Basements are one of the top requested areas to add radiant heat. Due to the fact that forced air systems heat air and hot air rises the basement is usually the living space that remains cold.

Radiant Floor Heating Tip: New construction is the best time to add radiant floor heating to a basement.

In these tumultous real estate times, many homeowners are looking to renovate or otherwise improve their current homes rather than house-hunting.  For those homeowners just starting out on a home improvement or renovation project, large or small, we think it’s worth looking into what radiant floor heating can do for you and your home.

You’ll soon find that there’s a multitude of uses for radiant floor heating in homes. Bathrooms, kitchens and entryways are ideals places to incorporate radiant heat. Tile, marble, slate, and even hardwood are floor coverings that are cold to step onto with bare feet during winter or summer. A radiant heat product can be installed under these surfaces throughout the home and take the cold bite out of these areas. Just think: you’ll never have cold floors or feet again!

But that’s not all.  People often comment to us that another area of the home that radiant floor heating makes sense in is your basement. Basements are one of the top requested areas to add radiant heat. Due to the fact that forced air systems heat air and hot air rises the basement is usually the living space that remains cold. New construction is the best time to add radiant heat to a basement.

Radiant Floor Heating Tip: The fact is that whether you’re building a new home, or remodeling your existing home, radiant floor heating is a great way to add comfort and efficiency to the rooms in your home that are traditionally hard to heat.

Time for a brain teaser! How can you comfortably heat your home while also enjoying a reduction in energy usage? Through radiant floor heating, of course! Delivering heat by air makes it easy to escape and increase your overall heat loss, while, through radiant floor heating, the evenly distributed radiant heat allows homeowners to turn down the thermostat two to four degrees.

As you might expect, turning down a thermostat can reduce energy costs by 10-40% and can be verified with your local utility company. This setback to your thermostat can happen because a radiant floor heats from the ground up and delivers the heat through objects not air. This makes the lowest three feet of your home the most comfortable where a forced air system loses its heat to the ceiling and is required to heat from the top down.

You might be surprised to learn that the installation of radiant floor heating is not a new development in the housing industry. Heated floors have been installed under bathroom and kitchen tile in the United States for the past decade and the warming products continue to gain popularity.

Radiant Floor Heating Tip: Many in the kitchen and bath industry expect radiant floor heating to continue to play a big role among homeowners who crave comfort features.

After all this talk, you might find yourself asking just how does radiant floor heating work? It simply heats the floor with electrical resistance cables that are spread evenly and sandwiched between layers of durable fabric. All these options are easy to install yourself or can be quickly installed by your flooring installer. If you choose to install the system yourself, you will want to have a certified electrician hook up the controls to a programmable thermostat.

A great thing you’ll find is that you don’t have to cover your ceramic tile, marble, or stone floors with rugs—install radiant floor heating and show your floor’s beauty and allow them to give you the heat you want at the same time! The feeling of warmth under your feet when it’s cold and snowing outside is like no other.

Yet another bonus of radiant floor heating is that it has even heat distribution and will not effect the furniture placement as it uses no radiators or heat vents. It is easy to install, is very energy efficient. There are also no filters to change or clean, which saves you additional time and money. There is also no dust or dirt forced into your air to breathe, which is extremely beneficial for those who suffer from allergies. Radiant floor heating also offers you complete control of temperature room by room in your house. Not only that, its operation is completely quiet.

Radiant Floor Heating Tip: Not only is radiant floor heating more comfortable, but the costs of operating radiant floor heating systems are nominal as compared to other heating options.

Were you like me and got a huge shock to the system (and your wallet) when your most recent energy bill arrived? It’s pretty scary how high those bills can get, we know. Well, we’d like to let you know that new technology in radiant heating can help you cut electricity costs. Now electric radiant heating systems offer you a choice of a thermostat that is controlled by a floor sensor. This allows you to measure floor temperature or with an ambient sensor to control the actual temperature in a specific room. Radiant heat can be used and controlled as a primary source of heat or used as a supplemental heating source to add comfort to your living spaces.

When an Electric Radiant Heat system is turned on, energy is forced through a conductive material to create resistance or heat. For most areas an electric line-voltage system is used. These systems use a special thermostat that has an integrated breaker for safety right at the power source. They are available in 110 or 220 voltage.

Low-voltage systems use the same voltages and consume the same amount of power as line-voltage products. The use of a step-down transformer reduces the voltage supplied to the heating materials. Due to their safe low-voltage current (8-30v) products like Zmesh can be nailed and stapled down to secure the electric radiant heat product to the floor and are therefore useful for installation under hardwood and carpet.

Electric Radiant Heat Tip: One of the low-voltage product recommended by warmzone.com is Zmesh.

The number of homes installing radiant floor heating (and keeping thousands of pairs of feet warm) is going up up up! It’s not hard to see why, when you learn more about the benefits offered by this kind of heating system.

A comparison of radiant floor heating to forced air is a car that has heated seats and a forced air heater/furnace. The forced air in a car can dry you out and can become uncomfortable and is difficult to dial in because of the heat loss due to its air delivery. A heated seat will provide you with quick results and will remain warm long after it is reduced or turned completely off. The heated seat actually warms your body and the car seat, not the air. Forced air will over time will inefficiently heat objects but with the negative side effects of dry air, dust and pollen.

It’s not hard to see why the silent operation of a radiant floor heating system free from drafts or flying dust particles is why these systems are becoming so popular. Many homeowners are searching for ways in which they can create a more comfortable, efficient, and healthier atmosphere in their homes. Radiant floor heating accomplishes each of those goals.

Radiant Floor Heating Tip: If you’ve never experienced the warmth and comfort of radiant floor heating, you’re definitely missing out on one of the finer things in life.