Radiant Floor Heating On Wood Subfloor

The one inch plywood subfloor will hold the flooring nails better and is your only chance to keep the top and bottom of the hardwood strip moisture stable.

Radiant floor heating on wood subfloor. When floating engineered wood floors that will be edge glued ensure the glue recommended by the flooring manufacturer is approved for use with radiant heat and that the subfloor surface. Always follow the manufacturers recommendations as to the installation of their flooring. When installing a radiant floor heating system under tile perhaps if you want a heated bathroom floor you ll need a special thinset or mortar that is compatible with the subfloor heating system. But it also is the high temperature of the wood that will tend to dry out the wood more than usual and more quickly in the fall when you turn on a hydronic heating system.

Installing radiant tubing on top of a subfloor. Both provide heating in a room from the floor up for consistent efficient warmth. Radiant heating works well with ceramic tile and vinyl but not with wood floors. Its success with carpeted floors depends on the length of the weave thick carpets or those with thick pads won t work well as heat generated by the system will stay trapped in the floor.

Smarttrac is a non structural modular panel system designed to simplify radiant heating and cooling installations in subfloor wall and ceiling applications. As might be expected direct or close contact heating always transmits the most heat. Warm water systems run hot water through pipes to create heat whereas electric underfloor heating heats wiring beneath the floor to generate heat. There are two types of radiant floor heating electric and water based systems.

Installing underfloor electric radiant heat. If direct gluing down an engineered wood floor is desired and the wood sub floor has a radiant heat panel system with exposed tubing i would recommend installing a 3 8 underlayment plywood over the piping first. Flooring layers that lay above the radiant coils and the subfloor benefit from the simple fact that heat rises. So while embedded subfloor heating does mean reduced heat the advantage is that the heat has more space to dissipate.