Floor Slab Heat Loss

Marc rosenbaum is the director of engineering south mountain company.

Floor slab heat loss.

Hvac air ducts located inside concrete slab floors invite a surprisingly broad range of building problems that fall into two broad categories. Functional troubles such as lack of air flow or collapsed ductwork and environmental problems such as. Learn why radiant heat in your concrete floor may or may not best for you. Up to 80 of heat loss in a floor slab occurs around the edges.

50 f ground at 4 insulation. If your house is built on a concrete slab and that slab was poured directly on the ground without a barrier or insulation you ve got the ultimate heat sink. The research is based on long term field test measurements of two new row houses in southern finland. Slab on ground heat loss floor heating summary the main objective of this research is to determine the effect of a low temperature floor heating system on the total heat loss via the slab on ground structures in nordic climate.

Check out this article for a list of slab edge insulation solutions and episode 125 for my interview with henry edney of maxraft. The r value is calculated from the heat loss from the slab. This article describes heating and air conditioning ducts that have been placed in or beneath concrete floor slabs. Away from perimeter i only lose heat to the soil.

Crawlspaces can be effective in lowering the average heat loss in a house when compared to an uninsulated slab floor as long as vents are well closed in the winter and allowed to breath. He uses an integrated systems design approach to help people create. Near perimeter oat is dominant. Notice the styrofoam going up the edge of the slab to reduce heat loss.

But remember phpp provides absolutely no cost effectiveness feedback. Learn how to estimate design heat loss through an insulated floor to a basement below. Learn how to do simplified heat loss calculations for basements slab on grade and walkout basement foundations. If i didn t have in floor radiant this would not be much 55 f space vs.

Hvac ductwork in floor slabs. It s possible that phpp accurately models heat loss through slabs. Concrete floor heating has many advantages over other types of heating systems. However if you re planning to install a floor covering on top of the slab you may want to consider one of our other floor heating elements like tempzone or environ combined with an insulating underlayment to help prevent heat loss to the slab.

It may not be intuitive but since i deal with. Just because phpp accurately tells you that your heat loss through a slab with 14 inches of eps under the slab is very low doesn t mean that using 14 inches of foam is a good use of the earth s resources. This is one step i see left out of a lot of radiant installations. The first thing to consider when looking into different types of concrete floors is why it s so important to insulate the floor slab.