Rupp Collector
Active member
Check around. A buddy of mine got all his tubing from a friend, who had connections. I would think you could do the whole floor for a couple hundred bucks. We laid his out in an afternoon on a 40x60 building.
Celing Natural Gas Furnace - Recommendations?
- Thread starter Sled Solutions
- Start date
Sled Solutions
Member
....but what's the boiler cost?
Future considerations.......
Paul.
I have done all my buildings with the in-floor heat. The main cost is actually the insulation. You need to wrap the entire slab on the bottom and all sides in 2" rigid, then put your rebar and wire mesh down. The cost for insulating the slab is about a buck a square foot. Tubing is a couple of hundred for your sized building and one of those on demand hot water heaters would work just fine. Laying the pex can be done by you, just lay it out on paper first.
The only drawback is if you plan to fluctuate temps a lot in the building. I keep mine at 53 in the winter, which is plenty warm to work in and a fully iced up sled will not only be melted, but dry by the morning. If you plan to heat it up to say 60 or 65 when you are in there and then keep it cooler when you are not, then in-floor is probably not the way to go. Too slow of a reaction time and a lot of money wasted heating up the slab for a short period of warmer temps. I am actually adding a heat exchanger for quick heat ups. Could be a way to go for you too.
Also, insulate the crap out of the building!
-John
I have done all my buildings with the in-floor heat. The main cost is actually the insulation. You need to wrap the entire slab on the bottom and all sides in 2" rigid, then put your rebar and wire mesh down. The cost for insulating the slab is about a buck a square foot. Tubing is a couple of hundred for your sized building and one of those on demand hot water heaters would work just fine. Laying the pex can be done by you, just lay it out on paper first.
The only drawback is if you plan to fluctuate temps a lot in the building. I keep mine at 53 in the winter, which is plenty warm to work in and a fully iced up sled will not only be melted, but dry by the morning. If you plan to heat it up to say 60 or 65 when you are in there and then keep it cooler when you are not, then in-floor is probably not the way to go. Too slow of a reaction time and a lot of money wasted heating up the slab for a short period of warmer temps. I am actually adding a heat exchanger for quick heat ups. Could be a way to go for you too.
Also, insulate the crap out of the building!
-John
Sled Solutions
Member
Ya John, I remember needing to run extra heat when we stickered your Nytro. I plan on keeping it at 50 degrees when not it but since I'll be working out of it I'll be turning it up every morning to 70 degrees. R19 in the walls and R49 in the ceiling should do it.
Thanks
40 gal hot water heater. I layed mesh then tied all the pex tube to that. I think the pex tube was maybe like $200 and the insulation on the floor was a couple hundred. I want to say everything was under $1500. If your planning on raising and lowering the temps like you said this probably isn't the way to go. My buddy has a house furnace in his 40x60 15ft ceiling and heats it great. He does have ceiling fans also. Good luck with your project Paul!
mjkaliszak
New member
Nothing closer to my heart than a man cave. With that being said here is another .01 cent of input.( Lets call it my .03 worth )
I believe that... , the system is filled with an antifreeze. Personally I would have both a Reznor & radiant heat in the floor.
Back when we built, radiant heat was still in it's infancy with my developer, I would have done my complete driveway, walkway & front porch. We have another builder that lives in our sub, he had installed radiant heat in his house about 7-8 yrs ago. He did the walkout basement & ground level floor ( about 4500 sq ft ). In our talks, we had discussed heating costs. Unfortunately he said that if... there was a financial advantage to radiant heat vs forced air he couldn't see it on his bill. I wouldn't expect a savings.
I have 6 over head ( ceiling ) receptacles installed for HO lights, crane, door openers ect.. I'm a little over board with lights as seen in the pic below. I should have had more installed, and additionally I installed Outside recepts on both outside walls of the cave. While on that topic I would suggest that when wiring in the switch banks for the ceiling recepts, have control of all possible receptacles at both banks ( if you have 2 ) I do... and the electro wizard that did my work has some recepts that work off of 1 switch bank and some that work off the other ????? Other features for thought are... excessive inside wall recepts, ( I have every them every 8ft,) some on every wall that way no matter where I'm at I can " plug in " and be powered, I have a 220 recept & line , and a generator back-up recept in the cave also. It is for powering the entire house but that way I simply roll the honda over and energize.... You might want to consider the generator back up system , we lose power frequently where I'm at and it doesn't look like the weather is going to change. ( hopefully more snow ).
I do have the hot/cold water in the cave but wish I would have added a sink also. Just for washing up ect...
I believe that... , the system is filled with an antifreeze. Personally I would have both a Reznor & radiant heat in the floor.
Back when we built, radiant heat was still in it's infancy with my developer, I would have done my complete driveway, walkway & front porch. We have another builder that lives in our sub, he had installed radiant heat in his house about 7-8 yrs ago. He did the walkout basement & ground level floor ( about 4500 sq ft ). In our talks, we had discussed heating costs. Unfortunately he said that if... there was a financial advantage to radiant heat vs forced air he couldn't see it on his bill. I wouldn't expect a savings.
I have 6 over head ( ceiling ) receptacles installed for HO lights, crane, door openers ect.. I'm a little over board with lights as seen in the pic below. I should have had more installed, and additionally I installed Outside recepts on both outside walls of the cave. While on that topic I would suggest that when wiring in the switch banks for the ceiling recepts, have control of all possible receptacles at both banks ( if you have 2 ) I do... and the electro wizard that did my work has some recepts that work off of 1 switch bank and some that work off the other ????? Other features for thought are... excessive inside wall recepts, ( I have every them every 8ft,) some on every wall that way no matter where I'm at I can " plug in " and be powered, I have a 220 recept & line , and a generator back-up recept in the cave also. It is for powering the entire house but that way I simply roll the honda over and energize.... You might want to consider the generator back up system , we lose power frequently where I'm at and it doesn't look like the weather is going to change. ( hopefully more snow ).
I do have the hot/cold water in the cave but wish I would have added a sink also. Just for washing up ect...
I assumed that the person starting this thread has an existing structure with the slab in place, in that case a ducted heating system would be the most comfortable. I do agree 110% that a hydronic in slab pex tubing system is the best. For anyone about to or planning on building check out a company called TEK SUPPLY @ www.TekSupply.com (800-835-7877).This supplier, among other things, carries pex tubing and a product called TEK FOIL which is a reflective air bubble poly insulation for use under the slab (and other uses too), it acts as a vapor barrier and won't change the grade. It is easy to install (comes in a roll) and is VERY cost effective ! I have used this product and will never go back to foam sheets. Sorry for this being a "plug" but I believe they are a single source supplier.
More misc.... A water will heat a lot but only up to xxx sq. ft. So if your going to heat a large area check with HVAC guy or suppliers on the internet to see if you need a boiler. Most digital T-stats go down to 45 degrees. Hanging unit heaters like a Modine or the infrared are usually loud, radiant is silent. A back-up heater (or anything) is always a good idea. The skim-over or cover and hide works well with drains but check with the building or zoning depts. Most actually allow them, you can't connect to the city sewer or septic without a 3 chamber oil interceptor but will allow a dry well or barrel drain (remember the water has to go somewhere anyway) but codes do change. I recommend a channel drain, they come in lengths starting at 2' & up which makes it easier to pitch the floor too and gives you a bigger target. For lighting the 2 or 4 tube 4' florescent T-8 (skinny bulbs) are rated down to 0 degrees (will work below that) and a 4' bulb will warm up and light faster than a 8' in cooler temps and use less power so you can save the cost of buying the high output fixtures. It can be tempting to get used fixtures but if buy new, they all will work, match and use less energy. And like the 100 watt bulb the T-12 bulbs (fat ones) days are numbered. Thanks, I hope this helps someone.
yamadooed
Active member
Not to be the garage police. But just check with or ask check with a local HVAC company as some of the local codes only allow certain types of heaters in residential garages... By me I know they allow the induce draft exhaust units and some sealed burner units but no forced air or wood burners at the time I did mine.
Sled Solutions
Member
I bought a furnace tonight.
$100 from a buddies brother, came with a new circuit board and a ignition probe new in the box. The guy is a heating and cooling tech and pulled it out of a mobile home. He has been storing it in his dads barn with the intent of installing it. His dad has since changed his mind and wanted it gone. NOTHING was wrong with it, the owner wanted a new furnace during a remodel. This will allow me to run duct work to the offices and heat the barn. Figured for $100 if it works for a couple winters I'm golden. Hopefully the outdoor wood burner will be in the budget next winter. Thanks for all the suggestions guys, I really do appreciate it.
$100 from a buddies brother, came with a new circuit board and a ignition probe new in the box. The guy is a heating and cooling tech and pulled it out of a mobile home. He has been storing it in his dads barn with the intent of installing it. His dad has since changed his mind and wanted it gone. NOTHING was wrong with it, the owner wanted a new furnace during a remodel. This will allow me to run duct work to the offices and heat the barn. Figured for $100 if it works for a couple winters I'm golden. Hopefully the outdoor wood burner will be in the budget next winter. Thanks for all the suggestions guys, I really do appreciate it.
If I understand correctly, this is in a new pole barn?
If so, an efficient radiant heated floor is probably out of the question. It's far easier and efficient inside of a frost wall building, where you can insulate the floor as well as the below grade walls all the way down to the frost line. For it to be feasible in a pole barn, you'd likely need to either extend the floor foam 4-6' outside beyond the walls, keep the heat coils a few feet away from the walls, or both.
The reason I say this is because I have a 2300 sq. foot shop that I retro fitted a heated floor into. For a number of reasons, I couldn't put the vertical foam down below the frost line, only 2" of 25 psi foam under the floor. To be short for the amount of money I spent on the tubing, foam, Takagi Jr instant water heater, circulating pumps, expansion tank, manifolds, valves, plumbing, installation, etc... I really wish I would have saved the money & put it into propane to fuel my 150K BTU "modine" ceiling heater. Don't get me wrong, the in-floor was nice when it was on, but it cost me nearly twice as much per winter in fuel to merely keep the air temp at 50 degrees. And I still needed to invest in the "modine" (only about $800 new with extremely easy installation in comparison) for quick raises in temp.
And the floor drain? I would never recommend putting a barrel under the floor. All safety fears aside, it will fail under the floor someday. As a concrete contractor, I can tell you everyone I've ever run across has eventually failed, with no way to service it w/o tearing out part of the floor. Now would be the time to simply run a pipe outside to grade, with a trap of course to keep cold air & small animals out. If you ever have an issue, it can be snaked out very easily.
If so, an efficient radiant heated floor is probably out of the question. It's far easier and efficient inside of a frost wall building, where you can insulate the floor as well as the below grade walls all the way down to the frost line. For it to be feasible in a pole barn, you'd likely need to either extend the floor foam 4-6' outside beyond the walls, keep the heat coils a few feet away from the walls, or both.
The reason I say this is because I have a 2300 sq. foot shop that I retro fitted a heated floor into. For a number of reasons, I couldn't put the vertical foam down below the frost line, only 2" of 25 psi foam under the floor. To be short for the amount of money I spent on the tubing, foam, Takagi Jr instant water heater, circulating pumps, expansion tank, manifolds, valves, plumbing, installation, etc... I really wish I would have saved the money & put it into propane to fuel my 150K BTU "modine" ceiling heater. Don't get me wrong, the in-floor was nice when it was on, but it cost me nearly twice as much per winter in fuel to merely keep the air temp at 50 degrees. And I still needed to invest in the "modine" (only about $800 new with extremely easy installation in comparison) for quick raises in temp.
And the floor drain? I would never recommend putting a barrel under the floor. All safety fears aside, it will fail under the floor someday. As a concrete contractor, I can tell you everyone I've ever run across has eventually failed, with no way to service it w/o tearing out part of the floor. Now would be the time to simply run a pipe outside to grade, with a trap of course to keep cold air & small animals out. If you ever have an issue, it can be snaked out very easily.
Buddy heats his garage in the UP with in floor radiant, and his boiler, a std 40 gallon hot water heater, has all the safety and expansion valves installed along with a thermostat controlled circulating pump. Water heater is filled with a mix of antifreeze and water, to keep things from freezing if the power should go out.
Sled Solutions
Member
I ended up running 4" pipe from the floor drain, outside to a crock filled with pea gravel. I got the pipe buried at about 30" and the stone bed at about 38". For sled melt off it should be fine....I hope.