Warmboard opinions

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Permalink Reply by Randy Esposito on October 30, 2009 at 2:16pm

Paul,

Warmboard is a great product but it is expensive and takes a little more labor to install because of having to layout the sheets correctly. Radiant in Gypsum requires that the house is built to take the extra weight.

Have you looked at QuikTrak from Wirsbo? It's a panel that goes over the subfloor that is very easy to install. There are some other systems like it out there.

My main problem with warmboard is that the tubes have to be installed before interior walls go up. Because the tubes go in so early in construction you run the risk of someone puncturing a tube somewhere. When you use a over the floor system you don't put the tubes in till much later (just before finished flooring).

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Permalink Reply by Paul Gustafson on October 30, 2009 at 10:49pm

Thanks for the input Randy. I haven't investigated the product you mentioned, but I will. I figured that Warmboard was pretty expensive, but I have yet to get a good feel for how much a system with Warmboard differs than other systems.

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Permalink Reply by Paul Gustafson on November 1, 2009 at 12:26am

I checked out QuikTrak. It seems that the difference from Warmboard with respect to its construction is that the aluminum is below the plywood rather than on top. I don't suppose that makes much difference. The main benefit I see in either product is that the heat is distributed better under the floor than with the Gypcrete system. I still haven't found any solid info on the cost of either product. If there's anyone out there who can enlighten me I'd appreicate it very much.

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Permalink Reply by Glenn V on November 1, 2009 at 1:05pm

I bought a magazine a while back, I think it was Mother Earth News,maybe a solar edition, that I believe is at my work, that someone layed out 1/2 or 5/8 plywood cut in strip lengths about 1' wide or so then nailed them down on the sub floor leaving gaps between them enough for the pex tubing to fit in and routered the plywood ends for the curve of the pex tubing to make their own.They bought sheet aluminum cut it in small sheets and layed them down on the plywood every so often formed down into the gaps between the plywood to fit the pex tubing to help in a more even heat transfer.

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Permalink Reply by Joe on November 1, 2009 at 3:11pm

Paul,

Here is a good, detailed article from This Old House concerning hot water radiant floor heating. They give a list at the end of the article showing suppliers. Other articles cover electric radiant heating pads for bathroom floors.

http://www.thisoldhouse.com/toh/article/0,,1548320,00.html

Joe, Sarasota

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Permalink Reply by James Goddard on November 2, 2009 at 3:01am

Here is a great site for DIY solar and alternate energy:
http://www.builditsolar.com/index.htm

In it, they have some very detailed plans and pictures of an actual in-floor heating unit (amongst a lot of other cool stuff). This one is powered by solar, but the heat source could be anything from gas to wood stove:
http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/SpaceHeating/SolarShed/House.htm

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