How To Install Heated Floor In Concrete

Slab heating mats and cables can be installed directly in the concrete when it is being poured.

How to install heated floor in concrete.

This article explains how to avoid some fatal mistakes when installing radiant heat in a concrete floor slab by describing an incompetent radiant heat floor installation along with an explanation of why things went wrong and how to avoid these errors. In bathrooms and kitchens install a moisture barrier to protect the gypsum. I ve poured hundreds of concrete floors with radiant heat and have learned a lot about how it works including the. For new construction homes there is yet another way to heat up a cold slab and it starts before the concrete has even hardened.

For concrete floor radiant heating systems the warm water tubing or electric heating elements can either be embedded within the slab on grade anywhere from the bottom of the slab to within 2 inches of the surface depending on the design and installation technique or fastened to the top of a concrete subfloor and then covered with an overlay. Mats that include a self leveling gypsum mixture over them is best. Being in the concrete business in maine i see a lot of people installing concrete floor heating as their main source of heat. The design and layout of concrete floor radiant heat is often complex and typically should be done by a certified radiant heating professional rather than the concrete contractor.

While hot water and air based radiant. A lot of planning and teamwork early in the process will help ensure a successful installation says the radiant panel association in its 2008 radiant flooring guide. Offering 20 watts per square foot the slab heat mats are ideal if you. Let it dry the appropriate length of time then cover it with flooring as if you were installing the flooring over a concrete base.

You can step onto a warm and inviting floor even one built on a concrete slab by adding in floor heating. The workers in the photograph at page top where our concrete slab.