Garage floor heating

Author
Discussion

Timbergiant

Original Poster:

995 posts

130 months

Thursday 30th October 2014
quotequote all
Does anyone have any experience of installing electric underfloor heating into a garage?
I know it works well in the home, my brother has it in his house and it's good but his was installed onto timber floor and where I'm looking to put it I have a normal concrete floor of the existing garage.

Muncher

12,219 posts

249 months

Thursday 30th October 2014
quotequote all
A wet system will be much cheaper to run and probably easier to install if you can manage it.

paulwirral

3,132 posts

135 months

Thursday 30th October 2014
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Lay the blankets out and fix with flexible self levelling compound then tile over fixing the tiles on a solid bed of flexible tile adhesive

IanMorewood

4,309 posts

248 months

Thursday 30th October 2014
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Just be conscious about point loading on the floor if you use the leccy mats, the elements are fairly easy to break.

B17NNS

18,506 posts

247 months

Thursday 30th October 2014
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Assuming the slab is already in place I'd have thought electric would be a much easier retrofit install. As above though, wet would be much more cost effective to run.

It takes a good while to warm up OP. Not a 'I'm going in the garage for an hour, I'll turn the heating on solution'.

Also, I doubt the slab will be insulated so it will be very inefficient.

Make for a nice place to work though if you can stomach the bills.

Otispunkmeyer

12,588 posts

155 months

Friday 31st October 2014
quotequote all
We have electric under floor heating in the bathroom. The floor is tiling. I am not sure of the wattage on the system because I've only just moved in and it was here when we got here. However, i suspect somewhere around the 150W/m2.

On the cold mornings we're having this thing takes a good 90 minutes to get any kind of discernible heat under foot. I think it took nearly 3 hours to get to its 28 deg set point. The heated portion isn't large, perhaps 1.5 m by 2.5 m. So 600W total ish. 3 hours to heat up, best part of 2 kWh, or 30 pence. Now thats for it to feel toasty underfoot...I haven't got on to it actually heating the room yet. Which it does. But I suspect it would be another hour before the room felt toasty too.

Sounds cheap, but every day?...30p x 365 = £110 a year.

I assume the electric stuff must work best when its under carpet rather than ceramic.

I would have thought something water powered would work better. Have you thought about a plinth heater? These are designed to go under kitchen cabinets and can chuck out a good lot of heat. The Hydronic ones (water from boiler) are supposedly the best and you can switch the boiler off and still have heating as water takes a while to lose its heat as compared to electric bar heaters in the electric only models.

Edited by Otispunkmeyer on Friday 31st October 13:14

Napper

120 posts

212 months

Friday 31st October 2014
quotequote all
I installed electric underfloor heating in my kitchen and garden room area when we first moved in. It's on concrete and is tiled straight over the top. It is a fair sized area and takes a good 12 hours to get to an operating temperature of 21 deg, but when it's on it is beautiful and everyone comments on it during the winter. I usually only use from October to march or there abouts.

However, of I ever get round to building my own house I will be using the wet version as the primary heat source.

I'm not sure of the running coat as such but it doesn't jump out on the electric bill during the winter as being too higher than normal.

Gingerbread Man

9,171 posts

213 months

Friday 31st October 2014
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Muncher said:
A wet system will be much cheaper to run and probably easier to install if you can manage it.
Easier to install????

TheJelley

196 posts

139 months

Friday 31st October 2014
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I have installed electric underfloor in the kitchen, small area at 150w per sqm, not commenting on the heating a room efficiency, but under slate tile, the floor is warm underfoot in 10 minutes.


IanMorewood

4,309 posts

248 months

Friday 31st October 2014
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Wet ufch is fairly easy to install on a new build but a pita to retrofit as you effectively have to relay your solid floor.

RichB

51,565 posts

284 months

Friday 31st October 2014
quotequote all
in a garage you can't beat an electric fan heater.

prand

5,915 posts

196 months

Friday 31st October 2014
quotequote all
Otispunkmeyer said:
We have electric under floor heating in the bathroom. The floor is tiling. I am not sure of the wattage on the system because I've only just moved in and it was here when we got here. However, i suspect somewhere around the 150W/m2.

On the cold mornings we're having this thing takes a good 90 minutes to get any kind of discernible heat under foot. I think it took nearly 3 hours to get to its 28 deg set point. The heated portion isn't large, perhaps 1.5 m by 2.5 m. So 600W total ish. 3 hours to heat up, best part of 2 kWh, or 30 pence. Now thats for it to feel toasty underfoot...I haven't got on to it actually heating the room yet. Which it does. But I suspect it would be another hour before the room felt toasty too.

Sounds cheap, but every day?...30p x 365 = £110 a year.

I assume the electric stuff must work best when its under carpet rather than ceramic.

I would have thought something water powered would work better. Have you thought about a plinth heater? These are designed to go under kitchen cabinets and can chuck out a good lot of heat. The Hydronic ones (water from boiler) are supposedly the best and you can switch the boiler off and still have heating as water takes a while to lose its heat as compared to electric bar heaters in the electric only models.

Edited by Otispunkmeyer on Friday 31st October 13:14
Something seems wrong in your bathroom! And although having very toasty feet in the bathroom is nice, is heating up to 28C really necessary? When we have it going, maybe 19-20C at a push to take the cold edge off the tiles, plus it also heats the room without having to be blasting out heat.

I've had electric heating installed in bathroom and kitchen in a couple of houses and it doesn't take hours to heat up to the operating temp, perhaps 10-15 mins (I can tell as I use the heating to dry the floor after mopping it), but we usually insulate well under the matting - so much so I've noticed we hardly need to have it on in the kitchen now.

(think we got ours from http://www.underfloorheatingworld.co.uk/underfloor... )

bogie

16,382 posts

272 months

Friday 31st October 2014
quotequote all
RichB said:
in a garage you can't beat an electric fan heater.
yup...my garage is insulated and tiled floor...a £50 fan heater with frost setting is perfect. During winter it occasionally comes on if it gets down to 5deg, but thats only in persistant cold spells. Put it on when I go in there in winter and its nice n warm in 10 mins

RichB

51,565 posts

284 months

Friday 31st October 2014
quotequote all
bogie said:
RichB said:
in a garage you can't beat an electric fan heater.
yup...my garage is insulated and tiled floor...a £50 fan heater with frost setting is perfect. During winter it occasionally comes on if it gets down to 5deg, but thats only in persistant cold spells. Put it on when I go in there in winter and its nice n warm in 10 mins
And you can warm your hands up in front of it and even warm stuff like rattle cans with it.

toohuge

3,434 posts

216 months

Friday 31st October 2014
quotequote all
prand said:
Otispunkmeyer said:
We have electric under floor heating in the bathroom. The floor is tiling. I am not sure of the wattage on the system because I've only just moved in and it was here when we got here. However, i suspect somewhere around the 150W/m2.

On the cold mornings we're having this thing takes a good 90 minutes to get any kind of discernible heat under foot. I think it took nearly 3 hours to get to its 28 deg set point. The heated portion isn't large, perhaps 1.5 m by 2.5 m. So 600W total ish. 3 hours to heat up, best part of 2 kWh, or 30 pence. Now thats for it to feel toasty underfoot...I haven't got on to it actually heating the room yet. Which it does. But I suspect it would be another hour before the room felt toasty too.

Sounds cheap, but every day?...30p x 365 = £110 a year.

I assume the electric stuff must work best when its under carpet rather than ceramic.

I would have thought something water powered would work better. Have you thought about a plinth heater? These are designed to go under kitchen cabinets and can chuck out a good lot of heat. The Hydronic ones (water from boiler) are supposedly the best and you can switch the boiler off and still have heating as water takes a while to lose its heat as compared to electric bar heaters in the electric only models.

Edited by Otispunkmeyer on Friday 31st October 13:14
Something seems wrong in your bathroom! And although having very toasty feet in the bathroom is nice, is heating up to 28C really necessary? When we have it going, maybe 19-20C at a push to take the cold edge off the tiles, plus it also heats the room without having to be blasting out heat.

I've had electric heating installed in bathroom and kitchen in a couple of houses and it doesn't take hours to heat up to the operating temp, perhaps 10-15 mins (I can tell as I use the heating to dry the floor after mopping it), but we usually insulate well under the matting - so much so I've noticed we hardly need to have it on in the kitchen now.

(think we got ours from http://www.underfloorheatingworld.co.uk/underfloor... )
I agree with Prand.....

It does sound like there is something wrong with the system and imo under floor heating is not designed to heat the air in the room, it is to take the chill off the cold floor and supplement the heating of the air with alternative systems.

furtive

4,498 posts

279 months

Friday 31st October 2014
quotequote all
IanMorewood said:
Wet ufch is fairly easy to install on a new build but a pita to retrofit as you effectively have to relay your solid floor.
Unless you use something like Polypipe overlay, which is a doddle to install (and works great)

Muncher

12,219 posts

249 months

Friday 31st October 2014
quotequote all
Gingerbread Man said:
Easier to install????
I missed the bit about the floot slab already being there. I will probably fit wet UFH to my garage and integrate it into the slab.