Gordon,
What a beautiful job! How would it compare with using copper vs. pex for cost and ease of installation?
Boy, I'd think you want to make sure you have a really skilled plumber/solderer. I'd be paranoid about leaking joints! At least pex I know I can lay down myself and one continuous loop sort of fool proofs that part (as long as someone doesn't nail a hole in it!)
Yes, I came across NRT at a forum for radiant, and I was so impressed by his free advise that I hired them for my basement radiant job. I feel sort of guilty asking questions to NRT without properly paying a fee! I figured I can find out some things on my own, rather than pester them with these kinds of questions. (So I pester here
)
I will pose the question to them on what would it do to cost to go from 1/2" to 3/8" pex. I would assume closer loops, more pipe, more sleepers, so higher materials cost, and who knows what the snowball effect when you look at manifold needs, pipe runs, pump requirements, etc. etc. But that my not be possible because of my heat loads anyway, since I know the first time they took a look at my main floor design, I needed the thermal plates only in certain rooms. Not sure if closer loops would eliminate that. Or if there are plates for smaller diameter pipe. I guess I can always ask about their recommendation to reduce height and see what they come up with. Worse they would say is we need a fee for that kind of services. I don't want to get ahead of myself paying the design fee just yet, since we're still awaiting an appraisal and bank approval to proceed.
My floors are only 8'1" tall, so I know height is at a premium. One question that occurred to me was do the sleepers for radiant go in before drywall or after? If before, would I leave a gap at the wall edges? Otherwise I was thinking that if not, then the drywallers will need to cut drywall sheets to fit anything less than 8ft, since I'll lose some of that spare 1" to the ceiling drywall. I know they are fast, but more costs, will = more labor hours.
Plus I'm also concurrently investigating how to handle 24+ inches of cellulose in my attic, and it appears that I'll have to add a layer of OSB before ceiling drywall since my trusses are 24" o.c., thus reducing my floor height even more. So the less I have to take for room on the floor, the better.
But that would mean more R, which should translate into less heat load, since I'm also skimcoating the ceiling drywall with 2# foam to seal air infiltration. And that could mean 3/8" pipe may be enough to serve the new loads. It all hinges on finding a cellulose sub for the walls. Anyone know where they sell those dense pack cellulose batts for walls for a DIY? Attic cellulose we can handle, is the dense pack/wet spray that I want to hire someone, and so far no one in my area seems to do it.
I had heard of the warm floor panels, but I already had my subfloor in by then, so didn't look any further.
I got a crazy thought, instead of having to use plywood sleepers, could I use 1x3, one on each side of the pipe? I would avoid having to rip plywood. The question would be what to fill in the middle, and how would it compare costwise vs. plywood sleepers, not to mention comparison of labor. SLC with foam beads?
I sorely regret not going with double bottom plates.
Sorry, I tend to get wordy
Thanks.
Vanessa
