It's been years since I've been on this forum. About 10 years ago I installed a Solo Plus boiler which operates smoothly. I use a combination of old cast iron radiators and cheap baseboard. Attached to the house is a small 9 X 13 greenhouse, which I'd like to heat. I installed the whole of the current system. How would I go about putting in an in-slab radiant loop for the greenhouse, or am I better off to just find cast iron radiators for the space and treat it like a seperate zone? As I understand it, the trouble with the radiant is that they operate at very low temperatures. Any advice would be appreciated.
Mixing hydronic baseboard with in-floor radiant
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Another thought- how well will in slab radiant work in a greenhouse. It experiences huge solar gain during the day. And huge radiant heat loss at night, neither fits a slab radiant design.
I'd look at cast rads or a forced air / coil unit heater.
I'd look at cast rads or a forced air / coil unit heater.
Friends of ours have a 10x20 greenhouse on the side of their pool house/garage building facing south.
The pool house and greenhouse has radiant heat in the slab and for almost 30 years Fred has 3' tomatoes and peppers in the ground in early May.
Unless you are using grow lights at night, you don't need to keep the greenhouse above 60 at night.
The pool house and greenhouse has radiant heat in the slab and for almost 30 years Fred has 3' tomatoes and peppers in the ground in early May.
Unless you are using grow lights at night, you don't need to keep the greenhouse above 60 at night.
maple1
Minister of Fire
I dont think I would say radiant in-floor using low temps is trouble. In your case the trouble would be it would not be able to recover very fast at all, say when the temp drops out at night.
I would likely go cast rads on their own zone. You can run whatever temp you want through those. If real hot you get fast recovery. If not so hot you get good maintaining heat with low supply temps.
I have never seen in floor heat in a green house in my area. I have it in my shop and love it but just like the other morning we were in the single digits and I opened the door to run the skid loader out. I still turn my air handler on with the coil in it to heat the shop back up quickly. I don't think in floor alone would warm a green house up fast enough when the sun goes down.
Thanks for all the replies. I believe cast iron radiators will be my best bet. Since the temp today is zero, I believe I'll just think about it until spring.
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