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[mlappin]

Years ago we remodeled our bedroom, if it had been recently I probably would have used Ultra fin, would have been tricky as it would have had to be installed from the top before the subfloor. Its not even a crawl space under that part of the house, I honestly think that room used to be a porch that was enclosed. Or maybe I would have done radiant walls then, no duct to that room at all. Fieldstone walls so don’t even want to tackle getting a duct thru em.

Going to remodel the office next, it shares a wall with our bedroom, I’m seriously thinking of taking two rolls of 1/2’ or 5/8” copper and placing fifty foot in a stud bay then doing another for a total of 100’. Place a small register at the bottom and another at the top and see what happens. New windows and siding and we filled any voids when we tore the lathe and plaster down. It doesn’t do bad most of the time, although on colder nights it does get chilly about 4am, a small window unit takes care of AC in the summer.

I figure why not, I already have several other zones set up in the house and have a spot left in the zone controller, just need another zone valve and other miscellaneous supplies.

[slimjim]

Here’s a thought Marty, years ago I made some towel racks for a bathroom in an old house out of copper, it warmed the room as well as the towels, I know, it’s your bedroom but putting tomorrow’s clothes on it tonight warms them up nice for tommorow morning!

[juddspaintballs]

What about radiant baseboard heaters?

[wreckit87]

Bare copper doesn't emit very much radiant heat, in a baseboard scenario we'd be talking ~50 BTU per foot with 3/4" type L and 180 degree water. I wonder what the actual output would be in a wall like this

[slimjim]

I gather Marty that you don’t want to give up any space?

[juddspaintballs]

Bare copper doesn't emit very much radiant heat, in a baseboard scenario we'd be talking ~50 BTU per foot with 3/4" type L and 180 degree water. I wonder what the actual output would be in a wall like this

Ideally, it would be finned copper tubing, as in a real hydronic baseboard heater. 

[E Yoder]

I've got a small (12'x12') office that I use for shipping, etc. Basically a storage shed. I put 100' pex under the floor and insulated it. That would barely keep above 50F in really cold weather. So I put approx. 100' coiled ½" pex under the counter, zip tied to the wall.
Now it'll stay any temp I set it at.
I think a bunch of pex in a stud bay would do pretty good. The more the better, the hotter the air the better the convection current will work.

[mlappin]

Yah, dont want to loose any space and the wife hates baseboard heaters. I thought about a radiant wall or two, but then all the baseboard trim and crown moulding has to be torn torn and resized. Baseboards is easy, crown mounding not so much.

I do have some baseboard in the basement but it’s ran behind the water heater, well pressure tank, water softener, etc so she doesn’t lose any space to it.

I even thought about a kickspace heater in a wall kit but my other ideal is silent. If it doesn’t work I’m out some pex and a 100’ of soft copper tubing. I’ll try it before hanging the drywall in the office, if it’s a flop I can at least repurpose the copper for something else.

[mlappin]

Bare copper doesn't emit very much radiant heat, in a baseboard scenario we'd be talking ~50 BTU per foot with 3/4" type L and 180 degree water. I wonder what the actual output would be in a wall like this

Ideally, it would be finned copper tubing, as in a real hydronic baseboard heater.

I thought about buying just some replacement elements. Could place em at a diagonal from corner to corner in a stud bay.  Even thought about cutting them down and using a ton of elbows. More I thought about a stack of foot long finned elements in the wall and a ton of elbows the less I liked it.

It doesn’t need much, coolest I’ve seen it so far was 65 with the rest of the house at 67.

[slimjim]

How about a nice ornate cast iron radiator then?

[mlappin]

How about a nice ornate cast iron radiator then?

Yah, I’ve thought about a few of those if we ever enclose the porch. Would loose a bit of space in the bedroom. Only real spot for it would be where one of her aquariums is at now, the chances of moving the angels for a radiator are nil to none.

[wreckit87]

Just thinking out loud, but what if you were to grab a roll of 1/2" pex and zip tie it into a slinky, like they do for geothermal trench loops, and bury that in the stud bays? Say maybe 100-150 feet per stud bay? Then you'd have a lot more coverage than trying to fight copper, as the slinky loops would simply overlap each other and get you a lot of emitter in a not so big area.. Might be kind of a bugger to get coiled, but should do nicely once in the cavity I'd think

[mlappin]

That’s what I was figuring to do with the copper, figure 50ft of copper probably radiates as much as 100’ of pex.

[mlappin]

And thank you, a slinky is the best analogy of what I planned with the soft copper tubing. Suppose soft expands and contracts more than hard copper tubing?

[E Yoder]

Emissivity of pex is actually higher than copper. I think so anyway because of coppers shiny surface.