MetallicaMatt

iTrader: (19)

This would be for a brand new garage, brand new house. I'm looking at buying land right now, so I'll be building in stages

probably:
5,000 sq foot garage
THEN a house

lol!

I plan to have at least 1 hoist in my garage, so I don't "need" heated floors, but I figured it would heat the garage better. I didn't know it was so cheap these days, having a heated driveway would be nice! With some of the ice storms we get up here by the lake

MikeGyver

iTrader: (5)

One of the accounts that I maintain is a library with 2 heat pumps, with gas instead of electricity for 2nd stage, or emergency heat as they call it. Also the outdoor units have thermostats that disable the heat pumps at somewhere around 35° F. There is no way to tell if they're saving money over gas-only heat, since the building was built this way 20 years ago. I always thought that if you insisted on having a heat pump, that this was the way to go about it in our climate (the salt belt).
I wonder if geothermal with gas backup would be an economical way to heat water?

MetallicaMatt

iTrader: (19)

from what I can tell, yes geothermal is expensive upfront, but after that, everything should be pretty dirt cheap (no pun)

plus the cost of electricity and gas is always going up...as of right now...they can't tax me for a hole in the ground for geothermal

...yet


also, maybe theres a tax write off for geothermal since all of this "go green" sh*t is in the news

MikeGyver

iTrader: (5)

I meant gas vs. electric backup.

mrdragster1970

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Don't forget with in floor system you can zone each room, and even a small area just for your car. As said, we have a couple of units in my building and it's great. Laying on the floor even when the air is cold is very comfortable. Plus you don't have to wait for the whole shop to warm up if you keep the heat low when you're not around for days at a time.

.

SSJIMMY

iTrader: (8)

im sure that will be very nice having heated floors hope nobody does that in florida though cause it be really hot. I love having the AC in the garages now though so much nicer to be out there.

MetallicaMatt

iTrader: (19)

yeah, I want to have A/C in my shop also

so I'm goina have to have low ceilings to help keep the cooling costs down, but still have room for a lift

LuvmyC5

iTrader: (1)

This might be a stupid question, but with the in- floor radiant heat, in the summer can you run just plain cool water through the PEX tubing and keep the floor temps down?

I'd have loved to have radiant floor heating in our house, but my wife didn't want to build, so we just bought one with a furnace!

Good Luck!

MikeGyver

iTrader: (5)

It depends on how much condensation you can put up with.

silverbandit0996

iTrader: (2)

im an electrician an we just installed a heated floor grid under some bathroom tile floor. you could probably sandwich it between some concrete.

454mag

iTrader: (17)

I installed a radiant loop in my ~1000 sq foot garage floor. It was the best move I ever made. I heat it in winter with 3 4x8 solar hot water panels and the garage never goes below 60 in the winter. I tried heating it with the gas boiler the first winter but it was crazy expensive. the solar panels work excellent and have the added benefit of providing domestic hot water from may to november when I dont need to heat the garage. I also covered the floor with commercial viny tiles and I cant tell you how much nicer it is to slide undeer a car on a nice warm floor in january.

OMGWTFBODY

iTrader: (5)

What is this cold you speak of?