The Toastiest Luxury Around

03 July 2008

You can have a Mercedes in the drive and a house in the Cotswold but for some reason nothing screams more luxury than underfloor heating.

Underfloor heating is still rare enough that when you stumble a place that has it, it feels like the ultimate luxury and it is difficult to resist the urge to just lie down, and stay there

There are four  types of underfloor heating. Ribbon heating mats, carbon film heating strips, electric floor heating cables and mats. According to suppliers, more and more DIY enthusiasts have taken to installing it themselves which means the cost has come down and the versatility of underfloor heating has been improved.

Generally, people have underfloor heating set to 27-28 °C. It works by an electric current passing through the resistance wires which then heat up the cable to a given temperature- depending on the design output of the conductor wires. Heating cables and mats are earth screened and fully waterproof, which makes them perfect for all underfloor heating installations including bathrooms.

Electric under floor heating comes in different forms: ribbon heating mats, carbon film heating strips, electric floor heating cables and mats. Due to the versatility and ease of installation required by the DIY enthusiast, and the increasing use by the growing underfloor heating trade, the more versatile (and lower cost) electric floor heating cables and mats are now recognised as the de facto product. Heating cables consist of twin core resistance wire conductors, with an outer sheath of (usually) PTFE, followed by screening foil, an earth braid and finally a waterproof protective outer jacket of either PVC or Teflon.

Electric heating cables have the advantage of allowing the installer to lay them out in any configuration: however, loose cables are required to be taped to the floor at preset intervals to secure them in position. This can be very time consuming and prone to mistakes, should the spacing distance not be accurate; leaving the installer with the problem with either too much heating cable left over at the end, or running out of cable too early in the installation and not achieving the floor coverage desired.

Whilst heating cables are perfect for smaller areas (like bathrooms) they can be very difficult to work with when scaling up the installation to larger areas, where a degree of experience is required to work with them to best advantage. The ideal solution to this conundrum is to use electric underfloor heating mats: the heating cable is pre-spaced by the manufacturer to produce a known output per m2, and secured onto a fibreglass mat backing. By using different conductor wire outputs per linear metre, cable heating mats can be designed to create different outputs of: 100, 150, 160 or 200 watts per metre squared (W/m2). Underfloor mats are the perfect solution for either the DIY enthusiast or experienced installer and can be laid out very quickly, saving valuable time for both trade and DIY alike. Heating mats also have the added flexibility of allowing the mat backing to be cut and manoeuvred around obstacles (like kitchen islands and fixed units). The heating cable is easily detached from the roll of mat backing and laid as a loose cable and fits easily into awkward areas.

If you would like to invest in underfloor heating or learn more about it, you can visit the The Floor Heating website where they offer a detailed online guide to underfloor heating.

Released By

Floor Heating Limited