pros and cons

[Radicalsheep]

So I am in the planning stages of building a new home. I was woundering what are some pros and cons to the use of a hot water tank or a boiler for heated floors.

Is a boiler needed for heated floors? I am only going to have heated floors in the basement and that is it.

The last house that I lived in had heated floors and they used a hot water tank and I had no problems with it.

So any insight would be great. Total Square footage of the basement is about 1100.

Thanks

[mdshunk]

Whether you're using a traditional domestic water heater or a bonafide hot water furnace, you're doing the exact same thing. A hot water furnace (what you incorrectly referred to as a 'boiler'; they're for steam) will develop more BTU's and can raise the water to higher temperatures than a domestic water heater will. For radiant heating, you generally use loop water temperatures that are only slightly above the desired space heating setpoint. The domestic water heater was probably used in your former residence due to the fact that it would develop enough BTU's at the proper temperature to fulfill the heating requirements of the particular radiant loop(s) in that home. You'd need to calculate (or have someone calculate) the BTU requirements for your basement heating to see if you only need the output of a domestic water heater or if you need the higher BTU capability of the hot water furnace. Be advised that a hot water furnace will generally have a much longer lifespan than a domestic water heater will, but water heaters are much cheaper to replace when the time does come.

[Radicalsheep]

Thanks for the info.

The last house I had the hot water heater supplied heat to about 1100 square feet and a 20 by 22 garage. And I never had any issues with not getting the required heat that I needed. So I am not to sure if I need to do to much for calculations. But I am sure that I will need to get the plumber to do it anyways.

And up in canada we call it a boiler which is the same for a hot water furnace. You can have a boiler and not produce steam. It is very common in the oil and gas indusrty to have a boiler to heat closed glycol systems.

But either way I get were you are coming from.

And once again thanks for the info. I will have to price out the difference in price from a water heater(tank) and the hot water furnace. I am leaning towards the hot water tank. If the requirments will be ok with hot water tank.

[mdshunk]

And up in canada we call it a boiler which is the same for a hot water furnace. You can have a boiler and not produce steam. It is very common in the oil and gas indusrty to have a boiler to heat closed glycol systems.

Yes, it is quite common in the US as well to incorrectly call a hot water furnace a boiler. You cannot have actually have a bonafide boiler that does not product steam. Regardless of where you live, this is still an incorrect reference. A boiler only properly referrs to a steam heating furnace, and a hot water furnace is for heating a hot water loop. A hot water furnace may have additional aparatus added (pressure control, sight glass, low water cutoff) to become a boiler to produce steam.

There done. I'm off my soapbox now.

Whether a hot water furnace it needed, or a domestic water heater will due, the same controls and pumps are needed for either system and can be discounted for the price comparison. You'll still need things like zone controllers, circulator pumps, mixing valves, balancing valves and the like no matter which heating device you need to go with. You surely know this already, since you are famaliar with these systems. I added this info mostly in the interest of completeness for future readers.