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Boilers & Radiant
Heating
 We Sell and Install
the following brands: Buderus,
Raypak, Triangle Tube, Munchkin and Dunkirk
We Use the following
manufacture’s components in our installations:
Honeywell, Grundfos, Taco, Bell &
Gossett, Wilo, Oventrop, Caleffi, Watts, Amtrol,
Superstor and Megastor.
We service All makes and
models.
Boilers
A boiler is the
heating plant used to create hot water or steam
for hydronic baseboard, radiant heat or steam
radiator heating systems. Also, boilers can be
set up to heat your hot water for showers or any
domestic use. In Colorado we have all types of
applications for boilers, steam, hot water or
in-floor radiant.
As with many other heating and cooling
products there has been substantial
technological improvement in boilers. The most
notable is the modulating boiler. Put
simply, the modulating boiler uses only the
amount of fuel to achieve the desired
temperature of the house depending on the
outside temperature. If the temperature is 40
degrees the boiler may only call for a little
fuel to create the desired result. If the
temperature drops to 5 degrees the boiler will
call for more fuel and heat up hotter. Think of
it as cruise control – you don’t need to press
on the gas pedal the same amount on a flat
stretch of road as you need going up in the
mountains. Consequently, you get better mileage
on the flats compared to in the mountains.
Boiler efficiencies have also improved with
AFUEs of ranging from 84% up to 96%. You can see
that with this level of increased efficiency,
the opportunity to save a lot of energy is even
greater. The average 25 year old boiler is
likely around 65% efficient.
An added advantage of a boiler system is you
a heat your domestic hot water and eliminate the
need for a separate hot water system. By
attaching a ‘sidearm” (water tank) to the boiler
system you will be able to heat water with a
system that is much more efficient than a
regular water tank. Further, the tank can be
smaller and offers a virtually limitless supply
of hot water because of the higher recovery rate
of a sidearm setup.
Radiant Heating
What is
radiant heating?
It is important to have a clear understanding
of how radiant heating works as well as how it
differs from other forms of heating.
Conduction
is how heat moves
through solid materials, or from one solid
material to another when the two are in contact.
If you stand barefooted on a cool basement floor
slab, heat transfers from your feet to the floor
by conduction.
Convection is how heat moves
between a solid surface and a fluid. The fluid
may be either a liquid or a gas. Hot water
flowing through a pipe transfers heat to the
inside wall of the pipe by convection. Likewise,
air flowing across the heat exchanger inside a
furnace absorbs heat from the hot metal
surfaces.
Radiant heat transfer occurs
when infrared light leaves the surface of an
object and travels to the surface(s) of other
cooler objects. Unlike conduction and
convection, radiant heat transfer does not
require a fluid or solid material between the
two objects transferring heating. It only
requires a space between the two objects. The
radiant energy only becomes sensible heat when
absorbed by a surface.
The radiant heat emitted by the relatively
low temperature heat emitters used in hydronic
heating is technically described as infrared
electromagnetic radiation. It’s simply light
that the human eye can’t see. However, other
than the fact that it’s invisible, infrared
light behaves just like visible light. It
travels in straight lines at the speed of light
(186,000 miles per second), and can be partially
reflected by polished metallic surfaces. Unlike
warm air, radiant energy travels equally well in
any direction. Up, down or sideways, direction
simply doesn’t matter. This characteristic
allows a heated ceiling to deliver radiant heat
to the room below. The radiant heat emitted by a
warm floor, wall or ceiling is a completely
natural phenomenon that’s literally as old as
the universe itself. A surface warmed by
sunlight gives off infrared radiation just like
one warmed by embedded tubing. The latter simply
uses a different heat source and transport
system to deliver heat to the surface. Most low
temperature radiant heat panels emit less than
1/10 the radiant flux of bright sunlight, and
all of it is infrared as opposed to ultraviolet
light. Even the human body gives off infrared
radiation to cooler surrounding surfaces.
Benefits of Radiant Floor Heating
Systems
Radiant heating systems are considered by
many as the ultimate form of comfort heating. In
addition to the advantages of hydronic heating
in general, warm floors provide benefits that
virtually no other system can match. Any one of
these benefits can become the “hot button” that
convinces a discriminating customer to install a
radiant heat system. Here’s a summary of these
key benefits.
Thermal Comfort:
Structures
equipped with radiant heat systems have interior
environments that are highly favorable to human
comfort. Unlike many systems that directly heat
the air, radiant floor heating gently warms the
surfaces of objects in the room as well as the
air itself. The warm surfaces significantly
reduce the rate of heat loss from the occupants,
allowing most to feel comfortable at room
temperatures 3 to 5 deg. F. lower than with
other methods of heating.
The air temperature at floor level is
slightly higher than the average room
temperature. This significantly reduces the rate
of heat loss from the feet and legs. Several
feet above the floor, the air temperature begins
to decrease. Most people tend to feel more alert
with slightly lower air temperatures at head
level. The lowest air temperatures in the room
typically occur just below the ceiling. The
result is reduced heat loss through the ceiling
insulation and hence lower heating costs.
Not Visible:
Most people realize that just about every
occupied building in North America needs a
heating system. However, few enjoy looking at
the heat emitters that are a necessary part of
that system. The fact that such heat emitters
often restrict furniture placement further adds
to their invasiveness. With a radiant heat
system, the floor surface is the heat emitter.
There’s no need to compromise the aesthetics of
the space or restrict furniture placement. It’s
a system that gives your clients a building
interior that’s as thermally luxurious as it is
aesthetically elegant.
Quiet system:
One of the
strengths of a radiant heating system is its
ability to deliver heat without delivering
noise. A properly designed radiant heat system
is the epitome of silence. The gas or oil burner
on the boiler is often the only component that
makes any detectable noise, and it’s usually
located in the mechanical room away from the
occupied spaces.
Clean system: One of the
biggest complaints associated with forced air
heating is its tendency to distribute dust,
odors and germs throughout a house. In contrast
to whole house air movement, radiant flooring
heating creates very gentle (imperceptible) room
air circulation. Many people who suffer from
allergies have found that radiant heat doesn’t
aggravate the symptoms the way a forced air
system often does.
Durable system:
A concrete
slab type radiant floor heating system is nearly
as indestructible as the slab itself. It’s the
ideal way to heat garage facilities, industrial
buildings, recreation rooms, basements or other
buildings with high interior traffic. You must
always insulate the concrete slab from the
earth.
Radiant Baseboard Heating
Radiant
Baseboard System
Similar to radiant heat, this system uses hot
water heated by a boiler to heat a space by a
combination of radiation and convection.
Distribution
Hot water heated by boiler and piped to
"fin-tube" baseboard units mounted along walls.
The fins increase the surface area of heat
dissipation making the unit more efficient. Air
is distributed by convection as air rises and is
heated by the baseboard unit.
Advantages
- Energy efficient
- Quiet
- Close temperature control
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