Bathroom heating

8 years ago

So, we are rebuilding 2 smaller bathrooms out of 1 large ones. Current bathroom has a small electrical radiator as a heating source. We would like to add hydronic baseboard heaters in both bath, since the full house has same type of heat.

Is this something that can be done.. meaning.. can I just "plug" into an already excising line that runs next to these new bathrooms without installing new boiler and new lines for this?

Thanks!

Featured Answer

Bruce in Northern Virginia

8 years ago

There are several ways to interconnect hydronic heat, so you will need to have a contractor look at the system to see what is feasible. For example, my house has radiators and the two main water pipes (supply and return) for the hydronic system run around basement near the ceiling. All connections to the radiators on the 1st and 2nd floors are run vertically from the basement pipes up to the rooms above, so there are two vertical hydronic pipes in the wall for each radiator (supply and return).

In my case, having a radiator in the room next door does not make it any easier to add a new radiator, since the new supply and return lines need to be run all the way to the basement.

Bruce

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Comments (10)

mike_home
8 years ago
Adding one bathroom to the existing baseboard heating system should not be an issue. How many feet of baseboard do you plan to add? About how many feet of baseboard already exists?
HU-51655312 thanked mike_home
HU-51655312
Original Author
8 years ago
So there's currently no baseboard heating in the 1 large bath. There's an electrical one (i think) which will be trashed. There is a line however that runs along the bathroom since there are 2 rooms on both sides of this bath that have baseboard heating.

The 2 new baths will be approximately 8x9ft. I'd like to put in whatever size is necessary to keep the baths warm in the winter.
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mike_home
8 years ago
Bathrooms usually have a limited wall space for installing baseboards. So I suggest you come up with a plan as to determine how much baseboard could be installed.

There are alternatives to baseboard. A towel radiator like this one:

could work if you have limited space.

You should get quotes from an HVAC contractor who does plumbing for baseboard heating. That will give you an idea how feasible it would be to tie into the existing plumbing.
HU-51655312 thanked mike_home
H B
8 years ago
Runtal towel radiators are terrific!
HU-51655312 thanked H B
HU-51655312
Original Author
8 years ago
Thanks Mike_home... Im more concerned if its actually possible to connect into my current baseboard heating that runs in the adjacent rooms. I am getting very mixed reviews from various contractors and plumbers.
User
8 years ago
last modified: 8 years ago
The best anyone can tell you from here is “maybe”.

That one bath needs to be super large to get two code compliant baths out of it.

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construction · More Info
HU-51655312
Original Author
8 years ago
i see... thanks Bruce.. didnt realize it could be done this way. i guess we'll see once we demo everything
Bette P
8 years ago
Curious, have you considered in floor heating? Is that a possibility?
Bruce in Northern Virginia
8 years ago
last modified: 8 years ago
If you are going to demo everything, you may want to ask your contractor whether it makes sense to install hydronic heat manifolds, and make new individual connections with PEX. When we upgraded our system we replaced the large pipes in the basement with 2 new manifolds (supply and return), and from the manifolds we have individual lines that run directly to each radiator. We were able to get rid of the large 1" cast iron main supply/return pipes running around the basement ceiling, and could route 1/2" oxygen barrier PEX instead.

This home-run design means that I can shut off the flow to an individual radiator from the basement if I need to fix a leak. I also have the option to replace the manifold shutoff for that radiator with an electric zone valve that would be controlled by a room thermostat. My house heats quite evenly, so I don't expect to ever install the zone valves, but I could see its value in houses with a more complicated layout.

Bruce