Infrared Heating

[MDC]

Does anyone have knowledge/experience of whole house infrared heating, please? That is, the only source of heating in the house is infrared. What's the story?

[Dan F]

Zehnder have a system which they have setup and can demoed to us in their camberley office, don't know much about it though.  We were told it could be used for cooling and heating.  https://www.zehnder.co.uk/products-and-systems/heating-and-cooling-ceiling-systems

[Russdl]

14 minutes ago, Dan F said:

We were told it could be used for cooling

Now that’s interesting. Looks clever, I wonder what the boffins here think of it?

[JohnMo]

Interesting that it's a water based system 

[SimonD]

It's just like UFH but in the ceiling. Not a new thing either, just new over here in backward blighty. Been around in continental Europe for some time and big companies like Uponor do similar systems. For a minute I feared we were going to be back on some debate about the electrical infrared heating and their efficiency rather than the wet systems. I made some efforts to source some for my project a few years ago but hit a bit of a wall in getting both information and supply.

 

Some research has suggested that ceiling installed systems are slightly less comfortable than floor ones due to the way our bodies perceive the warmth in our feet etc. However, I really don't like UFH as it makes my feet really uncomfortable and I prefer the warmth from above. Maybe I'm weird.

[Dan F]

10 minutes ago, SimonD said:

For a minute I feared we were going to be back on some debate about the electrical infrared heating and their efficiency rather than the wet systems.

 

Maybe that was my fault for mixing up "infrared" and "radiant" and the OP was asking about electrical infrared heating!  From what I remember Zehnder saying, the in-wall/ceiling systems produce more radient heat than UFH does and therefore you don't have to heat the house as much.

 

 

[JohnMo]

16 minutes ago, SimonD said:

really don't like UFH as it makes my feet really uncomfortable

Really depends on the level of insulation you have and how long you have the floor heating running for.  Long run times let you have super low flow temps.

 

Our flow temps at the moment are around 26, so floor temp is 21, no perception of a warm floor.  As it cooler than your body.

[ReedRichards]

2 hours ago, SimonD said:

It's just like UFH but in the ceiling.

 

The Zehnder product video makes it look more like ceiling mounted radiators!  

 

Infra-red heaters are typically electrically powered and instantaneous which makes them the most expensive type of heating you can get.

[JohnMo]

9 hours ago, ReedRichards said:

Zehnder product video makes it look more like ceiling mounted radiators

That's because they are, either hot or cold water powered

[MDC]

15 hours ago, Dan F said:

Zehnder have a system which they have setup and can demoed to us in their camberley office, don't know much about it though.  We were told it could be used for cooling and heating.  https://www.zehnder.co.uk/products-and-systems/heating-and-cooling-ceiling-systems

That's an excellent source, thank you!

[MDC]

14 hours ago, SimonD said:

It's just like UFH but in the ceiling. Not a new thing either, just new over here in backward blighty. Been around in continental Europe for some time and big companies like Uponor do similar systems. For a minute I feared we were going to be back on some debate about the electrical infrared heating and their efficiency rather than the wet systems. I made some efforts to source some for my project a few years ago but hit a bit of a wall in getting both information and supply.

 

Some research has suggested that ceiling installed systems are slightly less comfortable than floor ones due to the way our bodies perceive the warmth in our feet etc. However, I really don't like UFH as it makes my feet really uncomfortable and I prefer the warmth from above. Maybe I'm weird.

Most warmth comes from above. 

[MDC]

12 hours ago, ReedRichards said:

 

The Zehnder product video makes it look more like ceiling mounted radiators!  

 

Infra-red heaters are typically electrically powered and instantaneous which makes them the most expensive type of heating you can get.

Is this an assumption? Is there anywhere I can compare the set up of an ASHP system with an infrared system in terms of equipment, and running costs? 

[MDC]

2 hours ago, JohnMo said:

That's because they are, either hot or cold water powered

Not always. The residential section suggests wall mounted radiators, presumably not in a connected system.

[ReedRichards]

1 hour ago, MDC said:

Is this an assumption? Is there anywhere I can compare the set up of an ASHP system with an infrared system in terms of equipment, and running costs? 

 

It's not an assumption.  Any conventional heater converts electrical power to heat with 100% efficiency.  Not all of that heat is necessarily useful, for example if you have electric UFH then (hopefully) most heat will rise and heat the room but some will go down and heat the ground.  But basically you won't get more than 100% efficiency - except with a heat pump.  Heat pumps do what the name implies, they pump heat from outside to inside your house and with a decent heating system based around a heat pump you can aspire to 300% or more efficiency, that is you would get 3 kWh of heat for every 1 kWh of electricity used.  So the running cost of a heat-pump based heating system should be 1/3 that of the infra-red heaters you are looking at.  Heat pumps tend to be expensive to buy and install; I have no idea about the cost of infrared heaters.    

[JohnMo]

Not sure you are completely correct. You are assuming the heater has to be electric, but the ones @Dan F references are water filled. Designed

 to take hot water and cold water also,  so can equally apply to a heat pump as much as any other cold or hot water source.

 

Quite a few manufacturer out there doing a similar thing, as mentioned early nothing new.

 

Would agree electric ones not as good as a heat pump heating system.

[ReedRichards]

10 minutes ago, JohnMo said:

Not sure you are completely correct. You are assuming the heater has to be electric, but the ones @Dan F references are water filled. Designed

 to take hot water and cold water also,  so can equally apply to a heat pump as much as any other cold or hot water source.

 

Quite a few manufacturer out there doing a similar thing, as mentioned early nothing new.

 

Would agree electric ones not as good as a heat pump heating system.

 

Yes, the Zehnder heaters referred to by @Dan F seem to me to be a type of water-filled radiator.  But whereas conventional radiators are misnamed because they mostly transfer heat by convection, the Zehnder heaters claim to transfer heat mostly by infrared radiation so really would be radiators.  When filled with cold water and suspended from the ceiling they would presumably just condense water and drip it on your head.

[SteamyTea]

There are around 28 million homes in the UK.

Has anyone come across many with IR heating?

Not as if Physics has changed any, even if you allow for the difference between Newtonian and Quantum modelling methods.

[ReedRichards]

13 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

There are around 28 million homes in the UK.

Has anyone come across many with IR heating?

 

When we were looking for a house in 2018 we looked at one which had recently purchased infra-red heating panels that were suspended from the ceiling.  Talking to the owners made me strongly suspect that these has been mis-sold on the basis of false promises that they were economical to run.  In reality these would be no better than the two-bar "electric fire" I had to heat my room as a teenager.  In fact they would be worse because they couldn't be moved according to where you were seated and did not have the parabolic reflector that my electric fire had.  They put me off that house completely.

[SteamyTea]

1 minute ago, ReedRichards said:

Talking to the owners made me strongly suspect that these has been mis-sold on the basis of false promises that they were economical to run. 

We see similar problems on here ever week.  Is gas cheaper than ASHP, Radiators or UFH.

 

A day studying very, very basic thermodynamics and energy production would solve that problem for ever.

[jack]

17 hours ago, SimonD said:

However, I really don't like UFH as it makes my feet really uncomfortable and I prefer the warmth from above. Maybe I'm weird.

 

I completely agree with that. I visited a friend on a cold day in winter after they'd finished their massive refurb. Left my shoes at the door, and then had my feet sweat uncomfortably through the next couple of hours.

That said, we have UFH throughout our ground floor, which is 90% concrete. Even when it's very cold outside and the flow temp is at its highest (27 deg, C, I think we have it set at), the floor temperature is never uncomfortable underfoot.

[Radian]

25 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

There are around 28 million homes in the UK.

Has anyone come across many with IR heating?

 

But all of them surely?  Near-infrared radiation is what you feel coming up from UFH and at close range to a water filled radiator. If you put a thermometer in a transparent vacuum chamber then the temperature it registers is the result of electromagnetic radiation. Aren't we just getting hung-up on an assumption that IR=resistive electric heating when it can come from a variety of different sources?

[SteamyTea]

1 hour ago, Radian said:

 

But all of them surely?

Getting into the territory that walls that are colder than the air temperature, and body temperature, can actually efficiently heat people up via IR wavelengths. Many people think it works and claim it is a good reason to have 'lots of thermal mass'.

 

See here: energy and light 

 

Edited November 5, 2022 by SteamyTea

[MDC]

Okay, to cut a long story short, there seems to be no direct experience of infrared heating within a dwelling. It seems safe to conclude there is no direct experience because no one has it in their dwelling and that is because it does not perform as well as an ASHP in a well insulated building. When using the term infrared heating, I'm referring to an alternative heating system to ASHP, gas, hydrogen, LPG, oil, storage heaters, wood burners, tumble dryers and so on. Thank you.

[Iceverge]

I've been thinking about this. ( DANGER DANGER)

 

Mitsubishi have A2A units that track occupants movements in a room to avoid blowing them with air directly. 

 

Could the same technology be used in reverse to target them with focused IR heating. 

 

Maybe a parabolic dish with an IR heat source and a 3D gimble. It would heat your skin directly enhancing comfort without the expense and inconvenience of heating the air and structure of the hosue. 

 

Perhaps a catchy name like " Living room Radiation Ray blaster" would see it top the sales charts.

[JohnMo]

Would look like you have a big satellite dish in your living room tracking your every move.  What would happen if two of you walked in different direction?