Rayotec triple tube

[dodgem101]

I'm looking for an underfloor heating system at the moment and wondered whether anyone here had used Rayotec Triple Tube and what you thought of it?

The reason it stands out from the rest for me is the fact that it can be installed directly below an engineered wooden floor as well as in screed. I am building a new kitchen extension which will have a new floor so i can install in screed there and tile it. The lounge and dining room currently have floors made of expanded polystyrene under chipboard under carpet on a concrete subfloor. The rayotec triple tube system can be laid in preformed insulated boards under a wooden floor and will only raise the floor level by a few mm from it's current height.

So, any opinions on the rayotec system, or other ways of achieving what i want? I know i could use electric ufh in the lounge and dining room, but water just seems to be a better system to me, and should be cheaper to run.

Thanks,
Simon

 

[mointainwalker]

Never heard of it - and couldn't find it - but if it only raises floor by a few mm then:

1) Insulation (special pre-formed boards) must only be a few mm thick
with consequent major heat-loss to sub-floor.
2) In spite of being of little insulation value, I would bet that
these "special" boards are specially expensive.
3) The tubes must also be very small which must result in either :
a) Very very short circuits or...
b) Potential problems with the flow-resistance and therefore the pump.

 

[dodgem101]

Sorry, i didn't make it very clear about the height of the floor.

It would only raise the floor height a few mm above my current finished floor height, since i am removing roughly 50mm of material to get back to the concrete. The preformed boards, which are the insulator, are approx 50mm thick, and the tubes (i think they are about 16mm) sit in the boards, so are separated from the subfloor by 34mm.

The woman i spoke to when i phoned them said average cost was around £20 per square meter, but i'm not sure if that was for in-screed or using the insulating blocks that they manufacture (probably from expanded polystyrene).

Link to their triple tube system: Rayotec Triple Tube.
(Rayotec are the first result when typing "Rayotec" into Google).

Cheers for your comments though

 

[mointainwalker]

OK

Had a look, but see no reason to re-invent the wheel.

They have a section "Why triple-tube heating ?" (or similar) and then proceed to give no reasons (!) but that is not unusual in a sales brochure )

There are also so many things left unspecified i.e. I couldn;t find the height of pipe which is reasonably important ( deduced it at 9 mm from a drawing: pipe + 6mm foil-insulation same height as a 15 mm batten)

How easy is it to lay this stuff as a triple-pipe ? 16 mm PER is difficult enough as a single pipe.

What is the tightest radius that is possible ? This will restrict how closely you can lay the pipe which determines the heat output.

They make a big deal out of confidence of quality saying they give a 25 year guarantee. That doesn't sound so good when you know that major PER pipe makers give 50 years

That's not too important though, as they only guarantee to refund the cost of the pipe which is not very important if the floor has to be dug up.

Then they talk about a s/s heat-exchanger in the manifold ? What the hell is that ?? All systems I know get their desired water temp from the boiler or a mixing-valve.

What's the attraction to you of this system, I really would like to know.

To me it just seems weird and , as in all walks of life, the more special and exclusive items there are, the more it must cost because of production costs and also the desire to push the price up as there is no comparable product/supplier

Edit: Have just re-read your post and seen need to heat other existing areas, but tell me, which of their options are you considering for that ?

 

[dodgem101]

Thanks again mointainwalker.

I'll take some of your questions, such as bend radius, back to Rayotec and see what they have to say. As you say, it could be pretty hard to get 3 pipes together round a bend without the inner one "popping up".

The 25 year vs 50 year guarantee isn't so important since the cost of the pipe isn't really the major cost, and in a rather selfish way, i won't be in this house in 25 years time anyway!

The thing that attracts me to Triple Tube is that i would like to use water based ufh in my existing rooms, but i cannot make my finished floor level more than 60mm above the concrete subfloor. Rayotec seem to be the only company that offers such a solution. I would use the Floating Floor - Tubing in tracked insulation method for these rooms. The alternative is electric, and i understand that can be more expensive to run.

In the kitchen extension, i can use any water ufh to be honest, since it will be laid in the screed under slate tiles. I have only considered Triple Tube for that since it was my choice for the other floors.

The whole contraflow design idea seems to make sense, though i don't know how much of a difference it would make in reality. More in the situation of laying a wooden floor directly over it than in the case of laying it in screed that's for sure!

 

[mointainwalker]

As someone with a personal interest in UFH and with a career in selling (nothing to do with heating), there is nothing I like about this web-site.

It gives very little information and is clearly sales-driven i.e. nice words and phrases - but no detail -carefully considered to target known reasons for not buying UFH e.g. floor-height, messy screed-laying.

Other questions I would ask.

1) What is the max output W/m2 at finished-floor surface?

If they answer this professionally, they should give you the figure with
input temp and also tell you the floor they have assumed.

This is important because since these pre-formed board are used, they are determining exactly what heat input you get and - this is the thing I don't like - since everyone's heat requirements are different , how is the system adapted to provide the right heat for a new-build in Brighton or an old house in Aberdeen ?

2) Who is responsible for supplying heat-loss calcs ?

I see in the blurb that they say the tubing is KEE Tubing, just looked that up and found the following at www.keeheating.co.uk

"Kee Triple Tube Underfloor Heating Limited is no longer trading.

Spare parts for the system, can be purchased from:-

Underfloor Direct Ltd,

Unit 1 Lisburn Enterprise Centre,

Ballinderry Road,

Lisburn,

BT28 2BP.



Phone 02892 634068

Fax 02892 669667

Email [email protected] "



I would be interested to hear of how you progress with Rayotec, please update the post.

Thanks

MW

 

[bricoleuse]

Thanks Mointainwalker, this is timely advice for me, as I had just been hovering over Rayotec's website myself and had been perplexed by Kee's announcement! I want to lay water underfloor heating, but can't raise the floor level by more than 8 cms, due to the ancient doors here. The existing floor is concrete and I will be laying natural, 2 cm thick cathedral flagstones. I would be very grateful for any recommendations you could offer me.

 

[mointainwalker]

Since this thread is only Rayotec, leave it as that and start a new thread and then i'll reply to that.