Should I have separate zones on central heating system?

[windsortg]

The central heating system in my home is currently running 19 radiators. I use Tado (similar to Hive and Nest) to program and control the hot water and heating system. I am looking to have an orangery built which will have a wet under-floor-heating (UFH) system on its own zone. I have been advised to also have one radiator in the orangery to boost the heat in the orangery whenever necessary.

Should I have this radiator in the orangery on its own zone or should it be connected to the zone that runs the UFH system? All zones can hopefully be controlled through the Tado system.

 

[BlueLoo]

As a guess:

If it's to boost the room, it would need a heat source separate from UFH heat source else its not going to provide much boosting and will skew the design parameters of the UFH?

Take the rad off the CH circuit and leave the UFH separate?

 

[windsortg]

Thanks @BlueLoo. Yes, it is to boost the room. What do you exactly mean by “a heat source separate from the UFH heat source”?

Where you say “take the rad of the CH circuit”, do you mean taking a connection from the existing CH circuit for the new rad? Would that mean the new rad would only come on based on the program and thermostat setting for the whole CH circuit?

Could the new rad be on its on program and thermostat stat setting, i.e. smart radiator thermostat?

 

[BlueLoo]

Thanks @BlueLoo. Yes, it is to boost the room. What do you exactly mean by “a heat source separate from the UFH heat source”?

Where you say “take the rad of the CH circuit”, do you mean taking a connection from the existing CH circuit for the new rad? Would that mean the new rad would only come on based on the program and thermostat setting for the whole CH circuit?

Could the new rad be on its on program and thermostat stat setting, i.e. smart radiator thermostat?

If you have all smart rads, you can do away with zoning at all, instead, each rad (or stat) becomes it's own zone. So for the Orangery (Jet Set Willy says Hi!) The rad in there can ask the boiler for heat itself.

 

[windsortg]

None of the existing rads have ‘smart’ thermostats. I wasn’t planning on putting smart thermostats on the rads either.

Based on that, what would you suggest would be the best set up? Could the new rad with its own smart thermostat be on its own zone?

 

[BlueLoo]

None of the existing rads have ‘smart’ thermostats. I wasn’t planning on putting smart thermostats on the rads either.

Based on that, what would you suggest would be the best set up? Could the new rad with its own smart thermostat be on its own zone?

A rad needs heat to work. If its dumb, it can't ask fot it itself so isn't much use in your situation (I don't think so anyway).

How are you going to supply the ufh? New boiler?

If so, can that be configured to provide low temp heat for the ufh and high temp heat for the rad?

What is your energy map for all of this?

 

[windsortg]

Hmm… sorry @BlueLoo but I’m getting a bit lost by what you’re saying . Most of my existing rads have normal thermostatic valves. I have a condensing boiler that supplies the hot water and heating to the rads.

For the UFH, I’ve had a couple of plumbers who said that I can take a feed from the flow & return pipes that come from my boiler to the airing cupboard (where a megaflow, pump and 2 x zone valves live) and run this to the UHF manifold. I guess somewhere a new zone valve will be positioned to operate the UFH system.

Based on this, what would you suggest would be the best way to connect the new single rad in the orangery?

Not sure what you mean by ‘energy map’.