Friday, October 26, 2012

Radiant Heat Floor + Solid Wood Floor? That will not work, unless...

[Chapter 1]
I've been doing flooring for a long time now. I stopped counting the thousands of square feet of various wooden floors that I laid down. Of course there are more memorable projects that stand out – the Campbell's soup family project, Geddy Lee's floor, Freddy's place, my parents' house – and just as I though that I have seen it all, this comes along...




A company out of California comes out with this product called the 'Warmboard'. It is a radiant heat flooring system that utilizes CNC routed sub-floor panels that are clad in a thin aluminium skin, into which hot water PEX piping is pressed into. I was very impressed with this product – the design and engineering allowed for a traditional solid wood nail-down installation. Typically, radiant floor systems required more expensive engineered flooring product and site specific installations methods [custom made sub-floors, 'floating floors' or 'glue-down' methods].



It was definitely an install that challenged my skills, but at the same time it was an opportunity to work with cutting edge technology, and given the energy efficiency of radiant floor heating systems, it just may be the way of the future.

[Chapter 2]

HEPA filters just make so much sense in shopvacs. The last thing I want is to finish off a job and leave the client with that 'freshly vaccumed, fine dust' smell in the air.