Solar Home Heating - Radiant Floor Assist System

If you are not familiar with solar glycol systems it may be better for you to view that page first, prior to reviewing this page. There is a link at the bottom of the Active Solar Water Heating for Freezing Climates that will bring you back to this page.

Take a close look at the drawing below. Home heating systems using liquid collectors are the most complex of solar heating systems. If you have a radiant floor heating system in your home, they can also offer the highest percentage of the load displaced by solar energy. Although a system like this can work with baseboard heating systems and fan coil units, they are more effective with radiant floor systems since the temperatures needed are typically lower with radiant floor systems.

System Operation: The collectors (normally 4 to 12) have a glycol solution fluid that carries the solar heat from the collectors through the heat exchanger in the bulk storage tank. The glycol loop control turns the glycol pump on when the collectors are warmer than the tank and off at night when the tank is warmer than the collectors. The floor control diverts the return water from the radiant floor when the solar heated tank water can deliver heat to the floor, assisting the boiler in heating the home. A third control and heat exchanger are used to heat the domestic hot water in a similar manner. A properly sized system of this type can provide from fifty to seventy per cent of home heating energy.

This system can also be used for heating an outdoor swimming pool in the non home heating months by incorporating another heat exchanger in the tank and another control to heat the pool. As you can see, this is the most complex of all of the solar system designs but it offers a quicker pay back as the collectors are working at full capacity all year around.

In some cases a large tank is not required for storage. Ranch style homes with slab on grade construction or homes with brick floors can have enough thermal storage in the floor itself to take the place of the tank. These systems are less complex and are therefore less expensive. The difference in the systems can be seen by looking at the drawing below.

System Operation: In this system we use a domestic hot water storage tank that has a heat exchanger built in. The seasonal use of the system for home heating is regulated by a manual valve to send the glycol solution through the heat exchanger when home heating is needed. The two controls for this system are tied together with the floor control sensing the floor return water and the glycol control sensing the water in the storage tank.

Solar home heating systems using liquid collectors are many and varied. The drawings above are three that fit into many situations. There is no one type of system that is right for all homes and every system like this is custom designed. The cost for a home heating design of this type is $50 per hour with most designs costing between $100 and $200. System design includes piping and control drawings specifically tailored to your home and also includes an estimate for equipment and material costs. We are also able to estimate the performance of the system if we have detailed information about the home construction. If you would like more information about our design services, please feel free to contact us at one of the numbers given below or e-mail
designservices@aaasolar.com
This e-mail address is specifically for custom design services of solar heating systems. If you have a question about whether a liquid or air collector system would be the best for your home or a question about a custom design for a commercial building or other application, the design services e-mail address can help answer these type of questions. Please acknowledge in your e-mail if you are able to read Adobe PDF files on your computer; this is how we normally send custom design drawings. We can also send them by mail if necessary. Please understand that any inquiries for sales related, customer service or solar electric design to the e-mail address above will be forwarded to the appropriate department and will only delay our response to your inquiry.

About us - AAA Solar has been distributing solar and wind energy products for over twenty two years. We have sold or installed over ten thousand solar and wind energy systems. We distribute a full line of alternative energy products including solar electric systems, wind turbines, solar hot water heaters, solar home heating systems, swimming pool heating systems and solar ovens. Many systems are available in kit form for the do-it-yourselfer. Our installation and service department is a fully licensed and bonded New Mexico contractor with plumbing, electrical and heating and air conditioning licenses. We install and service solar systems and high efficiency heating and cooling appliances throughout the state of New Mexico. We occasionally install and or service systems in neighboring states. Please call us or e-mail for more details.

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