Underwood Heating For Homes: Create The Best Experience With Kährs

August 21, 2019

Wood floorings are a sight to behold. They exhibit class and elegance, elevating your home to its best. While more and more people prefer wood flooring above the others for their homes, they are also looking at ways to improve the functionality of their home or apartment flooring

Although Dubai is predominantly a warm and sunny city, it is usually always cool inside the homes, offices and other commercial building with full-time air-conditioning. This is why a lot of homeowners are looking at underfloor heating, especially in the winter season. Fortunately, wood flooring and underfloor heating go hand in hand and can provide a very comfortable experience. 

Kährs hardwood flooring is a perfect choice for providing underfloor heating to your home. With specifically designed installation instructions, both hot-water, as well as electrical heating, can be provided with Kährs wood flooring. With proper installation and maintenance, these floorings can provide warmth during the winters for years. 

Underwood heating requirements

Kährs engineered wood floors are exceptionally good for underfloor heating as the surface temperature of the floor must never exceed 27°C. Wooden floorboards can easily maintain a temperature of 23°C over the entire floor area of a room with hot water or radiator heating, where the set temperature of the room is around 21°C.

For a room that is reasonably furnished without a wall to wall carpet covering the floor, 23°C is, in fact, the ideal surface temperature. If we assume that the room has a proper ceiling, windows and insulation have already been provided, underfloor heating in combination with Kährs wood flooring is undoubtedly of the best in the market to keep your floors naturally warm.

Moisture susceptibility

Any flooring with underfloor heating is generally more susceptible to moisture than those without it. Underfloor heating can lead to a notable difference in the moisture content between the dampest and driest parts of the floor over time. This will cause the wood to dry, contract and shrink in accordance with the climate. The shrinkage due to moisture susceptibility can make normal wooden boards to concave and create gaps in between from time to time.

The moisture susceptibility also varies between different wood species. For instance, hardwood flooring made from hard Maple or Beech tends to expand and contract more than other wood species. Therefore, these wood floorings are not recommended for use with underfloor heating. 

The Kährs Linnea 7 mm or the Kährs Original 15 mm parquet flooring with normal Woodloc® or Woodloc® 5S joints are a perfect fit for floors with underfloor heating. Both Kährs Linnea and Kährs Original and can considerably reduce gap formation and keep the floors beautiful throughout the year. The floorboards must be laid close to the subfloor, avoiding air gaps to ensure that the wood does not dry out very quickly.  As mentioned before parquet flooring made from hard Maple or Beech must be avoided while choosing your Kährs hardwood floors.

Installing underwood heating

Underwood heating loops are laid out at 18°C working temperature and with relative humidity between 30 and 60% before, during and after laying the floor. The Kährs technicians also prefer laying an intermediate layer of cardboard for the right amount of thermal resistance between the floorboards and the heating elements.

To install underwood heating, the floor must be constructed with a heat distributing layer, to ensure even temperature over the entire surface of the floor. The laid floor or the intermediate layer must have a low thermal resistance (like that of cardboard). Apart from this, a vapour barrier is built into the floor plan, positioned closer to the wooden floorboards, especially if the joists are thicker or heavier. These barriers will further help with insulation as well as fight moisture susceptibility. As the vapour barrier is composed of a thin film, usually a material like polyethene, that prevents the formation and diffusion of water vapour into the floor during the winter season.

With the right hardwood flooring and proper installation techniques, guard your home flooring against the cold winter days. Enjoy warmth in each step with Kährs.

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