Ceiling Heat, Part Deux

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JFletcher

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Williamsburg, VA
As a follow up to this topic:

http://forums.mikeholt.com/showthread.php?t=181788

If I may ask the more experienced members here, how would you know that ceiling heat is there? Lack of baseboard heat, check the panel in hopes of finding an old 'ceiling heat' marking? Even a small pilot hole with a camera seems like it would miss finding this, even if you went thru the wire grid (oops). Would that stuff get hot enough to damage the paint finish below? Were ceiling heat grids/mats installed widespread, and what timeframe was their hey-day?
 
I used to install quite a bit of the Flex Watt stuff shown in the older thread. As I remember the NEC requires that a label be installed in the panel indicating there is concealed ceiling heat. I think the thermostats we used in each room had similar labels.
 
A line-voltage 'stat in each room with no visible load (baseboard, etc) would be a "tell".
 
And, still, there will be jobs that eat your lunch.

I was hired to install some recessed 6" rounds in a 1915 mansion that had a lot of gee-whiz gizmos added to it beginning in the 1930s and on for a couple decades. I would learn this as I did more work, later. . . but that first job, adding the recessed cans to improve the kitchen lighting was the introduction.

The kitchen was an interior room, having no walls adjacent to the mansion exterior. It had been remodeled with new cabinetry sometime in the eighties. The ceiling turned out to be plaster on expanded metal lathe with embedded 1/8 inch copper tubing for a HYDRONIC heating system controlled by pneumatic thermostats. It's amazing how fast a sawzall will cut through a ceiling like that without any hint of difficulty until the water starts flowing. . . .
 
OldSparks said:
A line-voltage 'stat in each room with no visible load (baseboard, etc) would be a "tell".
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I agree. The Flex Watt systems had stats that said Flex Watt unless they have been replaced with aftermarket. The homeowner usually knows about the heating system. The best way to tell is as OldSparks said though.
 
MNSparky said:
I agree. The Flex Watt systems had stats that said Flex Watt unless they have been replaced with aftermarket. The homeowner usually knows about the heating system. The best way to tell is as OldSparks said though.
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Tim,

Have you seen many systems in the metro? We rarely see them.
 
chris1971 said:
Tim,

Have you seen many systems in the metro? We rarely see them.
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I haven't seen a lot, Tim. Just a few and they've always been the Flex Watt style. I've never seen the individual cables or the hydronic style Al mentioned. I hope I never have to deal with the disaster he had on his hands!
 
curt swartz said:
As I remember the NEC requires that a label be installed in the panel indicating there is concealed ceiling heat. I think the thermostats we used in each room had similar labels.
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And if you count on that sort of indication on something that has been installed for 40-50 years, you will cut into them.
 
Ceiling cable heat would have to have a stat in every room wouldn't it? Use a UG wire locator to trace down the wires up the wall and onto the ceiling, and there if close enough to the surface you can use a NCV sensor to trace it exactly, to avoid cutting wires during rework.

The flex-heat ribbon stuff? Yeah horrible stuff, delete it.
 
GoldDigger said:
That would show the actual heat grid, but would not show any low resistance interconnecting wires.
Better than nothing though.
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Would you be able to make some assumptions as to the interconnects by where the grids starts and stops?
 
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