Anyone have Radiant Heat under Wood Floors

We are redoing our home, and its a completely open floor plan, No walls at all except for a small half bath in the center.

Our dilema is, we wanted to put radiant heat under granite in the kitchen.
But we are thinking the flow of the open floor plan will look weird with just the kitchen granite and the rest wood.

So we are debating doing wood floors in the kitchen, but then we wont have any space for baseboard heating.

anyone have any advice.

Personally i want wood floors in teh kitchen, and FH wants granite, granite is hard on your back, and i feel wood has more give and not so cold and hard

Re: Anyone have Radiant Heat under Wood Floors

We have radiant heat under our granite floor in the kitchen and I LOVE it. We have an open floor plan too...but our house is so uneven, we were able to create a tiny step-up into the kitchen so it looks separate from the wood floors.

Re: Anyone have Radiant Heat under Wood Floors

We have engineered hardwood over our radiant heat on the first floor. I don't think regular hardwood was an option with the radiant heat.

Re: Anyone have Radiant Heat under Wood Floors

Message edited 9/13/2007 12:33:23 PM.

Re: Anyone have Radiant Heat under Wood Floors

Re: Anyone have Radiant Heat under Wood Floors

I will ask her if she has the contractor yet... She is building from scratch and hasn't closed on the land yet. I know she has an architect and some contractors, but not all.

I'll ask her when I talk to her next - I'm sure it will be soon.

Re: Anyone have Radiant Heat under Wood Floors

IMPORTANT -- This is what my hubby says about radiant heat under hardwood floors:

Tthe flooring must be installed over a dry surface, humidification should be provided in the house in the wintertime, and abrupt turning on and off the system can’t occur (large temperature swings) because it will cause cracking. The consensus here (his office) is that in a few areas of the house it is a good idea (tile floors in bathrooms, concrete floors) but throughout the whole house, radiant heat a bad idea unless proper installation and maintenance is adhered to by the homeowner. So yes real hardwood can be installed over the radiant heat but certain possible issues must be addressed.

Re: Anyone have Radiant Heat under Wood Floors

My parents have it in their house, there is a special wood that you use in order to have radiant heat otherwise the wood will expand!

Re: Anyone have Radiant Heat under Wood Floors

Re: Anyone have Radiant Heat under Wood Floors

I have radiant heat in my house and I have ceramic tile over it and Pergo floors. We're going to be selling our house really soon and didn't want the expense of putting in hardwood.