Tips for using underfloor heating

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If you have underfloor heating, how do you use it? What I mean is - it takes longer than radiators to warm up - so do you just set it to a certain temperature and leave it?

Systems may vary but the instructions on mine suggest you leave it set at the lowest temperature you can live with..(so 21 for me during the day and 18 overnight) and let the thermostat regulate it. If you feel chilly, you can then boost it higher for a particular room. I have separate controls for each room.

It is the main (only) heating in our large open plan kitchen/dining/living space. Unfortunately apart from bedrooms we have no doors, so the corridors to bedrooms and to the front door and the other living space are all open, even the other living space has archways not a door (NOT our design!) so we find the ambient heat really wafts away quickly.

Our system is one that was installed when the house was built, it's a large concrete slab under the tiles that takes roughly 3 days to properly heat up, so we have to leave it on roughly 6 months of the year as heating it up costs a lot, but maintaining the heat doesn't. It is powered via our solar, but does have an override to mains power, so we try to boost it on sunny days, even if that means it's a bit too hot. Boosting it via mains power is very expensive. The control panel on the wall has a green light if it's running via solar, and a red one if it's running off mains. It does seem to run much better on sunny days when we need it less than on a cold, wet week when there is little solar generated.

It is really nice to have warm feet! There is definitely a massively noticeable difference in temperature if you walk on the non carpeted floors that don't have underfloor heating.

Hope that helps!

We have it only in the bathroom. We have it on a timer thermostat that essentially keeps it low in the day and bumps it up a bit during the night and earlier morning so bathroom trips in the night do not lead to frostbitten feet. The floor is tile.

Thanks. I will probably keep it on at a constant low temperature…

Ours starts up earlier and aims for what you set it to. So if you set it for 20 degrees at 7 am - it will start heating at 6 (for example) so it reaches 20 degrees at 7 am.