Can I Skip the Baseboard Covers?
I went round and round about what kind of heat to use on my weekend house, and, with the help of this board, decided on forced hot air with central a/c. THEN my plumber/heating guy tells me, guess what, looks like the old furnace is fine, the baseboards probably need minimal repairs, and why on…
I went round and round about what kind of heat to use on my weekend house, and, with the help of this board, decided on forced hot air with central a/c. THEN my plumber/heating guy tells me, guess what, looks like the old furnace is fine, the baseboards probably need minimal repairs, and why on earth would you scrap everything?
Well, crap.
So it looks like I’m keeping the baseboard. I hate the look of baseboards. But I really hate the look of the covers and all other covers I see online. Would it be insane to skip the covers? Just have a copper pipe lining the room? I know the covers provide some.. something to radiate the heat and I know they’d be really hot without the covers. But is that so bad? I have hot risers in my apartment and manage to avoid them.
Can I skip them?
You may be right edifice rex, but there are whole rooms where it’s just the pipe, looking a little like the pic master plumber posts — which is exactly what I was thinking of doing. There are portions with fins and covers and I think those were more recent additions. Maybe patched in to beef up the heat? Not sure. I’ll be up there tomorrow and I’m going to look the whole line over.
I like those Runtal baseboards a lot. That’s plan B for sure.
You said “fins are part of the cover”. I believe you will find the fins are part of the covered pipe and the cover snaps on the Fin Tube. The bare pipe you see is used to connect the sections of Fin Tube.
Exposed fins are not a good idea as they are sharp but people do it. Other than a custom cover………
These work well and look good but are not that cheap 13k btu for $850
http://www.pexsupply.com/Runtal-UF-4-168-12-x-168-14-ft-Baseboard-Radiator-13020-BTUH-6027000-p
Ugh. You’re right, tybur6. I misunderstood.
Anyway, the info is the same. You’ll be reducing your heat output from 580 BTU/ft to 45.
I did it in an office in SoHo here and they love it: http://www.flickr.com/photos/gatewayplumbing/4051011109/
But we had to triple the amount of pipe we normally would have used.
yes, it’s just pipe. no fins, no enclosures, no nothing. just a 3/4 copper pipe running all around the house.
if a naked pipe is not going to work, can I buy and add fins to existing pipe?
Ringo, are you talking about removing the square aluminum fins from the copper pipe in addition to the sheet metal enclosures?
But that’s what Ringo said initially…. I’m confused.
Ringo’s initial post: “Would it be insane to skip the covers? Just have a copper pipe lining the room?”
So that would be all 45 BTUs per foot. No covers. No fins.
DIBS, it will be propane.
I know what you’re saying about though. I’m on the board of my brooklyn co-op and we bought our oil (and now gas) like this. Not sure how the prices move with propane. I expect there is a similar break for buying off-season. Who knows.
No. I mean the sections of pipe that do not have fins (bare) emit 45 BTUs per foot.
The sections of pipe that have fins on them, emit 580 BTUs.
This is irrespective of either the bare or finned tubes being in a factory enclosure.
No. I mean the sections of pipe that do not have fins (bare) emit 45 BTUs per foot.
The sections of pipe that have fins on them, emit 580 BTUs.
This is irrespective of either the bare or finned tubes being in a factory enclosure.