Why Choose Hydronic Baseboard Heaters
Take it from a man who knows: hydronic baseboard heaters are one of the best heating options for the really cold parts of the country.
Growing up in the midwest I know it can get very cold in the winter time. Sometimes to cold to run you heat as high as it needs to be to warm your entire house. We tried both electric and propane gas but the bills were just too high. I can imagine this is as bad in some of the even colder climates as well.
One of the best ideas we came up with as a family was a secondary heating source. We finally got tired of the stress of our heating and electric bills, and figured that the best way to go was to purchase individual heaters for our house. We had kerosene heaters, electric heaters, and even a wood burning stove. One problem that we encountered, however was the price it cost to heat every room with kerosene, along with an increase in electric bills. With the wood burning stove it was hard to heat rooms that weren’t connected to the room with the stove. We had many concerns over what to do, until a friend told us about hydronic baseboard heaters.
First, we did some research and found that hydronic heaters have been around since the 40’s and that they are much safer than many of the other options. These heaters basically heat water, which is then transferred throughout the metal tubing and released out into the room. The hot water comes from a boiler located in the main housing unit of a hydronic furnace system. That water is then transferred through the pipes to all of the various baseboard heaters located throughout the house. Once the heated water has been sent through all the pipes, there is a return pipe that sends the cooled water back to the main unit.
We found that these heaters were perfect for rooms that didn’t have a good heat source, upstairs bedrooms, the laundry room, the kitchen and bathrooms. With the central unit we were able to control when to heat a particular room and how much to heat it. They were also a great source of heat for the garage where my dad worked. And they work well as replacement sources of heat for those old ceramic heaters you still have stored around from the 1960s.
One of the nice characteristics of these heaters is that they are easily installed almost anywhere, as they do not take up much space. The most ideal location would be along an exterior wall to counteract the drafty winters.
One plus that we found with these hydronic baseboard heaters was the ability to move them from room to room, so if my dad was working in the garage all day, he could add an extra heater to keep him warm. Once the family got home for the day, the heaters could then be moved back to their original location. We also found it convenient because each heater came with its own thermostat built into the portable units, so we could decide how warm we needed each room to be. Like when we were at school our bedroom heaters would be turned down to minimize the costs of heating in our home.
