Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with heat

how much heat radiates from a person

sockpim — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 12:51:13 -0800

How much heat (preferably in W or KW) radiates from the average person. (that is if they were fully clothed on an average day)

winterize my house in the green mountains

herbplarfegan — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 06:48:18 -0800

need help winterizing house! the house is not horribly inslated, but it has a lot of windows and very very high ceilings. my aim is to insulate the windows as much as possible, and whatever else. what I'm looking for is materials, brand names, and methods. heat is from Rinnai propane heater and a wood stove.

I saw AskMe discussions on this, sorry.. but I want really to get as specific as possible. my landlord lives out of state and just says "take care of it, send receipt to comp rent" about everything, and I've always just passed this kind of stuff off to landlords.

right now the Rinnai is on 'low' and the wood stove is loaded and burning, but the Rinnai is still huffing loudly to get heat into the place (cha ching$-- bad news.)

last year I lived in a summer-house all winter, also with a Rinnai heater, and it was $300+ a month.

I live in Vermont, at a high elevation. The temperature right at this moment is 1F / -17c. I've lived in Vermont all my life-- I can take the cold; it's my wallet that has a problem with it.

Most effective means of moving hot air?

ascetic — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 13:24:48 -0800

What is the best way to move hot air? Would it be blowing air across the heat source (ex: wood stove) or suck the air away from the heat source? I use a wood stove to heat my home which works perfectly, but it occasionally gets too hot in the living room (where the wood stove is). I want to disperse some of this excess heat into the other rooms.

Baby, it's COLD inside...

Spyder's Game — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 13:51:12 -0800

Thermostat seems to work fine. Except at night. When it gets cold. Quick background info: We bought this house a year ago. Yay! Ran into this same problem almost immediately. The heat works fine. Sometimes.

Last night my wife came home after I'd already gotten in bed. She said "it's freezing in here!" and I suddenly realized it was pretty cold. Temp had been falling steadily since I'd gone to bed at ten or so. So, rough night and two grumpy toddlers later, we were trying to figure out what happened. Then the heat (the glorious HEAT!) came on. And all was good. Last night it got cold again.

The thermostat seems to be the problem. Says the temp is 66 degrees. Says it SHOULD be 74. Fan is on AUTO and blows continuously, cool to (cold!) room temp air. It seems like it's TRYING to heat, but it has no heat to give. The next day, all is good again. What is it about cold winter nights (we had this problem last year right after we bought the house and muddled through the rest of the winter after the thing seemed to auto-correct itself.)

If I didn't know better, I'd think we had accidently programmed the thing to cool down to 66 at night. But we checked the programs. Daily and weekly. The temporary override feature also says it's working to bring the temp up, but it stubbornly stays at 66. I mean, a SOLID 66. Which is why I think the thermostat is to blame.

When it does heat, it blazes like the noonday sun, and does a great job. But at night, it's a different story. Anyone have an explanation for this? Similar problem that you fixed? We thought about calling a technician, but we're afraid he'll just come and charge us $150 to show us how to program our thermostat. But we're tired of shivering under the covers at night.

Here is the manual for the thermostat. It's the 5000 model.

I'm going to bloody well fix this Xbox myself.

Frasermoo — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 18:11:33 -0800

Help me fix my Xbox 360. I'm looking for documentation on a tried and tested fix for the red rings on the 360. Having been through multiple consoles, I've decided to try the X clamp fix myself. Has anyone here done it themselves? What instructions did you follow? Was it successful?

does a direct external heat source mess with your body?

bdoop21 — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 11:20:47 -0800

Is it bad for you to sit in front of a heater, even when its not THAT cold? I live in the pacific north west and find that I am always cold but even when I was living on the east coast I was always cold though, so I'm not sure what that has to do with it.
Maybe I just need to move to a warmer climate, but I dont think that is going to happen any time soon.

I know there are ways of making heat in your body through yoga and other exercise, but my boyfriend says that sitting in front of a heater is actually bad for you and that it will make you colder when not in front of it.
Is this true?
Is it effecting my internal temperature regulation system, making my body dependent on external sources of heat to keep warm?
I wear lots of layers and still want the extra heat that comes from my amazing little heat dish. I love it.

How should I stay warm this winter?

apricot — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 20:40:53 -0800

Which is more efficient/economical to run: a baseboard heater or an oil-filled radiator-type space heater? I'm a Californian getting ready for my first winter in Massachusetts. My apartment has electric baseboard heaters. I have never had those before, and I'm worried my bill is going to be HUGE once it gets cold. It doesn't help that whenever I tell someone those are the heaters I have they dramatically wince and hiss through their teeth. Also, one of my neighbors said her bill was several hundred dollars a month last winter. I'm thinking an oil-filled radiator might be sufficient and a lot less expensive to run.

Bonus question: I have two cats, and would love to have a safer heating source to leave on if I'm going to be out for several hours or overnight. A different neighbor, who also has cats, says she leaves her heaters on when she's not home, but that seems really unsafe to me. Are baseboard heaters safe, or are the other ones safer?

Here are the details:
My living room is basically one big room with a doorway to the kitchen on one end. The living room and kitchen each have drafty old windows (both of which I have covered with that lovely plastic sheeting stuff, which has already helped a lot). There is a front door and a back door that both open up to unheated stairwells. I bought weatherstripping for the doors but haven't installed it yet. My apartment is on the top/second floor, with apartments below and on either side. The building was built in the 70s. The windows and heaters seem to date from then too.

There is one long baseboard heater underneath the window. It's controlled by a dial thermostat on the opposite wall near the kitchen and front door. I spend most of my time at my desk or on the couch, which are near one end of the heater, in the opposite corner from the thermostat. It seems like I could get a space heater to warm the corner where the cats and I spend the most time, and avoid having the baseboard heater running and heating the whole room. I'm an impoverished grad student, and am worried about having to pay huge chunks of my stipend to WMECO. Would it be less expensive to run the space heater, and would that be enough to keep me and the cats warm?

I used to live in a drafty old house in Portland, where the wind ripped the plastic sheets right off the windows and we kept the thermostat at 60, so I know the drill about bundling up indoors and am generally a hot person anyway, but I have never been through a New England winter and I don't know if my plan is realistic or not. Can anyone with experience chime in?

Heat Miser

mkb — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 07:43:57 -0800

Our house (with a recently replaced boiler) doesn't get heat in every room. I thought I had figured out the cause, but I was wrong. We have a gas steam boiler installed about two years ago, and we live in Salem, Massachusetts.

The second floor of our house has four rooms: the office, the master bedroom, the bathroom, and the nursery. Each of these rooms has a radiator, and when each radiator is fully open and the heat is on, the radiators in the master bedroom and the office get warm while the other two rooms don't seem to have anything.

I think I had previously gotten heat in the other two rooms by closing the valve on the radiator in the office, making the office colder. However, when I did this last night, the radiator nursery still never got warm.

Is this a problem I could fix on my own? How could I investigate further? If not, is it expensive? If you're in the area, is there an HVAC person you could recommend?

Help us save Hormona the banshee cat.

Viola — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 12:58:27 -0800

A cat in heat is keeping up the entire household at night with her werewolf yowling. They're about ready to give her up. What can they do? Much more inside. My friends own Mona Lisa, one of the sweetest, calmest, funniest cats I've ever met. They adopted her from the animal shelter as kitten 3 years ago after she'd apparently been spayed. When the cat went into heat again and again over the next few months, the couple took her to the vet, who performed exploratory surgery to make sure they hadn't missed any ovarian tissue. Vets came up with nada, even suggesting the couple made up the claims. Yet Mona's symptoms are classic ones of a cat in heat--she yowls like a banshee, crouches with her butt in the air, has loose stools, throws up her food, and basically does anything she can to get some action. The symptoms are fairly prevalent during the day but absolutely terrible at night. The couple shut off their bedroom to keep Mona from tearing at the curtains, but the cat just threw her body against the door in a mad frenzy. It was, says the wife, like a different animal had possessed their sweet kitty.

The couple felt they could deal with Mona's hormones every so often until they had a baby who wakes up during these nightly episodes, ending with a screaming cat and a screaming baby. It's gotten to the point where no one in the house can sleep even when they lock Mona in the bathroom with her litter box and put in ear plugs. They live in a small loft apartment, so sounds reverberate quite easily. Moreover, the cat just seems miserable during these cycles.

The vet says he can do another exploratory surgery at a whopping 10K, but he promises little remedy and feels it will cause the cat more stress than good. The family loves this cat, but they're at their wit's end and need to get some sleep. Googling "calming cat in heat" produces some disturbing, NSFW results that no one is willing to do. As of right now, no family friends have stepped up to adopt Mona, so their next option is an animal shelter that will surely have to warn future owners that Mona turns into a horny, leg-biting werewolf every other month.

Is there any hope for this family to keep the cat, any remedies they can try, or will they have to give her back to the shelter? Any help is much appreciated.

Installing geo thermal in an old house with boiler?

idyllhands — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 20:07:09 -0800

Installing geo thermal in an old house with boiler? I am considering buying an old (1910s) house with a boiler and radiators installed. I was thinking it would be great to convert it to run off of geothermal. How difficult/expensive would this be? I live in Kansas, so we need good heating as well as cooling for summer. I was hoping to accomplish both with a geothermal system.

(No) Bake Sale

Dr. Wu — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 08:05:23 -0800

I need to bake something, but it's hot (and getting hotter) and humid, and I don't want to raise the temperature in here any further. Any suggestions for no-bake (or toaster-oven?) treats? As part of our volunteer commitment to our CSA, my lovely fiancée promised to make some baked goods for their biweekly bake sale, which takes place this afternoon. However, she is overworked and never got around to baking last evening, and won't be home in time to make anything in time for the sale.

So I need to bake ... something. Could be anything, as we didn't promise to bring any item in particular. Cookies, brownies, whatever.

But, yeah, it's hot and I don't want it any hotter in here. Do you know any good no-bake recipes that produce something bake-sale friendly? Whatever I make must be apportioned into individual-size units, as cookies or brownies would be. A cake that could be sliced would work, too.

The toaster oven doesn't make things too warm in here, so I'm open to toaster-oven-specific recipes, too. Microwave is an option, as well.

We have a reasonably well-stocked kitchen, and I'm a pretty good cook. (She's the better baker, but I can manage.) Any ideas?

Thanks!

How to DIY modify my electric smoker to control cooking temp.?

savagecorp — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 18:07:17 -0800

I have an electric smoker grill, with 2 setting - on / off. Is there a way to regulate how hot the heating element gets, in order to control the cooking temperature? I bought a bullet style electric smoker a little while ago, and it works great. The only problem is that I would like to lower the cooking temperature; It smokes about 25 - 50 degrees too hot, depending on how long it's cooking. The heating element, in the bottom of the grill, is basically an over-sized hot plate.

Is there some kind of DIY modification I can make to have more control over the temperature?? I was thinking there would be some kind of gadget/ electronic something, I can put between the wall outlet and the grill's plug to regulate how much electricity is flowing to the hotplate...? I was also thinking of wrapping the heat element in foil, but not sure if that would work either.

Summer in the Terminal City

philip-random — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 12:53:28 -0800

Help resolve a dispute among co-workers. Vancouver is a wonderful city, everybody says so. It just doesn't happen to have been built for serious summer heat. Yet now it is hot (and getting hotter) and here we are in a "home office" that will start to absolutely bake in roughly one hour (when the afternoon sun hits the windows). Given that we have no air conditioning and that we are on a deadline this week and so must stay "on the job", how best to keep this place as cool as possible ...? My strategy (based on something I remember my grandma doing way back when in sweaty pre-airconditioned suburban Montreal): shut all windows sun-facing windows now, pull the white reflective blinds and essentially keep the coolish air we have now for as long as possible. We do have a fan by the way.

The counter strategy (based on hystrioncally presented "common sense"): don't do anything until the sun starts to hit, then pull the blinds, but leave the windows open which, to my mind, would just let the hot air in far more quickly, wouldn't it?

Please help us. We know all about dealing with rain but this summer heat stuff just makes our brains melt.

Please don't cook your dog.

arcticseal — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 13:40:13 -0800

What's the recommended action to take and agencies to contact when faced with an animal stuck in a locked car in 100 deg heat? I've just had a confrontation in my supermarket car park with an irresponsible dog owner who had locked his dog in his car whilst he went shopping for groceries.
Luckily he turned up while I was talking to the security guard about the best action to take. His immediate concern was if he was going to get a ticket, not the health of his pet or the questionable decision of leaving a dog in a car in Texas in the summer. Unfortunately he drove off before I thought to get his licence plate and report him. Needless to say I'm disturbed that there are owners like that out there.

What does MeFi recommend as the best course of action to take should I witness this again? I've previously called the fire department for a neighbour's child in a locked car when he hit the locks while the mother was outside (under cover and in the Spring) and they were marvelous, but what's the protocol for animals?

Where can I find a replacement lid for my Dutch Oven?

Diablevert — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 15:48:01 -0800

Does Benjamin & Medwin still exist? And if they don't, any idea where I can get a lid for my cast iron pan? Can I make one? I have a cast iron pan that came with a glass lid --- dropped it the other day and the knob cracked. I had thought it was a Lodge --- but it's not, it's by a company called Benjamin & Medwin. There are some stores selling their stuff online, I couldn't find any that had my Dutch oven. They don't see to have their own website, and the when I called the number given for the only address I could find for them, it had been disconnected. Does anyone know of a company that makes glass lids that will stand up to the high heat of cast iron cooking? (I particularly liked to do no-knead bread in mine, and for that I usually crank the oven to 450.) Or if not, is there at way to tell whether a plastic knob from the hardware store can take that kind of heat? The glass itself isn't cracked; I could screw in a new knob.

I can't wait on two hours for a pizza to bake

saffry — Fri, 22 May 2009 17:06:23 -0800

I'm having trouble with my oven and think it's the door gasket/seal. Specifically, I see that the gasket is only going 3/4 of the way around the door, and isn't on the bottom. Is that normal? I think the answer is probably no, so...... how easy is this to fix?

Cheap heats?

msalt — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 14:15:32 -0800

Are there any good low-capital alternatives to electric Cadet heaters for warming and cooling my house? My old (1900) house has only Cadet heaters (circa late 1990s) for warmth, probably because a previous owner ripped out a furnace to convert the basement into a rental unit (which it still is). 3 stories -- bsmt, main floor, attic converted into master bedroom, 2900 SF. There is no ductwork at all right now. Weatherization is weak.

Are there any practical alternatives? Even just better brands of heaters? My electric bill is quite high in winter, as you can imagine -- this is in Portland OR -- and I don't have the $14,000 I was quoted for a central heat pump, even with the $2K or so in tax rebates I could get. It's a shame though because the attic gets pretty hot and the heat pump sounded nice.

Could I get a relatively inexpensive ductless heat pump just for the attic, and how would that compare to a window AC unit? Is there a way to install a heat pump there without tying up the only window? I see web pages quoting around $1,000 "per ton of cooling capacity" -- what does that mean? Or would I be better off putting any available money into better windows and insulation? Thx

It's too darn hot. How to cool off my studio apartment?

lsemel — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 22:25:33 -0800

How can I cool off my NY studio apartment this summer? Our building has central air conditioning, and while it's cold enough when I sit right next to the unit, the rest of the apartment gets boiling hot. During today's heat wave, when it was 82 outside, a thermometer sitting on the unit read 70 degrees. On the other side of the room, it was more like 75, and on the other side of of the apartment, almost 80. The building doesn't allow window air conditioners. This is making living here really uncomfortable -- what else can I do to cool this place off? I've been putting up with hot, stuffy summer air in my apartment long enough. I want to do anything and everything I can to cool the place down this year. The heat wave of the last few days reminded me once again how uncomfortable it can get.

Here's a plan that's similar to my apartment. (Unlike the apartment depicted, I don't have the main area divided into two rooms.) The central A/C is to the right, underneath the window. This unit has cold water pumped to it, and cools the room by blowing air over the cold water pipes. The window is south-facing, as wide as the entire wall, and extends all the way up to the ceiling,. Today, when it was around 82 degrees out, a thermometer sitting on the unit reads 70 degrees. On the other side of the room, it'll read more like 75, and in the bathroom or kitchen, or by the front door, almost 80. I have a Vornado fan underneath the air conditioner blowing upwards.

The building won't allow a window air conditioner to be installed. Last year I tried getting a portable air conditioner (this model) but it had absolutely no effect whatsoever, even after running it for days.

What else can I do to keep things cooler in this apartment? More fans? Install a ceiling fan? Replace all my inefficient, heat-emitting incandescent light bulbs? Any ideas would be appreciated!

Cool it now!

gnutron — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 08:43:58 -0800

Help me control the intense heat radiating through my living room windows! Reflective film? Curtains? I live in a house. Our primary living area is a wonderful space. The west-facing wall is composed of three 6' tall x 3.5' wide windows. These windows are on the second floor, and they do not open. The sun beats against the windows all afternoon, and when it gets hot outside, it gets ridiculously hot inside. Like hot hot. Africa hot. (Often 85+ degrees). There is no central air conditioning. We have fans and a portable air conditioner. They help keep it reasonable, but I need to address this problem at the source.

Currently, the windows are fitted with custom blinds. They're nice, but they do very little to keep the heat out. What's the best way to keep the heat from radiating through these windows?

1. Heat-control film? Has anyone actually used this stuff? Does it work? Is it actually clear? This seems like a decent option. The main issue with film is that we have a great view, so we don't want to obscure it with tinting, or film that looks bubbly and cracked. It also seems like the film could be a major PITA to put on correctly.

2. Heavy curtains? Would this even work? Or would the heat just come through window and get trapped between the curtain and the window? This seems like it could easier to implement than the window film.

3. ???

We are renting, so no major renovations will be happening. Ideally the solution won't cost more than a couple hundred bucks. But it's becoming a serious quality-of-life issue that I'd like to address before summer really hits.

Ok, so you have hot rocks. Now what?

bitter-girl.com — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 10:56:42 -0800

This weekend, I saw a green renovation show that used a large amount of gravel in the basement to hold heat gathered from a solar-collecting area in the roof. My dad, a builder, says this method doesn't work well. Help me understand if someone has devised a "better mousetrap" or if this is just something that has never worked and is being done for greenwashing on TV... The premise: attic space with solar glass panels in the roof (which are exceptionally clear and transmit the most UV rays through) also features double-insulated windows on the inside wall to let light in. Space heats up, presumably like a big solar cooker, and using a 12" PVC tube + small fan, the heat is transmitted to a large, concrete-block-walled room in the basement filled with a few tons of gravel.

Show host says the heat from the attic space warms the rocks, whose thermal mass then distributes the heat for up to 48 hrs. But HOW?

My dad's a carpenter, and worked for a gravel company in the 70s. He said he's seen this done before but it's not very effective.

Effective/efficient are two different things... presuming the heat makes it down and warms up the rocks, sure, they'll stay warm for a while, but what's making my head hurt is HOW can this heat be used to warm up the rest of the house? Even as an adjunct heat source, it just seems as if you'd have a nice warm roomful of rocks in the basement and not any real effect elsewhere, no?

I'm interested in building a straw bale house with an insulated foundation someday and am wondering if putting a system like this would help warm the area under the first floor, but can't quite wrap my head around how this works, or would work best... thanks!

Is an energy audit worth it?

walla — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 14:12:26 -0800

Should I get a home energy audit? This article says old houses use up to 50% more energy than new houses!!! Our house was built in the 1880s, and it's big enough (around 3000 sq. ft.) for waste to matter. We also live in Chicagoland, so we use a lot of heat. Our utility companies don't offer free audits, so getting one could cost several hundred dollars. Has anyone actually saved money because of changes recommended by an energy auditor?

Catfilter: If I spay my cat while she's in heat, will she continue to yowl for the rest of her life?

bunky — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 15:57:00 -0800

I thought my cat had just _finished_ her first heat and made a vet appointment to have her spayed tomorrow. Well, guess who started yowling and moving her tail sideways to display feline private parts?! Should I keep tomorrow's appointment and have her spayed _during_ her heat, or should I wait? I once knew a (human) female who took the Depo-Provera shot for birth control. Well, they gave her her shot at the wrong time in her cycle and she ended up having her period _all month_. I'm worried about something like this happening with teh cat if I go through with the spaying...and combing the internet for answers, I've seen it written that this can happen. Readers, do you know of this actually happening to a cat you know?

How unpleasantly hot and humid is Japan's rainy season, and what can I do to prepare?

Kirn — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 13:57:59 -0800

How unpleasantly hot and humid is Japan's rainy season, and what can I do to prepare? I'm going to Japan on holiday for about 10 days during the middle of June this year, which as I understand it is right in the middle of tsuyu, the rainy season. (No possibility of changing dates. I'll be in Tokyo for maybe half the time, and various other places around Japan as yet undetermined.)

Everything I read keeps telling me about how horrible the heat and humidity are during this time. I live in Britain and don't enjoy very hot weather, so I'm probably even less used to this than visitors from other countries might be, and am a little concerned about it. (The rain itself doesn't bother me at all, just the heat and humidity.)

How unpleasant am I going to find this weather? Is it going to seriously affect my holiday? Does it get worse the more it rains? Does it get better at night? Do most places have air-conditioning?

And, any and all suggestions as to what I can do to lessen the effects are very welcome. Thanks!

C-c-c-cold.

ricochet biscuit — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 20:03:18 -0800

Two nights running with no power or hot water. What's a tenant to do? I live in a residential highrise in a large Canadian city. The power for the building went out at about 2:00 am this morning; twenty hours later (I type these words at 10:00 pm or so) no word on when it will be restored. The superintendent shrugs and says they are trying to get a generator, but "they will probably not be able to turn it on because people will complain about the noise."

The building changed hands a few years ago and the new owners, a numbered company, are a somewhat shady lot in my view. Last summer, a couple of months apart, letters from both the gas company and the electric supplier appeared taped to the front door of the building stating the owner was in arrears and unless they were paid by the eighteenth (or whatever) of the month, the building would be cut off; both times service continued uninterrupted, so I suppose someone intervened.

Twice in three years my rent cheque has been lost: once in 2006, a note appeared on my door a few days into the month notifying me I had not paid. I declared that I had and sure enough it turned up. Last month, two weeks after my rent cheque had been cashed, two strangers declaring themselves to be the owners knocked on my door saying I had not paid. I again declared that I had and that the money had already been withdrawn from my account. They took my phone number, promised to look into it, and then continued down the hall, knocking on most if not all doors on my floor (for what it's worth, these seem to be the actual owners, as I have since seen them in the office on the main floor, but they presented no ID when they turned up at my door and demanded money).

Tonight I returned home after a business trip. Jet lagged and tired, I was looking forward to a hot shower, a warm meal, and maybe watching a DVD. The cab pulled up in front of a darkened building, and the latest in a series of revolving door superintendents, standing out front told me the power was off and there was no firm idea of when it would be back on, so "welcome home." I trudged up eight flights of stairs by the light of my cell phone (no emergency lights in the stairwells) to find that there was no hot water, no heat, and I had a fridge full of room temperature food. I collected some supplies and set off to my office to microwave some gradually thawing food.

On the way down through the darkened lobby, I encountered some bylaw enforcement officers, so the city is on the case. The bylaw dudes were talking to the new super, now on his fourth day, and were less than happy to hear that with no emergency lighting in the stairwells, tenants had put candles on each landing. Yes, a whole bunch of unattended open flames in a building with no working fire alarm system (I assume) apparently does not fit in with the fire code.

Friends have offered to put me up, and indeed I work in the hospitality industry, so I can probably go snag a free room, so I am not worried about that, but I am wondering what recourse I have for a refrigerator full of spoiled food and two nights and counting with no heat or hot water or power. When the lights come on again, should I go grocery shopping, save the receipt, and deduct the amount from my next rent cheque? When the temperature is right around the freezing mark and the landlord has reneged on the agreement to provide heat, is there any option that tenants have, save to move away?

Brazilian Cherry over radiant heat (or: living life on the razor's edge)

jewzilla — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 09:37:04 -0800

My wife and I would like to install a floating Brazilian Cherry wood floor over radiant heat. Almost all manufacturers do not warrant this (and Brazilian Cherry is often called out as the worst possible wood to use over radiant heat). However, SOME manufacturers do warrant it. For example, I just finished speaking with Mannington, which warrants this flooring over radiant heat (as long as the floor doesn't exceed 90 degrees). The rep couldn't tell my why their floor is different than anyone else's, so I'm skeptical that this is a good idea. Can this be done successfully? I am suspicious of the manufacturers that claim to warrant it. I'm especially interested in hearing from someone who's had a similar floor installed for several years.