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How do you add an Air Exchanger to a house with Hot Water Heat?
Bob Engelhart
June 17, 2020Updated: Sept. 15, 2020
How could I add an exchanger to a house without existing duct work?
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Do you mean you have hot water radiant heating in your floor and you are asking if you should install an HRV or ERV ventilation system?
I will answer based on that assumption, if I’ve missed the mark let me know And give me a bit more detail so we can help. But by ‘hot water heat’ I will assume a boiler and either radiators spaced around the house or perhaps a radiant floor, my answer would be the same either way.
Radiant heating systems in homes don’t introduce any fresh air, so you should have some sort of ventilation system to remove airborne contaminants and humidity, while providing fresh air for occupants. I would also assume you may have a somewhat older home as new homes now would likely be required to have ventilation equipment to meet regional building codes.
There is one excellent solution for retrofitting HRVs and ERVs in a home without needing to undertake a dusty home renovation project and rip apart drywall, that would be a ductless wall unit ERV. There are a couple of companies that manufacturer ERV wall insert ventilation systems that only require running a low voltage wire to each unit. They work in tandem, where one unit blows out at the same time that another unit blows in, each has its own ceramic heater core that absorbs and releases heat. You can see more here-
Lunos Ductless ERV heat recovery ventilation systems
Thank you. You got this almost exactly right, except that we are building a new home. I would like to use underfloor hot water heat throughout the house vs. traditional forced air. So, the heating systems would not have ductwork with leaves me having to figure out how I can 1. Add and air exchanger 2. Provide A/C 3. Add a make-up air 4. Add humidity. It seems I am going to end up with a lot of individual systems whereas if I used forces air all of those things would be part of the one system.
Where are you building, Bob? Some building codes require HRV’s or ERVs to have makeup heat (which is just a small coil to raise the temperature of incoming air during the coldest times), so you might need to get some info from your local building inspector. The Lunos I mentioned above is a great system but it’s hit and miss for getting building inspectors to sign off on it, so you may need to be running ductwork to a centralized core any, but that is pretty standard in homes with radiant floors.
You could have an ERV with AC as well as makeup heat attached, so really that’s all in one system, but yes, it won’t have anything to do with your radiant heat system.
I have a home with swamp coolers and radiant heat. We do have ducts for the swamp coolers but no air intake from inside the home like a typical AC unit. Would a HRV unit work in this situation?