ᐅ Is underfloor heating necessary in the shower? What are your thoughts?

Wickie schrieb:
According to our architect and tiler, it is common practice not to install underfloor heating in the shower area. It can be done, but it is rather uncommon?!

Yes, that’s also my impression from many conversations. Underfloor heating in the shower is not seen as standard and is often used by the general contractor or builder to add extra charges.

I think it makes sense and I will have underfloor heating in the shower as well. However, currently in our rental apartment, we have a walk-in shower without underfloor heating. Since the water initially comes out quite cold for the first few seconds and I am a dedicated hot shower person, I usually have to let the water run first. Then warm water arrives and flows for about 4 seconds. That is usually enough to warm up the tiles, or at least to eliminate the cold feeling on my feet. So it works without heating, but it’s more comfortable with it.

The story about lime scale seems like a nice tale spun by a tiler with a vivid imagination.

We had underfloor heating installed in both showers, of course.
I don’t see any reason not to do this. I also don’t see why it should be more expensive.
Our heating contractor simply integrated the heating loops.
The screed installer then left out the shower area with edge insulation strips or something similar.
The tiler installed the floor drain there and created the slope for the shower with fast-setting screed.

If this is planned from the beginning, it’s not a problem at all.
Of course, a general contractor (GC) might charge a hefty extra fee for this since it’s considered a “nice to have,” but that’s another story.

It just has to be planned accordingly. The minimum thickness of the screed over the underfloor heating must be correct, even with a sloped screed.

But I don’t think it’s a big problem if it’s missing. As ruppsn wrote, the tile heats up quickly when water lands on it. Not a big deal.

Whether the tile is preheated to 28°C (82°F) or is at a room temperature of 23–24°C (73–75°F) doesn’t really make a crucial difference.

matte1987 schrieb:
We had underfloor heating installed in both showers, of course.
I don’t see any reason not to do it. Likewise, I don’t see why it should be more expensive.
Our heating installer simply integrated the heating loops there.
The screed contractor then left the shower areas free using edge insulation strips or something similar.
The tiler installed the floor drain and created the slope for the shower with fast-setting screed.

If this is agreed upon from the start, it’s absolutely no problem.
Of course, a general contractor (GC) might charge a hefty extra fee for this, since it’s considered a “nice to have,” but that’s another story.

No idea if it’s expensive with a GC. We decided to do it as well (against the opinion of the architect and tiler); it wasn’t more expensive and was done exactly as you described here.

But it really has to be planned from the beginning.

Whether the lime issue is just a myth or not, I don’t know—we’ll see then...

matte1987 schrieb:
We naturally included underfloor heating in both showers. I don’t see any reason not to do so.

There is also a (probably the only) formal reason: the minimum coverage of the heating pipes by the screed could be compromised by the slope beneath—since the screed thickness decreases along the slope. The base slab below remains flat and fixed. This could cause the screed to crack later.

However, everyone does it this way—and it still works perfectly fine...

They simply adjusted the insulation to a 3cm (1¼ inches) slope for me.

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