I have a client who just bought a new condo and has a bathroom with walls and floors covered in marble. The only heat source is a heat lamp above the toliet. Does a ventilation fan exist that will blow heated air into a room? He does have accses to the joists under the floor in the basement and the boiler is oilfired steam.
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The ultimate would be a radiant loop under the floor using water from the steam boiler. It would take forever for a heat lamp to heat up that much thermal mass. A fan is not going to help, because the [radiant] lamp does not [directly] heat the air. In fact, it could make matters worse because of the wind chill.
Cold toes=cold wet naked folks.
For more info on getting hot water from a steam boiler, see:
http://www.oldhousejournal.com/magazine/2003/february/hybrid_hydronics.shtml
Marble lined bathroom is an IDEAL case for using underfloor radiant heat! The floor would be kept warm, and that would ratiate up to warm the towels and bodies.
A heat lamp in the ceiling is the WORST way to heat a room, because human factors studies show that people, generally, like to have warm feet and cool heads. A hot lamp heating the top of your head, while you stand on cold stone is more like torture than pleasure.
Underfloor radiant 'staple-up' tubing with hot water from the boiler would work a treat! Probably the boiler is providing much hotter water for the radiant base board heat elsewhere in the condo (since its less efficient than in-floor heat the temp needs to be higher), so a tempering valve of some kind will likely be needed for the bathroom heat supply, but that's just part of correctly designing the installation.
Find a local radiant in-floor heating specialist in your area and contract them to do the design (and you do the labor) and you'll be all set.
Norm
Edited 10/30/2003 12:40:31 PM ET by Norm
Edited 10/30/2003 12:41:01 PM ET by Norm