Replies

1. GBA Editor
   Martin Holladay | Sep 27, 2018 05:25am | #1

   Brad,
   I'm not in favor of the approach you are suggesting. It sounds like you intend to pressurize the air space under your base cabinets, and provide slots in the toe-kick to let the warm air into the kitchen.

   There are several problems with this approach, including:

   1. When you pressurize the space under the cabinets, you may be sending warm air into your walls. The only way to prevent this is to do a meticulous job of air sealing before the cabinets are installed -- and you may have to depend on other trades to do this work.

   2. When the furnace is running for extended periods of time, you'll be heating up the bottom shelf of your cabinets. I hope the homeowners don't store chocolates in their base cabinets.

   All of that said, the area of your slot, at a bare minimum, would need to at least equal the cross-section of the ducts that are used to pressurize the space. For example, a 6 inch round duct has a cross section pi * 3 * 3 = 28 square inches. A 1/4-inch-wide slot would need to be 112 inches long to equal 28 square inches -- but if the slot is a little less than 1/4 inch, that would throw off the math.

1. 
   user-802936 | Sep 27, 2018 12:27pm | #2

   Thanks Martin, all good points.

   I should clarify, this is new construction so air sealing the kick boxes can be controlled and would be a priority.

   We'll have in-floor radiant heat, so the kick supply will be cooling only. Considering my sweet tooth, I appreciate you're looking out for the chocolate...

   I'm configuring some slot configurations and the calcs. you've provided are helpful.

   Thanks again.