The Floors of a Zone are distinct from the Ceilings of the Zones Zone even if they share similar geometry & many features.
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Floors are also Split Automatically by Hero when any adjacent Ceilings are detected on the Level below. This can occur after a new Zone has been created or when Floors or Ceilings are moved.
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Hero’s Automatic Splitting Feature is a very handy tool that removes the requirement to manually split and connect adjacent spaces. However there are occasions where manual User adjustment or overriding of the adjacency & other construction properties (assembly & insulation) of automatically split Floors & Ceilings is required after a split. For example in the image below, a Zone’s Floors have been split into 3 Floors with 2 adjacent Internal connections to Ceilings below, but also a third Floor “FLR 05” which has an initial default adjacency of “Ground” and Construction “CSOG-100” which is inappropriate. In this example, the User would be best to set FLR 05 to Neighbouring Adjacency which will then trigger a Construction change & update too, as this section has an Adiabatic Adjacency condition that should be ignored in a Chenath simulation (e.g. no temperature difference, only internal mass of materials). |
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Offset Points
Floors can have Points added to their polygon shape after they’ve been created.
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FLOORS WITHIN THE DATA-GRID
Property | Description | Edited Within |
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Assembly | Hero has a variety of Default Floor Assemblies that can be used, and these are visible within the Construction column of the Floor Data-Grid. The current Assemblies include assemblies |
of types:
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Concrete waffle pod slabs of various thickness.
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Construction Column | |
Type | In addition to the Construction or Assembly of the Floor, the Floor Data-Grid also contains a Type column that is used for reference & information but that if changed may change both the Assembly and Adjacency Type to the relevant defaults for that Type as required. See above Assembly row for details. |
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Type Column | |
Insulation Option | The Insulation (if any) can added to a Floor via the Insulation column of the Floor Data-grid. There are variety of Floor Insulation Options available depending on the Floor Construction, including: Slab on Ground Assemblies: Several common R-value underslab insulation products. Waffle Pod Assemblies: Various thickness of EPS-foam waffle-pod void formers that lie below the slab. The R-values are the thermally bridged R-values that account for the concrete ribs or beams across the floor. There is also a uninsulated option in the list for non-foam based waffle-pods such as plastic void formers etc. Suspended Floors: A variety of Insulation options that represent common insulation systems including:
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Insulation Column | |||
Slab Edge Insulation | Concrete Slab on Ground & Waffle-pod Floors can have Slab Edge Insulation added to them via the Slab Edge Insulation column in the Floor data-grid. There are a fixed variety of typical R-value products that can be selected for the Floor.
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Slab Edge Insulation Column | ||
Floor Covering | Floor Coverings are used to model the effects of various materials on top of the Floor Assembly within a Simulation. The Floor Coverings have slightly different Materials depending on whether they are applied to a Suspended Timber Floor or not. See the Floor Covering Table below for further details. | Covering Column |
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Area | The Gross Area of the Floor in Square Metres (i.e. does not include Holes/Stairwell area) | Not Editable within Data-Grid |
Sub-Floor Ventilation Type | Floors with a Sub-Floor Adjacency can toggle the Ventilation rate of that Sub-Floor Zone through the Ventilation column in the Floor Data-grid. This is described in further detail in the Sub-floor Zone section. | Subfloor Ventilation Column |
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Floor Adjacency Types
Similar to Walls & Ceilings, Floors have a variety of different adjacency conditions that are determined by whether the floor Floor is adjacent to actual model objects or that can be selected manually be the user.
Adjacency Type | Description |
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Editable Within Data Grid | |
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Ground | The Floor is directly adjacent to |
Ground such as for a Concrete |
Slab or Waffle-pod |
Assembly. If the |
Adjacency type is changed then the Assembly will be automatically changed away from a Ground type |
For floors that are not adjacent to another ceiling below, then there are a variety of adjacency types that can be manually selected by the user to model specific conditions.
Floor Data-Grid Adjacency ColumnAssembly. | Yes |
Subfloor | Floor is adjacent to a Sub-Floor Zone. When a Floor has a Subfloor Adjacency, Hero will automatically create a Subfloor Zone underneath the Floor, or if a Subfloor Zone already exists on that Level, will expand the Subfloor Zone to encompass the area below the newly changed Floor. Subfloor |
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Zones are detailed further in the Zone section of this tutorial and have many special properties. |
Yes | |
External | If the Floor is sufficiently elevated such that the area below it does not form a enclosed or semi-enclosed Sub-Floor Zone, then the External Adjacency Type should be used. This represents a Floor that is simply adjacent to the External environment temperature (i.e. outside air). |
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Yes | |
Internal | Floor adjacent to a Ceiling from the same Dwelling |
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No | |||
Neighbouring (Actual Connection) | Floors adjacent to a Ceiling from a different Dwelling.
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No | |
Neighbouring (Manual Selection) | Floors adjacent to a Conditioned Space that is not part of the Hero |
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model (i.e. Adjacent Buildings, Commercial Spaces etc).
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Yes | |
Carpark | Floors adjacent to an actual Carpark Zone that is part of the Common Area Dwelling |
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No | |
Corridor | Floors adjacent to an actual Corridor Zone that is part of the Common Area Dwelling |
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No |
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Floor Coverings
Floor Covering Name | Modelled Material | Additional Layers for Suspended Timber Floor |
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Timber | 12mm Timber Hardwood | 19mm Particleboard layer |
Carpet | 10mm Carpet with 8mm Rubber Underlay | 19mm Particleboard layer |
Tile | 8mm Ceramic Tile | 19mm Particleboard layer + 6mm Compressed Fibre-Cement Underlay |
Vinyl | 3mm Vinyl Floor Tile | 19mm Particleboard layer |
Cork | 6mm Cork Floor Tile | 19mm Particleboard layer |
Brick | 75mm Brick Floor | None |
Stone | 10mm Slate Floor | 19mm Particleboard layer |
Earth | 50mm Soil Floor | None |
Exposed | No Floor Covering (i.e. just Assembly + Insulation Option) | N/A (only available for Slab Assemblies) |
Internal Floor/Ceiling Construction
When a floor has an adjacent ceiling below it, such as on a two-story dwelling, or between two apartment dwellings, the full material buildup for the assembly is determined by both the Floor & the Ceiling’s properties.
An internal ceiling can only have a plasterboard ceiling or exposed ceiling assembly applied to it; and the internal ceiling will not be able to have Insulation applied to it in the Data-Grid. If this internal floor/ceiling is to be insulated, the insulation gets applied to the floor above. The complete material build-up that will be simulated is the Floor Covering followed by the Floor Assembly followed by any Floor Insulation followed by the Ceiling Assembly below.
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Roof-Space Soffit Floors
When a Ceiling has a Roof-space connection Space Adjacency such as from formed by an Attic assembly Assembly type, then a special Soffit floor Floor will be automatically created for the roofspace Roofspace and will become visible in the Floor Data-Grid tab. These are discussed further in the Roof-space Zone section.