Fab topic. Glad to see you hit this one @editor ! 

@lucia thank you. It took a while organise because there were so many parties, but monitoring (in my opinion) is key to ensuring systems are truly efficient because we all have a part to play in cutting energy consumption, especially in home heating.

@editor I just watched it! The Planet Devices guy nailed it - there's so much data that HP companies obscure and it shouldn't be like that. It should be for owners to decide whether to geek out or not. Massive credit to Tristan and crew because they set the ball rolling on transparency and accuracy. 

That was a good and useful programme thank you. I learned a bit there. 🙂

@editor the link is dead.

@morgan which link? YouTube?

Some of us heat pump owners have been moaning about data obfuscation for years, and more importantly, finding ways of getting at the data. 

Unsurprisingly, heat pumps do tend to collect a lot of data. They have to, as part of their control systems. You can't, for example, have weather compensation without knowing the outside air temperature, or at least an approximation to it. You can't control the LWT (leaving water temperature, flow temperature) if you don't know what the LWT is. And so on. And data is valuable, so they collect it, and send it back to the manufacturer's servers. The data is there alright, it's yours, because it comes from your heat pump, the question is how to get it.

The DIY answer for many, if not most, heat pumps is through a modbus connection. It's a fair bet if your heat pump is Homely compatible, it will have a modbus connection, because that is what Homely uses. If you are inclined to geekiness, and can twiddle a screwdriver, all that data is within your reach. Here is some data from my heat pump for the last 24 hours. It is running in always on (no setback) mode, under weather compensation. The big spike yesterday is the DHW heating. The heat pump is cycling, but it is low frequency, around twice an hour, nothing to worry about, it seems to be part of Midea's modulation strategy: 

How I did this is in part described in this thread, in part because I have yet to complete the full write up (about 2/3 done so far).

It should also be borne in mind that monitoring a heat pump this way (over modbus) means you are reliant on the manufacturer's data, which may or may not have been cooked before being served, so to speak. Independent monitoring kits get round this, but the are expensive and usually invasive, in that you have to invade the system to install some of the sensors. As it happens, I have an independent external heat pump only kWh meter that allows me to manually confirm the kWh input (the Midea volts x amps data under-estimates is by about 18%), and I also have an analogue flow meter in the primary circuit, and that confirms the Midea reported flow rate (used with other variables to calculate energy out) is reasonably accurate. Both of these meters were put in place during the original installation, something to bear in mind if you are thinking of installing a heat pump, and are inclined towards DIY monitoring.        

+1 for @cathoderay.

Well worth bearing in mind that the modbus connection can be used in a selection of ways. @cathoderay's preference is bespoke coding which gives absolute flexibility and control. I happen to use modbus to let Home Assistant capture the data (for my inverter, not my heat pump) which trades some of the flexibility and control for what I find to be more user friendly. Others may well dislike Home Assistant's take and prefer to use modbus to connect a different system. Eventually that modbus connection is simply an enabler for whatever solution you decide on to connect locally and capture that raw data, so don't be put off by the "DIY" label @cathoderay uses; once you've got that one bit sorted (the two-wire connection and the modbus conversation on top of it) you can crunch the data in whatever way you find easiest and most comfortable.

@majordennisbloodnok - very much agree, think of the modbus connection (which is simple and easy to do, hence the mention of DIY!) as an enabler - it enables you to connect to the heat pump however you wish, to both read data from and and write data to it. The 'write data to' takes it to another level, you can control the heat pumps as well. For example, I have a simple auto-adjust script that adjusts the LWT when there is a discrepancy between the desired indoor air temperature and the actual indoor air temperature.

@editor Yes but it has reappeared now.

@editor And whereas everyone (I’m sure) would be keen to have their system running as efficiently and economically as possible, not everyone has the time, interest, enthusiasm, knowledge or patience to set the equipment up. Having smart controllers that ‘micromanage’ these tasks is the way to go - whilst also ensuring that all ‘on/off’ controllers are removed from systems and the market place - for the good of all! Regards, Toodles.

Posted by: @toodles

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@editor And whereas everyone (I’m sure) would be keen to have their system running as efficiently and economically as possible, not everyone has the time, interest, enthusiasm, knowledge or patience to set the equipment up. Having smart controllers that ‘micromanage’ these tasks is the way to go - whilst also ensuring that all ‘on/off’ controllers are removed from systems and the market place - for the good of all! Regards, Toodles.

I'm not sure I'd go quite so far as to say they're THE way to go, but I'd happily agree with A way to go. Another the video hinted at was the possibility of some form of remote management by the installer company and, whilst I can't see too many of them viewing that as a cost-effective use of their time I can see the dawn of something like AI doing it for them, not a million miles away from the Havenwise solution but with the installers being the customer instead of the home owners. Is that a smart controller or pro-active tweaking by a conscientious installer? Blurs the line, I suspect.

Largely irrelevant, though, since your main point is, of course, that not everyone wants to tinker but most want best efficiency and effectiveness. Definitely agree there.