Posted by: @grahamh

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It doesn't matter how simple the installation or the unit is there is always an installer who can balls it up.

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It is an old cliche that whenever you build something to be foolproof, nature builds a better idiot.

@majordennisbloodnok 😅 I heard a scientist being interviewed some years ago and he was being asked about the difficultu of designing a device that was foolproff; his reply was that ‘You can design a thing to be foolproof …. but not Bloody Foolproof!’ Toodles.

Posted by: @ajbevster

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Sensor and control box should be moved this week. Fingers crossed. When the electrician comes back I'll get him to disconnect the thermostat and make sure the ashp is set up to work without only using wc.

If the controller box has a temperature sensor (I don't know but the manual should say) do insist they put it somewhere sensible!  You may just want to use it at some point and while they are moving it they may as well do it properly.

Not quite sure the replies (except for a very earlier one) really address the serious issue of noise. What are the culprits? 

I suppose it could be:

- Fluid resonance? Compressor vibrations travelling through the fluid in pipes and then into the structure where pipes connect to it somewhere. Possibly amplified by circ pump?

- Compressor vibrations travelling through the copper of pipes if the hoses are not connected with proper flexes/joints

- Low frequency noise ingress from the outside fan/compressor noise getting in to the house (low frequency noise can sneak in all sorts of ways - through small gaps and it can then make internal walls vibrate.

- C pump not mounted properly and perhaps on too high a setting pushing vibrations into the structure.

Lots of ways heat pump noise can potentially cause issues.

Questions:

Is the unit itself properly isolated?

Is the tone inside the same as the primary tone outside?

Does the noise appear in pockets and alcoves?

If you press your ear against a wall near the noise, can you hear vibration?

can you download a spectrum analyser and upload a screenshot of the frequency inside and outside?

@elton found the culprit. For some reason it's just the return pipe. One with blue handle pic attached. The red one is perfectly still but when you put your hand on the blue pipe you can feel it vibrating. Plumber thinks could be air in the system. To be fair he'd already gone by the time the heat pump had even turned on so no idea how he'd have known if he'd done a good job. Noise is constant now I've sorted the wc and thermostats. No more pulsating at least. Plumber will be in Wednesday to diagnose. Fingers crossed.

Also, how much water should be coming out the bottom of the unit? It's crazy how much water there is, plus there's a pipe connected to waste so I would have thought it would go down there. 

Good to hear you have some progress. Is it mounted on rubber feet? Also looks quite close to that wall - thought 30cm was a minimum but I might be wrong.

Update number 1. 

Plumber has returned, flushed the system out and took the filter out to find loads of brick dust in the pipe filter! This was due to them installing the pipes then cutting whole through wall and not covering up the open pipes so all the dust just filled the new pipes. 

Now there is no noise inside the house. What a relief. 

Spoke to electrician who insisted the "outdoor thermostat" was fitted correctly only for the plumber to eventually come to my aid, sent him picture of the manual showing exactly where it needed to be fit and he finally backed down and admitted his mistake. I mean seriously, who certifies these installers? Now to book him in to resolve and try and get him to move the control box inside the house! He was still adamant that the control box didn't need to be used. 

The saga goes on...

Good you are making progress.  It sounds like the internal noise problem is fixed, just in case it's relevant it took 4 weeks for all the air to come out of my system and that caused a gurgling sound in one of the radiators which I had to bleed every 2 days.

Stick to your guns with the control box.  As you know it's totally impossible for you to get the system running efficiently without it.  From what you say the electrician is clueless about ashps! 

I am not overly familiar with the ideal controller but from what I've heard it's good.  It also appears to use the same concept for adjusting WC curves as Vaillant, which is so much more user friendly than the standard '4point' approach adopted by most of the Chinese and Japanese companies.  I suspect this is because both have had to supply boilers with WC to the mainland Europe market for decades, so have worked out how to make a UI to WC understandable by the ordinary mortal.  The Chinese and Japanese companies haven't had this experience.

You are getting there, sad that the installer makes it so difficult!

although it is possible to get the unit (or any heat pump) to run brilliantly on 3rd party stats it takes a bit of tweaking to get it right and its very easy to make it stupidly expensive to run. The ideal halo (i have on) is the best controller for heat pumps on the market, its the only one that normal people not heat pump dicks (like me)  can drive. Its nice and easy to use but.......... in the installer menu of the master control box you can adjust how much influence the halo has on the running of the unit. If the influence is low the room temp does not adjust the weather comp, if its high it does, i cant remember how it comes from factory.

Mine cycles 2 x and hour because its running a bit warm, so I'm slowly turning up the room influence and down the weather comp curve too to get it perfect. I do it a bit every day and see how its going. its super geeky, reduces cycling and has a slight impact on run cost but not enough to make it worth doing unless you want to be a geek. Assuming of course that its not set up to run flat out all the time. 

how to do this is all in the installer manual, weirdly easy to understand, that's another first in heat pumps, normally its written appallingly. 

If you want advice how to do this first I would monitor your energy, see if its cycling a load. make a note how much, it gives an idea how far out the weather comp is. If it is then call ideal and they will talk you through adjusting it, there tech support is amazing. 

@grahamh silly question but how do I know how many times it's cycling? And how many times do I want it to cycle? 

I'm looking forward to getting the boxes in the right place so I can play with the controls! Once it's moved I'll definitely be back to ask for help setting up. Might go to ideal first so I can ask them all the silly questions I want to ask. 

Thanks again 

you can see compressor starts in menu, scroll to diagnostics, then scroll to page 3. make a note now, do it again tomorrow, divide by 24 and bingo.

I use the tesla powerwall app. it draws a pretty picture. 2 x an hour is acceptable more than that you should try to reduce it. mine was cycling 4 x an hour to begin with but im getting there now 18 times a day. But dont beat yurself up about it, the only heat pump ive ever seen that didn't cycle was a RED, that thing started maximum 3 times a day. It basically never stopped except when it went into and out of hot water, It was amazing, no longer available. 

@jamespa once again thank you for the advice last week. I'm keen to move away from the evo thermostat and receiver. Can I just disconnect the receiver from the heat pump (isolating everything) and i assume it will then work purely on wc? I'm tempted to buy the halo air for future tweaking but struggling to see it's major value other than looking pretty and slightly easier to adjust temp inside property.