Posted by: @papahuhu

↑

I think you may have a good point, it’s a big fridge.

As I tell my sceptical neighbours, we now have 5 heat pumps:  in the fridge, freezer, wine cooler, EV and ASHP.  None of the first 4 are ever serviced and the fridge/freezer/wine cooler combo is now getting on for 20 years old. 

I think the annual ASHP service is a massive con, having paid £300 for one that didn't amount to much more than opening the casing and washing the outside.  The technician missed a really bad wiring connection on the power supply right at the front of the unit that literally melted the wiring

a few months later.

So I am self insuring from now on.  If something goes wrong I'll get it fixed at the time.

@downfield 

Only flip side is warranty, lots of circuitry however well potted, sitting outside in all weathers. Had my fair share of trying to “repair” circuit board corrosion with a toothbrush and ethanol. Now I don’t even have an airing cupboard to try and dry them out!

@papahuhu, the better solution when it comes to rodents is simply to seal all potential entry points. Once those are properly sealed, there’s nowhere for them to get in.

That does raise an important wider point though. If wiring is chewed and damaged, leading to a component failure, I’d be very surprised if that was covered under warranty. In most cases, I’d expect manufacturers to class that as external damage rather than a product fault.

Coincidentally, my next video is going to be on warranties, so keep the comments coming… I’m pulling together a lot of real-world examples from the forums.

@editor condensate drain worries me, Ive wondered why they don’t have a rodent mesh, or perhaps there is internally.

@papahuhu I’d be surprised if there were was any rodent protection inside the unit.

Quick question to everyone. Do you service your heat pump mainly to keep the manufacturer warranty valid or because you genuinely see value in the service itself, and if your warranty comes to an end, will you continue serving your heat pump?

Posted by: @editor

↑

Quick question to everyone. Do you service your heat pump mainly to keep the manufacturer warranty valid or because you genuinely see value in the service itself, and if your warranty comes to an end, will you continue serving your heat pump?

to keep the manufacturer warranty

when your warranty comes to an end, will you continue serving your heat pump - no, but I will do a couple of operations myself (clean filter, clean find, clear out debris in drip tray).

@editor I’m not sure, I think it may be FOGC (Fear of getting Cold) as much as anything. I feel that manufacturers are placing us over barrels with the warranty malarky and this is a typical insurance company ploy. ‘We will will honour your policy as long as you have complied with every single one of these 1,001 policy requirements.’ My experience of my Daikin service contract left a foul taste in the mouth - not even removing the outer casing on a monobloc (2 years in a row) suggests to me that the job is looked at as a money earner rather than as preventive maintenance! Toodles.

@editor 

Solely for warranty. As toodles said, the “service” doesn’t represent any form of true preventative maintenance. 
The logical action would be every year to pop the cash you don’t spend on a service into a high interest savings account and create your own insurance slush fund to cover repair/replacement.

@editor No and no from me!

For comparison, my EV (Smart #1) requires servicing every 2 years /18k miles in order to preserve the 3 year warranty on the car (Battery is 8 years).

BUT the first service is free, so no costs until the end of year 4.

That is for a much more complex machine that is subject to much higher environmental demands and safety regulations.  So why does Mitsi insist on a service every 12 months to preserve my warranty?  Do they not believe that after making ASHPs for many decades they are likely to fail if the outside casing doesn't get washed?

@downfield Washing the outside casing is your job but many engineers while cleaning the evaporator (essential) will also wipe over or spray the casing with cleaner. this is the most important part of the service, there is leak checking to do too which can reduce the chance of a failure when you most need it.   As for free on your EV, you take it to the dealer and all they do is 'check' items, we would travel to you which costs say 1/2 a day.  Nothing is free though, we have sold heat pumps to village halls and they often want a complete package, so all costs are covered in the one figure. Some individuals like this approach too so I'm sure your EV would be £1000 more if it included a full 5 year warranty and servicing, its free because they added the cost into the purchase price.

@downfield I am going to make this response fun as Maintenance / Service talk is boring for me but I think we need to stop saying servicing is a waste of time or massive Con, it the level of service or the lack of that is a Con not the actual service needed.

So please see my response below as me giving a helpful but fun response.

You cannot compare any item in your home to an ASHP its like comparing a car to a go-cart in moving parts and tech, they both need attention but when the go-kart explodes you just replace it, you need the car to live. An ASHP has way more moving parts and it significantly more advanced, it is exposed to the elements, its not comparable to a fridge, wine cooler or the Go-Kart. If the ASHP was a simple as a fridge it would not cost £4,000.00, the main reason you need a service on an ASHP and the manufacturers insist on it is because of some of the following points listed below: 

1) external in internal temperatures change which means the ASHP (fridge as you call it) must operate on a fluctuating DX heat exchange, an appliance such as a fridge inside your home benefits from a steady state of running and the temperature in the home environment is often steady, most if not all fridges and wine coolers operate on a fixed capillary expansion design this means the compressor work is steady (not fluctuating - fixed speed), the ASHP operates on multiple EEV / LEV, MFS/MCS these are modulating and moving components that need checking. There is one or 2 sensors in a fridge, there are way more on an ASHP 

2) external elements deposit on the coils and components at a higher volume or level compared to internal environment (basically it not windy in your home and less dirt flys around)  

3) a fridge is a whole central and sealed unit from what it is connected to, including the area being conditioned, so this is an accurately designed and measured device designed to do the job, nothing changes apart from door seals ware or the amount you open and close it, they don't last 20yrs if you open and close them 4 time an hour for 24hrs (96 times a day) over the whole winter for 10 years like an ASHP has to cycle during the winter. The ASHP is bolted straight to heating circuit of your home which is heating your home and in nearly all cases your home is not a perfect box like a fridge box, its not manufactured perfect, its not managed perfectly, its not a consistent environment for the heat losses.  

4) It is unlikely a rodent will climb inside your fridge inside your home, it is likely it will your ASHP, it is unlikely a home owner will pull their fridge out to check, it is very unlikely and even dangerous on R290 systems for the home owner to take the covers off the ASHP to check

5) It is unlikely your neighbour will complain that the fridge in your home is 10% more noisy and call the council for noise pollution, it is likely your ASHP after 3-4 years will make more than 10% more noise and cause the neighbour to complain, it is also likely when the engineer attends and has to spend 5hrs fixing the non-serviced unit he will charge you £600 for the pleasure as you have no agreement with them.

6) ASHP Monoblock's tend to have a multi finned fine Aluminium composite coils that are sensitive to air flow and heat exchange, fridges have a skin condenser or a fixed plate, often not a fan, not fins not wind, this all makes fridges and freezers a steady heat exchange, in fact almost predictable and calculated to the decimal point. The ASHP has a much smarter design, its amazingly adaptable and can fluctuate to cope with its environment, but this is via a lot more sensors and moving parts that need checking.

This is also for fun below:

This is the story of an ASHP life that was neglected.

yr1

The heat pump bobbed along all spring no big stress, it heated the water all summer and only lost its water pressure 3 time that year, engineers fixed the water pressure 3 times under warranty, come the winter the HP found it had to work much harder but did what it needed to do. On December 24th it lost its water pressure again, the home owner under instruction of the installer duly filled the the pressure again and away we go, winter passes and the (radiators unseen internally start to break down as no one has Re-doused the circuit water)

Yrs2 

The heat pump bobbed along all spring no big stress, it heated the water all summer and only lost its water pressure 1 time that year, engineers fixed the water pressure 1 time at a cost of £245 due to no maintenance agreement so warranty was void, come the winter the HP found it had to work much harder but did what it needed to do but this time found it was 4% less efficient, no big deal i can fluctuate, perhaps its the weather making me less efficient. On December 16th there was a power cut, the system sent an error code and shut down, the home owner called the ASHP company but unable to raise them as no agreement and no warranty he called many others and they said they were so busy, but don't worry, with the help of friends online the home owner managed to fix the issue by a hard reset and 3 soft resets all was good, nothing wrong with just keep resetting is there? (what was not noticed was the code error showed phase imbalance and sensor errors but they are all wiped off now) 

Yrs 3

The heat pump bobbed along all spring no big stress, it heated the water all summer and only had 3 resets by the home owner as the home owner now knows how to do this, no big deal as its easy to reset when the ASHP goes off, the ASHP had noticed that it was running 7% less efficient but hey, I can fluctuate but I am not sure about my noise now its gone from 42db to 47db. The compressor amps increase from 3.6 to 4.1 but nothing to worry and that coil you half cleaned is only 78% efficient now, hmm I wonder if thats anything to do with the fact that my coil is lightly blocked and I have a slightly loose sensor on my CD-02/01 or the fact that my level bolt has come very slightly loose, ah well lets keep heating water. (radiators keep rotting away)

Yrs 4

The heat pump now starts to have flow issues due to the radiator decomposing into the circuits, flow is reduced, HX is 78% efficient, compressor is drawing 5% more energy, noise has increased by 9% (poor little 9kW LG ASHP)

Yrs 5

Neighbour popps over to home owner and mentions noticing the noise a bit and also recollects that they have always noticed the noise for 5 years and its caused them 5 years of anguish and heartache, home owner says, its the ASHP, they are rubbish, wish I never got one, it was good for the 1st 2 years but just costs me money now, noise, reset's, callouts all 2 of them in 5 years and so on.

Yer 6

ASHP goes BANG!!!!

Compressor failure, evap fan seize, inverter board exploded, repair expensive, replace better option:- repair cost £4300 warranty 1 yr, replace £6200 warranty 5 years or more. 

Yer 6 (alternative universe)

ASHP didn't go bang, it is due to go BANG!!! in another year, hopefully that year would be in year 25 as people have told me ASHP maintenance is a waste of money these things last 25 years without maintenance (fingers crossed eH)