Hi Folks,

New to the forum and it looks like a great informative place with lots of good knowledge.    I'm currently in the process of have a Daikin Altherma M - EDLQ011-016CV3 installed, with the plumber finishing off next week and Daikin coming into commissions as well.  So I'm hopeful that all will be well and I wont need this forum too much for troubleshooting.   However, it's been a long painful process so far so I'm not that confident I wont be fixing issues and tuning the system myself.  I will reserve judgement until its all completed of course.

@saf1973, welcome to the forums and good luck with your installation and hopefully your system will be installed well. We'd still love to hear your updates regarding performance and efficiency. Please keep us updated and feel free to start a thread dedicated to your pump and installation.

hi. im new here sorrry for my bad english as its not my first language. move to jersey chanel island from thailand in 2002 when i was 11/12. i am a plumber my self but new to ashp normally oil boiler. manage to get my self a 3 bed semi detached house in jersey with my wife and install a ecodan 8.5kw with 210L pre-plumb cylinder with UFH/Rads as old owner had gas boiler but very expensive to run in jersey and its the best thing i have done!!. had it 3yrs now but still tweeking it every year (plumber thing lol) main thing is its improving every year any help willing to learn!!

Hi @biketrials1 and welcome.  From your other post it looks like your ASHP is running fine and hopefully you'll be able to provide some good advice for others.  

Is your ASHP cheaper than gas to run?  That's not usually the case in the UK but maybe Channel Islands are different. 

PS your English is very good! 

Posted by: @andris

Hi, I have been reading this forum since it started. I have been really enjoying it. I love trying new ways of improving my ASHPsetup, so I followed many advice from here and tried different ways to get better heat using less kw.

My name is András. I am from Hungary. So, apologies for any mistakes I will make here with my spelling and English. We live in Scotland near Edinburgh. We did a self build in 2015 4 bed detached, conservatory, attic, heated about 230m². 

My brother is a heating engineer, so he came over to help. He did all plumbing heating and the hetpump. I have a little different setup than most ASHP on this forum. I have Samsung 16kw unit air to water but also air to air with 3 split aircon units. I think they call it TDM. I never had any problems. I think we oversized it a bit. Also, I did the insulation of the whole hose and the membrane , so I made sure no air leaks anywhere as i was aware of low flow temp

 

 

Hi Andris and welcome.  That sounds like an interesting setup.  Do you have a separate unit for air to air or does the Samsung unit do everything?  

PS I am from Edinburgh but live in England now.  And your English is good.  

I'm a self-builder actively renovating a 1930's farmhouse in rural West Devon.

The house now has a large south-facing extension with active and passive solar elements.

We have under-floor heating (80% completed) fed from a 280-litre Thermal Store. This currently uses a gas-boiler and solar vacuum-tube array. The UFH runs through both solid-floor and suspended-floor zones, allowing different heating profiles.

Warm-roof construction means that the rafters and attic space are now inside the insulated envelope of the house.

We have a VW ID3 EV with a 7kW charge-point, but no 'smart charger' at present. That can be added when V2G becomes available for EVs with CCS connection (tricky!)

The 'plant room' houses the electricity distribution boards, PV-panel String Combiner box, 3.6kW inverter and an 8kW PowerVault storage battery installed as part of a trial by OVO Energy. The house has been provided with a 3-phase feed, courtesy of Western Power Distribution (WPD), but currently still uses only one-phase via an Aclara SMETS2 Smart Meter.

I have been observing/commenting on the ongoing Zero-Carbon Heating Trial being run by OVO with 100% BEIS funding. Based on insights gained there, I am now commencing the design and construction of a hybrid off-grid storage battery system. This will be capable of running a future heat-pump (ASHP or GSHP) in addition to 24v LED lighting, internet routers/WiFi, phone and other 'essentials'.

As part of a local Community Energy Group, I have been monitoring a local substation for the past 3 years. WPD have kindly provided me with access to some of their in-house data/mapping. I am therefore briefed on issues which concern them, including losses due to phase-imbalance and harmonics from heat-pumps etc. This is informing me on the best approach for grid-connected and off-grid storage.

And yes... I'm the same 'Transparent' who has been actively posting to the OVO Forum over the past 5 years. 😎 

@kev-m Thanks for the compliment on my English. Yes, I have one outdoor unit. I will try to give more info on my setup under the ASHP forum.

Hi All,

I found this via Mars YouTube channel and website - so thank you Mars!

It's particularly interesting for me because I recently moved in to an eco -conscious brand new house with ASHP, electric only, UFH etc.

Now with the benefit of three months data to review usage I am really disappointed (well, really pissed off tbh) to learn that I have tripled my costs already compared to my previous dual fuel/combi boiler property and i am already £470 in deficit with my energy supplier based on their estimate.

Hoping to get a few clues from the experience and knowledge of the smart people here!

There will be many others who feel equally upset at the high running costs of heat-pumps @London-trader - the present steep price rise for energy is only going to make your comparison look worse.

You don't say what your new house has to store Domestic Hot Water (DHW) nor UFH water. Storage is an important part of the heat-pump system design and installation.

Even so, I believe there are two main strategies which could alleviate your situation:

1: Move to a Time-of-Use tariff so as to take mains electricity for your ASHP only during those times of the day when it is affordable.

2: Store the required electricity in a battery which directly feeds the heat-pump (independently of other mains powered devices in the home). Ie de-couple the heat pump's grid-connection!

You will see from my own introduction just above yours that I'm already "on the case". The proposed system will also be able to take electricity from other sources such as PV panels.

The technology is mostly already available, albeit not all in the UK. However there are some safety and regulatory issues as to how it gets implemented. Once I've had a good read through of the Forum sections on Energy Storage I'll post more there.

@london-trader the vrc700 will be set with an artificially  high heat curve to allow the heatmiser stats to operate.

the trick is to set heat miser stats to maximum, and lower the heat curve and let the vrc700 do its stuff 

@transparent thanks for your reply.

I'm rapidly getting my head around the complexities, it's a steep learning curve for sure and i'll be keenly watching your progress

I have a Unistor unit in the loft. I signed up with Octopus and the tariff unit rate is 22.97p kwh.

Since i moved in September 29 I have been using about 900 kwh per month. Single person occupancy currently. For a 100sq m two bed it is way too high, nowhere near my EPC projection. Had a phone consult with Vaillant who directed me to change a few settings and it hasn't made any difference so I was beginning to feel somewhat disconcerted until i found this forum