Hi Guys

I'm new to the forum but have been using a lot of the content from the RHH over the past 12 months or so as a way to try and limit the mistakes in picking and installing a system. I wont go into all that on an intro page, but I could not believe the difficulty in trying to do things right, and even then the pitfalls which awaited me. I naïvely thought - get three quotes and go with the cheapest - wow, was I in for a shock 🤣 Probably got 7 or 8 quotes in the end and now know more about the process than most of the people who came to quote 😳 I still can't believe companies are so poor at what they are supposed to be professional at, and as soon as I started asking questions, and then questioning their replies, half of them went into scrip mode and answered questions I had not asked, and the other half were like rabbits in the headlights.

Anyway, this is what I went for in the end:

2000sqft 70s bungalow, just getting the underfloor and loft insulation sorted now that the system is pretty much in and up and running, although there are still a couple of small bits which need resolving from the install. I asked all companies to do the heat loss report based on my insulation being right as I was going to do it after the project, so wanted it included in the calculations which were incidentally - ranging from just over 8kw to just over 12kw! 🙄 

Heat loss used was Approx. 8.5kw and located in central Scotland not far from the coast. Using a Vaillant 10kw Aerotherm, with standard controls and a 250L slimline Vaillant cylinder. Got 19 radiators linked up to it, mostly new styles, but kept some older ones to reduce the costs, and got new underfloor pipework where required according to the installer.

At the same time I got a large solar system installed, its 34 x 475w Aiko Neostar 475w panels @ 16.1kw, a Sigenstore system with a 12kw inverter and gateway which also has DNO approval for the same, 27kwh of battery storage and a Sigen 7kw EV charger.

I've just started playing with tariffs and asked Googles AI for help on this also - which I'm not convinced is right, but the conversations did give me thinking material, so worth looking at, but I ended up not doing what it suggested anyway. I went for Octopus Agile for both import and export and have left the Sigen AI to manage the process. Again, I'm not sure if this is the right thing to do but you have to start somewhere, so until I have it running a while it will be hard to tell how good it is, and TBH, my initial thoughts were just go for an EV overnight tariff and rely on solar and the batteries during the day (octopus intelligent go is not supported by the Sigen 7kw EV charger BTW), so we will see?? Got my gas disconnected also 😉 

James

It really depends on the building and what you want to aircon. Trying to aircon an entire house if you already have an air/water heating system is probably overkill.

One big item when doing a bigger install is the loft. If you've got a loft that's just a loft not rooms then it's hugely easier to do the upper floor as you can do it from the loft space with ceiling units and the like.

AC was relatively painless, installer drilled a couple of holes in the lounge wall screwed the interior blower inside and hung the HP up high outside to match, gas up, wire up the wall to loft for leccy and hoover up.

I was really torn between A2W or putting another aircon at the other end of the house and running them as main heat source but decided to take the MCS grant route for winter comfort…..or rather ‘she’ did!

AC was relatively painless, installer drilled a couple of holes in the lounge wall screwed the interior blower inside and hung the HP up high outside to match, gas up, wire up the wall to loft for leccy and hoover up.

I was really torn between A2W or putting another aircon at the other end of the house and running them as main heat source but decided to take the MCS grant route for winter comfort…..or rather ‘she’ did!