ASHP & triple glazing

[Moxi]

I was talking to a chap nearer to the village yesterday, he’s had an air source heat pump fitted by the fit and flit brigade, he had some assistance from the manufacturer because the unit wasn’t wi fi enabled but other than that he was left to figure it out. He was telling me that it cools down in the house too fast when they turn it off and takes ages to warm up so they have to light the WBS more I told him that the idea was to set the temperature they wanted and then let the hp run to maintain the temp and not to turn it on and off as they would if it was lpg gch. I will get the name of the hp and see if anyone here can give us some pointers regards set back for night time and some of the clever stuff Fintray and JB and others are discussing regards curves and run modes to try and help the guy fathom it out.

He gave me the impression that he was stuck with it and wished he still had his lpg boiler.

Moxi

[Joeboy]

People don't tend to like change. In particular when it isn't a seamless transition with preferably an improvement for no cost...

Back in the real world and being generic.

Did he have a heat calc
Has he addressed insulation

Both my and Fintrays heat curves were set at 0.6. Fintrays is a 10kW, mine is a 7kW. The heat loss calc defined these specs. We both found 0.6 to be too high. Fintray is running at 0.4 now as am I.

The fella could use 0.6 to.0.4 setting as a ballpark to play in. Pick one, pick.an internal temp and see how often the heat pump kicks in and out. Is it too hot, too cold, raise or lower as req'd and test again. Tell the fella about low & slow. He want the heat pump running at as low a flow temp.as he and his family are comfortable to live in. It's not a race and it's not for misers, or at least shouldn't be.

The idea is to heat the whole house to a decent living temp and let the whole home be a storage battery. First part takes 5 days to a week, to truly bring every.surface and material up to temp takes a few weeks. I mean it ALL...

This leads onto question.of costs which leads me back to point 1 & 2. That should help. Tell.him.to get out of stop/start mentality. He'll feel better.

Our thermometer on smart thermo for hp is set to 19, we back it off to 18.5 when solar gain kicks in thru the day. The wbs goes on in evening and runs low & slow. It still knocks the big lounge heating up to 22 and bleeds heat throughout the house so the HP.doesnt run. We are 75% down on log use. We have setback at 19.5 degs in the rest of the house for low rate thru the night and back down to 19degs from 05.30 onwards.

Seems to be working well for us.

If the fellas got any questions he's more than welcome.

[Moxi]

That’s brilliant info and guidance cheers JB I will go and chat to him and come back in a few weeks to update you all.

I do know that before the heat pump they were getting through a 47kg lpg cylinder ever other week which astounded me because we maybe get through one cylinder every six to eight weeks in a cold winter and maybe three to five months in the summer and that’s when we used to cook with lpg as well as water and some heating.

Hopefully he’s already grasped the keep it on all the time message and then we have a working basis.

Thanks again

Moxi

[Richard77]

How you getting on with the hot water Joeboy? Are there any times you struggle to have hot water when you need it?

I assume the amount of hot water you can use is dependent on the size of the tank they put in?

One of the reasons that I am weary about getting a heat pump is the amount of people in our house and how much hot water we go through (showers, dishes, etc.) and whether the heat pump/tank can supply the household with enough hot water.

[Joeboy]

How you getting on with the hot water Joeboy? Are there any times you struggle to have hot water when you need it?

I assume the amount of hot water you can use is dependent on the size of the tank they put in?

One of the reasons that I am weary about getting a heat pump is the amount of people in our house and how much hot water we go through (showers, dishes, etc.) and whether the heat pump/tank can supply the household with enough hot water.

My wife, daughter and son are class 1 ubershowerers. You'd think niagra was running in there. I started running the hwt at 50 degs setting. That wasn't enough.for the simplest of reasons. The water tank after a shower isn't hot enough for handwashing any dishes that don't make it to the dishwasher. We are now running at 65 degs hwt and running a night 1.5hr and 2 of 30 minute top ups through the day. When all 4 of us were here over Christmas week it was not a problem.

The hwt heats up fast, ive seen it dumping 11kW into the hwt in the right conditions. You run one or the other but as the heat is even throughout house you don't notice the space heating is off for 30 minutes.

I'm pretty sure you can spec a bigger cylinder if need be?

[Joeboy]

That’s brilliant info and guidance cheers JB I will go and chat to him and come back in a few weeks to update you all.

I do know that before the heat pump they were getting through a 47kg lpg cylinder ever other week which astounded me because we maybe get through one cylinder every six to eight weeks in a cold winter and maybe three to five months in the summer and that’s when we used to cook with lpg as well as water and some heating.

Hopefully he’s already grasped the keep it on all the time message and then we have a working basis.

Thanks again

Moxi

Sounds like his house is leaking heat at a high rate. He needs to address that or he'll go nowhere.

Insulation is the no1 requirement. All the rest follows. I find it astonishing when people refuse to grasp the simplicity of that and instead chuck tech at a problem. The humble loftroll is a good friend.

I am reworking the loft space to maximise use for swmbo post HP install. It already has a combination of original loft roll, top up loft roll, extra top up loft roll.and blown cellulose in the awkward to reach sections. I'm going to pour a load of vermiculite in to fill in any final gaps/cracks as part of the job and call it done. A big Bobby wooly hat on the hoose.

[Richard77]

How you getting on with the hot water Joeboy? Are there any times you struggle to have hot water when you need it?

I assume the amount of hot water you can use is dependent on the size of the tank they put in?

One of the reasons that I am weary about getting a heat pump is the amount of people in our house and how much hot water we go through (showers, dishes, etc.) and whether the heat pump/tank can supply the household with enough hot water.

My wife, daughter and son are class 1 ubershowerers. You'd think niagra was running in there. I started running the hwt at 50 degs setting. That wasn't enough.for the simplest of reasons. The water tank after a shower isn't hot enough for handwashing any dishes that don't make it to the dishwasher. We are now running at 65 degs hwt and running a night 1.5hr and 2 of 30 minute top ups through the day. When all 4 of us were here over Christmas week it was not a problem.

The hwt heats up fast, ive seen it dumping 11kW into the hwt in the right conditions. You run one or the other but as the heat is even throughout house you don't notice the space heating is off for 30 minutes.

I'm pretty sure you can spec a bigger cylinder if need be?

That's good...

The main thing for us would be to ensure we have enough instant hot water no matter what time of the day really, can easily live with a slight drop in temperature in the house as long as the hot water was there.

... But I digress, as there are jobs to do before I get to that stage as need to join the insulation party first or would be completely pointless.

Yeah nice one that it all seems to be operating the way you want, you are getting good results and seem happy with it.

[Joeboy]

How you getting on with the hot water Joeboy? Are there any times you struggle to have hot water when you need it?

I assume the amount of hot water you can use is dependent on the size of the tank they put in?

One of the reasons that I am weary about getting a heat pump is the amount of people in our house and how much hot water we go through (showers, dishes, etc.) and whether the heat pump/tank can supply the household with enough hot water.

My wife, daughter and son are class 1 ubershowerers. You'd think niagra was running in there. I started running the hwt at 50 degs setting. That wasn't enough.for the simplest of reasons. The water tank after a shower isn't hot enough for handwashing any dishes that don't make it to the dishwasher. We are now running at 65 degs hwt and running a night 1.5hr and 2 of 30 minute top ups through the day. When all 4 of us were here over Christmas week it was not a problem.

The hwt heats up fast, ive seen it dumping 11kW into the hwt in the right conditions. You run one or the other but as the heat is even throughout house you don't notice the space heating is off for 30 minutes.

I'm pretty sure you can spec a bigger cylinder if need be?

That's good...

The main thing for us would be to ensure we have enough instant hot water no matter what time of the day really, can easily live with a slight drop in temperature in the house as long as the hot water was there.

... But I digress, as there are jobs to do before I get to that stage as need to join the insulation party first or would be completely pointless.

Yeah nice one that it all seems to be operating the way you want, you are getting good results and seem happy with it.

Oldskool insulation and chasing air leaks/holes are the simplest and most cost effective way to improve the home. Don't get me wrong, I love the tech side and I'm thrilled by what the HP has brought and soon the 3G.

But just like the pyramids at Giza, they'd look a bit stupid with no bottom layer. In this overstretched analogy that would be proper heat calc on pyramid 1 and insulation levels on.pyramid 2

Or as I had it drummed into me offshore, the glory of the 6 P's. Again, its one people don't like to face as it's not easy. It could literally be the mantra of the nascent HP chaser?

Proper
Planning
Prevents
Piss
Poor
Performance

We've got rock wool, earthwool, vermiculite, blown cellulose, celotex, kingspan and expanding foam. All different sizes and all used in different parts of the house for different reasons. If you keep in mind air circulation and don't create any stagnant spots it's only upside you'll see. The 3g and new doors will be the maraschino cherry on top and they'll be great but only because of pyramid 1 & 2 having done the heavy lifting.

[NoraBatty]

Perlite was delivered yesterday and we set about filling the cavities for the cloakroom.
We went with supercoarse 3-6mm stuff. No point having dust was the thought.
Its very very dusty, and even at 3-6mm there is still alot of superfines in there. Fine layer of dust everywhere in the house this morning.
Not complete yet. We had to stop because we need to go and get/ install proper ducting for the extractor. Im not a fan of the plastic slinky ducting that was there.
Despite not finished and still holes letting cold air in, room feels significantly warmer this morning.

The external wall we did omplete has gone from 15.3C to 17.6C overnight.

We estimate to need another half bag to finish what we have, totalling 350Litres/ and 50L to go in the garden =total cost £130.
Just need some penetrating rain now in that direction to put it to the test.

[Joeboy]

Perlite was delivered yesterday and we set about filling the cavities for the cloakroom.
We went with supercoarse 3-6mm stuff. No point having dust was the thought.
Its very very dusty, and even at 3-6mm there is still alot of superfines in there. Fine layer of dust everywhere in the house this morning.
Not complete yet. We had to stop because we need to go and get/ install proper ducting for the extractor. Im not a fan of the plastic slinky ducting that was there.
Despite not finished and still holes letting cold air in, room feels significantly warmer this morning.

The external wall we did omplete has gone from 15.3C to 17.6C overnight.

We estimate to need another half bag to finish what we have, totalling 350Litres/ and 50L to go in the garden =total cost £130.
Just need some penetrating rain now in that direction to put it to the test.

That's great to read, total victory! Our front lounge has completely changed in feel. I really love what insulation brings.

Not sure where you sourced from. Travis Perkins are a decent supplier. If I hear back from fueltheburn I'll hold off on buying more. If not I reckon I could lose another 4 bags into the loft top up.