Air source Heat Pumps any good?

[Phil Pascoe]

Around here they list buildings and watch them fall down for a half a century. One nearby is listed because of the superb original coving .......... which is made up of rubber and other materials from packing crates after WW2.

 

[Skydivermel]

agreed with everything you said until you got to that point ..!! If it is a sealed unvented cylinder then the legionella risk is nil. Legionella requires air entry to the system along with moisture. It will not grow in a closed chlorinated water source and there are no reported cases anywhere of it in a domestic environment in the last 20 years. Legionella cycles just cost money, they do not actually do anything.

As you say if it's a sealed system. But all systems will eventually get oxygen into them so once a week for 2 hours at cheap rate electricity is worth it in my book. However one hell of a lot of UK properties still have open vented systems. Our housing stock is some of the oldest in Europe and we do very little to insulate them. If Govt gave grants for the correct insulation then we could all run ASHP. BUT if insulating to a very high degree then we have the issue of moisture retention which leads to the necessity of the correct ventilation system for the property.

It's a never ending circle of expense for the homeowner.

The current house building boom we're going thru worries the life out of me. We're building the slums of the future. Think back to when we were kids (me was 1956 - 1970) we had some of the coldest and draughty houses with ice on the inside of the windows. However we were also more healthy then as a nation than we are now.

 

[mikej460]

Think back to when we were kids (me was 1956 - 1970) we had some of the coldest and draughty houses with ice on the inside of the windows. However we were also more healthy then as a nation than we are now.

Bit of a stretch this, although as a young boy I do remember 1963 ice leaves on the inside of my bedroom window (brand new house with no central heating); I think our current state of health is more down to not living in slums, better diet, reduced smoking, better public health education and better medication.

 

[Lorenzl]

I think that was the way in the late 60's/70's @mikej460 The first house my parents brought had one electric fire in the lounge only and I remember waking with frost on the inside of the bedroom windows.
My second house had one gas fire in the lounge and a small electric fire in the hall.

 

[Cooper]

However we were also more healthy then as a nation than we are now.

Only anecdotally, but in my cold 1950s childhood lots of the elderly didn't get much past 70. We've had a boom in folk reaching their 90s since central heating became ubiquitous. But I must agree about the state of housing stock.
I think its a cultural thing, thinking being cold is healthy. Bedroom fan lights open on winter nights, one bar electric heaters if you were lucky to get into your pyjamas, then two or 3 thick woolly blankets, an eiderdown and on really cold nights your coat over the top.
I have a theory that our rulers were brought up in freezing public school dormitories and think being cold was good for the nations character, hence pathetic energy regs. in the 50s and 60s.

Where my daughter lives, in a Munich suburb, they have district ground source heating with heat-pumps in the homes. The modern buildings have very high spec insulation and older buildings far better than here. They also have an obligation to regularly upgrade boilers in homes that are off grid. Qualified trades people know that there will be a regular supply of work, not like ours, with energy policy turned on an off at the whim of the current Prime Minister. (will green levies still be in place when the next one shuffles in?) You would think the current energy and climate emergencies would make zero carbon the most important policy but it seems cutting council tax in Tunbridge Wells is far more important.

 

[dickm]

Forgot to add - bigger wood stoves are better - a small fire burning hot in a large stove with a larger surface area is more efficient than the opposite.
Also much faster in terms of heat generation - you can get a room warm very quickly with small stuff packed loosely with the vents open to burn it fast.
This is roughly what is behind a rocket stove at one end of the scale, or a gasification boiler at the other, i.e. fast hot burning for greater efficiency.

Not convinced about that. When we moved into our present house (near passivhaus spec) it had a huge Vermont Castings stove in the living room. We didn't have it running all the time, and my impression was that it took a heck of a long time to warm up to efficient burning. Replaced it with a 5kW Squirrel, which heats the whole house via a forced ventilation/heat recovery system, and to us, it seems much better.

 

[Jacob]

Not convinced about that. When we moved into our present house (near passivhaus spec) it had a huge Vermont Castings stove in the living room. We didn't have it running all the time, and my impression was that it took a heck of a long time to warm up to efficient burning. Replaced it with a 5kW Squirrel, which heats the whole house via a forced ventilation/heat recovery system, and to us, it seems much better.

You can kick off efficient burning very quickly by just having loose dry small stuff in there, not packed tight, which should burn off like a rocket if the vents are open and flue is OK. Might have to keep adding small stuff to keep the temperature up, and then start putting in bigger stuff gradually.
I had a Squirrel too but it was a high maintenance job needing fire bricks and baffles at regular intervals.
The Dowling stoves are sheet steel welded and totally maintenance free so far (20 years or more) except for broken glass accidents (twice).
The main thing is to avoid slow burning - a little and often rather than packed in tight.
For maintaining background heat you need thermal mass:
Gassification boilers give you fast hot burning with heat saved in a thermal store (big water tank).
The primitive (?) Russian version involves small hot fires in massive masonry constructions to store heat.

 

[Misterdog]

The primitive (?) Russian version involves small hot fires in massive masonry constructions to store heat.

Known in this country as the chimney breast.
A ton or two of masonry which serves no structural purpose.

Some of the Russian and other very cold climate stoves doubled up as a setee and/or bed.

We think we are hard done by if we cannot have our homes heated to 22/23 C.
My father was at Stalingrad in WW2, the temperature that winter was apparently minus 20....to minus 40.

Turn on the 'heating' and a sniper would shoot you.

Still many will complain that we are freezing to death this winter and blame our 'Fascist' government.

 

[artie]

How about we learn to be happy at 17Deg instead of 22.

Saves heating costs, helps the planet and aids in weight loss as your body will burn fat to keep warm.

Win, win, win.

 

[Droogs]

that's still too hot, 16 C is ideal room temp for me CH set to come on at 14 and off at 18

 

[Lorenzl]

What we want is an over active thyroid in the winter and under active one in the summer. You could do it with drugs and it would be cheaper

 

[deema]

Unfortunately, as you age, you feel the cold more and need a higher temperature to remain comfortable. When your young, your body is able to generate heat to keep you warm, as you slow down and lose muscle mass that ability decreases. There are a number of conditions that also mean you need a warmer temperature to feel comfortable, at 17 degrees that just 1 degree warmer than the minimum temperature for an office environment. I know that if I had run the offices in my company’s at 17 degrees a certain sex would have lynched me, the minimum acceptable temperature was considered to be 21C!

 

[mikej460]

Unfortunately, as you age, you feel the cold more and need a higher temperature to remain comfortable. When your young, your body is able to generate heat to keep you warm, as you slow down and lose muscle mass that ability decreases. There are a number of conditions that also mean you need a warmer temperature to feel comfortable, at 17 degrees that just 1 degree warmer than the minimum temperature for an office environment. I know that if I had run the offices in my company’s at 17 degrees a certain sex would have lunched me, the minimum acceptable temperature was considered to be 21C!

I think my wife must have worked there...

 

[Misterdog]

Because they all wanted to work in summer blouses ?

 

[dickm]

You can kick off efficient burning very quickly by just having loose dry small stuff in there, not packed tight, which should burn off like a rocket if the vents are open and flue is OK. Might have to keep adding small stuff to keep the temperature up, and then start putting in bigger stuff gradually.
I had a Squirrel too but it was a high maintenance job needing fire bricks and baffles at regular intervals.
The Dowling stoves are sheet steel welded and totally maintenance free so far (20 years or more) except for broken glass accidents (twice).
The main thing is to avoid slow burning - a little and often rather than packed in tight.
For maintaining background heat you need thermal mass:
Gassification boilers give you fast hot burning with heat saved in a thermal store (big water tank).
The primitive (?) Russian version involves small hot fires in massive masonry constructions to store heat.

Can't disagree with most of that, just that my experience of the VC one was that its thermal mass was useful IF running all the time, but even doing exactly what you say, it was a pig to get going for intermittent use.
Don't know the Dowling stoves, but had read that welded sheet was inferior to CI. I'll bow to your superior knowledge, but stick with my second Squirrel! Had one in last house but one, which fortunately the buyers didn't want, so it moved to our last house and worked well for about 17 years; probably still going strong. After falling out with the Vermonster, got another Squirrel which has been in for about 14 years.
Working with some Swedes many years ago, and they had one of those huge masonry surrounds to a small fire.
Could look up the exact date we were there, because our very dour Swedish "minder" was sitting in his car on a bleak airfield when he suddenly shot out of the car, waving his arms and shouting gleefully "She's gone, she's gone". Thatcher had just resigned.

 

[Chris70]

If it is an unvented cylinder - ie one with no header tank and at mains pressure - it is not required. Get it turned off

How can I tell simply if it’s an invented cylinder? ‘Power Naturally’ designed and installed it. I’ve every reason to believe they’re competent.

 

[Chris70]

How can I tell simply if it’s an invented cylinder? ‘Power Naturally’ designed and installed it. I’ve every reason to believe they’re competent.

Err, unvented, not invented.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Turn the taps on. If the hot and the cold come out at the same rate, it's probably unvented.
Turn the rising main off - if you've still got hot water it's vented.

 

[Jacob]

Can't disagree with most of that, just that my experience of the VC one was that its thermal mass was useful IF running all the time, but even doing exactly what you say, it was a pig to get going for intermittent use.

Maybe a flue problem? It takes longer to get a woodburner going from cold if it's piped into an old masonry chimney rather than an insulated modern flue pipe. Sometimes pays to get a draught going by burning loose paper, cardboard, small kindling first.

Don't know the Dowling stoves, but had read that welded sheet was inferior to CI.

Seems indestructible. Have only burnt wood, maybe coal would be too hot

..... he suddenly shot out of the car, waving his arms and shouting gleefully "She's gone, she's gone". Thatcher had just resigned.

I remember the feeling!

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Seems indestructible. Have only burnt wood, maybe coal would be too hot

It isn't. I burn anything that will go in mine.


Dowling Stoves - Little Devil