They will get left as they are if they have the minimum output required.
Heat Pumps: anyone have one/thought about it?
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Soldato
If you need longer rads, the pipes can also be run horizontally along under the rads. Obviously not as aesthetically pleasing, but may not be seen in a lot of cases.
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I'm looking to extend my house in the near future and I'm thinking of installing an ASHP as part of the work, but I'm struggling to understand what 'stuff' will need to be installed, where, and how much space I'll need.
There's obviously the monobloc unit and a hot water tank. Then I think there's also an expansion vessel and some kind of control panel? If I go with underfloor heating, then I'll also need the manifolds for that too. What about a buffer tank?
I found the following image which seems to show most of the gubbins. I'm mainly worried about things that I wouldn't be able to fit into a say 80cm x 80cm floor to ceiling unit. Anything extra/missing shown that I need to find a space for?
Also, how close does the monobloc unit need to be to the hot water tank? I imagine the answer is 'as close as possible', but this would likely mean having it right next to the patio, so situating it ~8m away on the other side of the house would be preferable. Is that feasible as long as I can get power to the unit, and hot and cold flow can reach it?
There's obviously the monobloc unit and a hot water tank. Then I think there's also an expansion vessel and some kind of control panel? If I go with underfloor heating, then I'll also need the manifolds for that too. What about a buffer tank?
I found the following image which seems to show most of the gubbins. I'm mainly worried about things that I wouldn't be able to fit into a say 80cm x 80cm floor to ceiling unit. Anything extra/missing shown that I need to find a space for?
Also, how close does the monobloc unit need to be to the hot water tank? I imagine the answer is 'as close as possible', but this would likely mean having it right next to the patio, so situating it ~8m away on the other side of the house would be preferable. Is that feasible as long as I can get power to the unit, and hot and cold flow can reach it?
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The heat pump can go anywhere within reason, other side of the house is fine. They’ll be a bit of loss from the insulated pipework but nothing to be concerned about.I'm looking to extend my house in the near future and I'm thinking of installing an ASHP as part of the work, but I'm struggling to understand what 'stuff' will need to be installed, where, and how much space I'll need.
There's obviously the monobloc unit and a hot water tank. Then I think there's also an expansion vessel and some kind of control panel? If I go with underfloor heating, then I'll also need the manifolds for that too. What about a buffer tank?
I found the following image which seems to show most of the gubbins. I'm mainly worried about things that I wouldn't be able to fit into a say 80cm x 80cm floor to ceiling unit. Anything extra/missing shown that I need to find a space for?
Also, how close does the monobloc unit need to be to the hot water tank? I imagine the answer is 'as close as possible', but this would likely mean having it right next to the patio, so situating it ~8m away on the other side of the house would be preferable. Is that feasible as long as I can get power to the unit, and hot and cold flow can reach it?
You might need a volumiser but it depends on your system, they can stick it in the loft if needed. As can the cylinder if really needed. They also make slim and tall cylinders if needed.
Retrofitting UFH is expensive and a huge job on top of the other work.
That's good to know. Would the heat pump need to be connected to the house in some way (e.g. power/pipework) in the immediate vicinity, or can the power/pipework all be put in an trench and run back to the utility room where the rest of the gear is? If nothing needs to be connected in the immediate vicinity, what's to stop me from installing it at the bottom of the garden (I thought this approach would require a split system as opposed to a monobloc)?
I'm not keen on putting stuff in the loft. Ideally I'd like to know the answer to whether one is needed quite early so I can plan for it. Is this something an installer would be able to tell me well in advance, or is it a late call depending on how the install goes?
Yea it's making me a bit nervous, and I'm not even close to getting quotes yet! Is a 1970's house with a solid floor with (I'm pretty sure) no insulation. The current plans involve building a reasonable sized extension to make a large kitchen/diner/living area. We'll obviously ensure the new portion has decent floor insulation, and it would be nice to tear up the rest of the rest of the existing floor in the room (approx 50%) to make the room fully insulated throughout. And if we're planning to redo the floor in 2/3rds of the downstairs, why not just go the whole hog and do put it everywhere (obvious cost issues aside)?!
Because the new room will be a a huge area with a tile floor, UFH just seems a perfect fit rather than having to squeeze massive rads around the edges of the room.
Soldato
The heatpump can be quite some way from the house, obviously water pipes and electrics will need to run back to the house - watch this video to get an idea of just how far is possible. May be worth watching some of his other video's as well about heat pumps and underfloor heating. Closer is better though as it reduces installation costs and also heat loss.
You will need a cylinder if that's what you mean by whether one is needed, and if you are building a reasonable size extension, is it possible to incorporate a plant room/cupboard? Have a look for a local Heatgeek installer and perhaps engage their services for advice.
The Heatgeeks channel on Youtube is also worth a watch. I've also recently seen that Valiant do a UniTower which incorporates most items excluding the ASAP in a tower that 600 x 700 (W x D), seems a lot neater to me.
Yes, you can install it remote to the house but the more work it will be, the more it costs. Good heat pump installers are in high demand so labour costs are high. A huge part of the installation is the labour, the individual parts are not that expensive. You may want to pay someone else to do the ground work or do it yourself if costs are an issue.
My relatively straightforward install had 5 people working on it, 3 of them were there for the entire time and it still took a week.
They should know from the initial calculations as to whether one is needed or not. Basically the system needs to have a minimum volume of water in it to be able to undertake defrost cycles.
It’s just a small insulated tank that sits inline with the pipework, one pipe in, one pipe out effectively making a sealed unit which just adds water volume. They can put it in the cylinder cupboard or the loft as needed.
If the pump in the heat pump can’t make the required flow rate for your rads, you may need to have a buffer.
A buffer is the same tank but it’s piped differently and you effectively have 2 circuits. One for the heat pump and o e for the radiators and they mix in the buffer. This mixing reduces efficiency but fortunately most don’t need this and you want to avoid it as much as possible.
Sounds like a reasonable plan. You’ll probably need to temporarily move out while that work is done.
If you have the ceiling height, you may want to consider an overlay system.
Edit: If the one piece of advice you take away from this, it’s engage someone on the heating side that knows exactly what they are doing, do not rely on a general builder for the heating - they will mess it up and it will end up costing you more in the long run.
For this kind of project, I’d engage a specialist, heat geek is a good place to start. They will be able to work off plans for the ‘to be’ on the heat loss and UFH side of things.
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I know I'll need a hot water tank, and it's easy to find the dimensions of those, but it's knowing how much other stuff I'll need (volumiser/buffer tank, expansion vessel, control panels, manifolds, etc) and how much space I'll need around the tank for all this.
The extension will contain a utility room where I'm planning to put all this. It's approx 3x2.3m, so a decent sized room, but this will also need to fit a washing machine, tumble drier, sink, window, door, plus some cupboard space and some worktop space too. I reckon I could create a 1x1m cupboard fairly comfortably. Any more than that and the layout starts to become awkward. But I'd rather have it all in one place and not have to put bits in the loft/garage.
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Soldato
I will grab some pictures of my loft install. It is pretty extensive and being a loft they didn't need to kill themselves in going tight.
1mx1m should be sufficient but if you have a huge 300L cylinder, that will squeeze the pace a bit.
If that’s on the ground floor, you’ll need to fit everything into that space, you will not be able to split it into the loft as that’s only really possible if it’s directly above the cupboard.
Don’t forget you’ll also need somewhere for the UFH manifold.
Edit: I can measure my cupboard, it’s slightly bigger than 1x1 and my volumiser is in the loft but we wanted to prioritise storage so it was pushed up to the loft. It would have easily fitted.
If that’s on the ground floor, you’ll need to fit everything into that space, you will not be able to split it into the loft as that’s only really possible if it’s directly above the cupboard.
Don’t forget you’ll also need somewhere for the UFH manifold.
Edit: I can measure my cupboard, it’s slightly bigger than 1x1 and my volumiser is in the loft but we wanted to prioritise storage so it was pushed up to the loft. It would have easily fitted.
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Soldato
1m x 1m x 2m is a good guide as you can fit most, if not all of the common items in that space (excluding UFH). My tank install space is 1m x 1m x 1.5m. The installer agreed to work with the space as the Octopus surveyors app is a default no on those dimensions. Plenty of space directly above in the loft as the 2 existing water tanks will go.
I may have some issues with my location next to the house. Local Town Council are very anti-heat pumps. So the typical 8-10m pipe runs may run up to 20m though 25m seems to be a reasonable limit before extra steps are taken.
Soldato
From some of the installs I've seen on YT a 1 x 1 meter cupboard should be sufficient, best way would be to have a chat with a local installer and get his thoughts.