Split Air con

So, our single 3.5kw upstairs unit has been in for a while now and working a bit harder over the last few days. Bearing in mind I originally planned a second unit downstairs, which isn't in yet, it's doing amazingly well.

Outside is 31 (ignore my location, I moved and I'm actually in the SE, Kent). On a day like this the house would usually be high 20s and wouldn't cool much overnight.

The single unit on Eco mode is holding upstairs at 21, downstairs is 23/24. The fan isn't running at full speed. I think it'll take a while to cool if the house was ever left to get hot, but we're just leaving it on all day so it stops the heat build up in the first place.

Very, very happy. We've also had some amazing nights sleep with the reduced humidity and cooler temps. We turn it off overnight as we just don't need it running once everything has been cooled.

I genuinely don't know if we'll bother with the second unit. I'll probably hold off for now.
 
@HungryHippos very interested. I love seeing what other people do and especially who take pride in their home! Absolutely stunning throughout, a massive improvement on what was there. I especially love the kitchen, the matt black looks great.

Have you done much of the work yourself? I tend to do everything myself to keep costs down and I prefer my handy work than contractors as appreciate they need to earn a living and get on to the next job. The AC is the only thing I've got someone in to do, and the water softener although I am more than capable with the plumbing.

@Matthew.M That is great, you must be really pleased! I left all 3 rooms on yesterday but mine did not cool the downstairs, although the living room did feel a lot cooler but thats probably because the kitchen was 28c from the wife having the oven on.
 
fobose said:
@HungryHippos very interested. I love seeing what other people do and especially who take pride in their home! Absolutely stunning throughout, a massive improvement on what was there. I especially love the kitchen, the matt black looks great.

Have you done much of the work yourself? I tend to do everything myself to keep costs down and I prefer my handy work than contractors as appreciate they need to earn a living and get on to the next job. The AC is the only thing I've got someone in to do, and the water softener although I am more than capable with the plumbing.
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Thanks mate! :cool:

Long Read ahead...

I did what I could with the help of my family, but a lot of it required trades unfortunately. I am just not that handy really beyond basic stuff, so it made sense to earn money with what I was good at and use it to pay people that know what they're doing.

Did most of the painting/decorating though with the exception of the hallway and kitchen, mostly because I wanted to blitz those rooms as quickly as I could and the hallway had the added height above the stairs. If you were looking closely you may also see the rad in the kitchen was swapped to a wall mounted one, we fixed the damage that move caused, can barely tell it was elsewhere before.

Found a few skeletons in the woodwork though, including;
  • An uncapped gas pipe (looks like they added electric hob but was originally meant to be gas)
  • In one of the pics of the kitchen there are 2 cabinets on the wall, behind those cabinets there was a hole in the plasterboard roughly big enough to fit your head into (best guess is they hit the rad pipe behind the wall when putting the cabs up, but never actually thought to patch the wall once the rad pipe was fixed).
  • Kickboards in the kitchen were just nailed together and then free-standing! :D
  • They had boxed in the free-standing fridge/freezer they had in the kitchen. That is a big no-no!
  • The heating system is 2 zone (downstairs + upstairs) but they had wired it incorrectly, so it basically came on in both zones when 1 was turned on. I actually think this was done on purpose somehow.
  • One of the kitchen wall cabinets was basically held to the wall with silicone.
  • They had swapped an electric shower for a thermostatic one in the en-suite, which is good, but the old supply to the electric one wasn't cut. So there was a switch in the bathroom for it, and it made the box on the ceiling turn on but did nothing else. We removed the box and tidied the cabling + turned off at the fusebox. I might be able to use this for the extra socket I wanted but need to investigate.
I think the previous owners liked DIY but weren't very good at it, so on my to-do list is the garden at some point, the patio they've put down isn't flat and a lot of the pointing is just missing, so it's weed heaven.

The original pics make it look better than it was as well, a lot of stuff was just "tired" looking, I think there was some neglect to the condition of things, I basically keep stuff as good as new for as long as possible.

The only things I kept of theirs decor wise were the wooden floor in the hallway (condition was OK + changing it would mean messing about with the skirting boards and architraves) and the shutters in the kitchen, which are pretty good actually and luckily were white.

I pulled apart a built-in cupboard they paid £2k for a couple of years earlier, but it was just a bit ugly and I didn't need it, so that was a massive waste of money! :(

One of the biggest "WTF" moments for me though was when I was locating sockets. In the landing upstairs they had zero sockets at all, honestly even one socket on one wall would have been enough. We added one by spurring it off one of the bedrooms on the opposite wall. An easy fix really (even sourced the same socket model). In the master bedroom there is absolutely perfect wall opposite the bed for a TV on the wall, or on a chest of drawers or something. Nope, no sockets anywhere nearby, need to add one there somehow...

As you can imagine all of that has come to quite a tidy sum, but fortunately I was able to pay for it out of savings + a bit extra on the mortgage when I moved, so financially it's all well within manageable levels, and I got what I wanted out of the work inc. the upcoming aircon which is something I've wanted for a while.

Don't really have much left to do, off the top of my head: sort garden out, get ethernet run to some areas of the house (nice to have more than requirement), get the windows properly cleaned (inside the frames), which is not a job I'm really looking forwards to doing so may see what the cost is to get professionals in to blitz it.
 
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An interesting read, it sounds like not all of it has been fun but respect that you've put a lot of things right. I've not found too many bodges in my place so far apart from a plug socket I needed to fix whilst doing the decorating, although I have not pulled the bathrooms or kitchen apart yet (kitchen looks great but is not ideal in layout).

Literally the week after I had the AC installed, I noticed the shower trap in the ensuite had a crack in it so we have stopped using it for now in case it's leaking through. 3 plumbers have all said the tray needs to come out and a new tray needs putting in (no access to the trap). Sod that, I hate the layout so will splash out on something very nice but do all the work myself, currently saving up some funds for that. It's a very large room (bigger than main bathroom) yet has a tiny shower cubicle in it and a frustratingly annoying small sink not fit for a small downstairs loo.

Networking! Now you are talking. The whole start of my decorating has been partially because of networking. I had dark navy carpet in my lounge / diner, hall way and landing which made the areas look dark. I am a massive fan of wood flooring so knew this was what I would change the lounge/hall too and why not run network cables whilst I was at it. I probably should have done a project log on here but had not been active on OCUK for a while. I'll have a look to see if I can figure out how you did that album on imgur then upload some pics to save spamming this thread with pics for those that are not interested.

Here it is @HungryHippos : https://imgur.com/a/O64caQN
 
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Split AC turns up this weekend, been talking about fitting one for ages and ditching the portable unit, baking my ***** off in the home office today was the last straw.

Two 3.5kW units going in upstairs, piping to be run through the loft and to a corner of the house out of the way, was going to go Daikin, however the Mitsubishi R32 multi split caught my eye instead.

When all said and done inc the two 3.5kW indoor units, one outdoor, pipework, condensate pump, external trunking, cables, clips etc etc the price is looking to be just under 2k.

Going to be interesting fitting it all..................

If this turns out well then the main downstairs and remaining main upstairs rooms will get a 3 / 4 unit split installed when the extension gets built.
 
Are you an AC installer/F gas engineer by trade or just a man in the know? At least the weather looks like it will be a bit cooler for when your working in the loft. I am interested to see install pics if you cba :)
 
fobose said:
Are you an AC installer/F gas engineer by trade or just a man in the know? At least the weather looks like it will be a bit cooler for when your working in the loft. I am interested to see install pics if you cba :)
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Not an AC installer, i suppose a man with some knowledge would best cover the base, installed some server room AC in the past was not tricky. Figure after lots of reading and having a father and myself who are both in "engineering" professions both very handy in DIY then how hard can it be :p

Will need to system vacuum tested before gassing it up, however you can do that yourself too, btw will get back to you on the "how hard can it be point", but not looking forward to working in the loft again.
 
Firestar_3x said:
Split AC turns up this weekend, been talking about fitting one for ages and ditching the portable unit, baking my ***** off in the home office today was the last straw.

Two 3.5kW units going in upstairs, piping to be run through the loft and to a corner of the house out of the way, was going to go Daikin, however the Mitsubishi R32 multi split caught my eye instead.

When all said and done inc the two 3.5kW indoor units, one outdoor, pipework, condensate pump, external trunking, cables, clips etc etc the price is looking to be just under 2k.

Going to be interesting fitting it all..................

If this turns out well then the main downstairs and remaining main upstairs rooms will get a 3 / 4 unit split installed when the extension gets built.
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Save a lot of dosh doing it yourself! What indoor units are you getting?
 
Don’t forget to put the fire nut on before doing the flare!
Lost count amount of times I have done this :(

Do you own a vac pump?

I really need to put one in my living room / dining room - I might cheat and get some one to do the installation.
 
fobose said:
Here it is @HungryHippos : https://imgur.com/a/O64caQN
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Read your whole link, very cool nice job on hiding the ethernet cabling, and the floor looks great! :cool:

I do quite like a nice oak floor, considered it for my kitchen, but decided to go tiling in case I get a leak, don't want to ruin the flooring as wood + water = long term damage.

Also props for being able to do a lot of the work yourself, saves you cash and gets you the result you want!

Not sure how best to tackle my ethernet situation. Fibre connection comes in to the cupboard under the stairs, ideally I'd like to run it so that it has ports in my lounge near the TV, and then at least some more near to my PC in the office upstairs, some more to the master bedroom where I would like to put a TV, and maybe more for some kind of wireless AP.

This has somewhat come about because I can get 900mbit fibre now, but my powerline caps out at about 250mbps :D
 
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Firestar_3x said:
Should be quite a good saving, gone for 2x SRK35ZS-W, but going to put the wifi module in each.
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Ah yeah those were one of the models I was originally looking at, should be good, apparently the MHI stuff is similar to their electric stuff in terms of quality.

My install begins! :D

The outdoor unit was going to be wall mounted but actually putting it there, it basically fits perfectly on the floor, so in the end opted to basically attach it to the slabs below.

If I come to re-do patio some time the system will need to be de-gassed, moved, patio done, then probably put back on anti-vibration feet. Bit of a cost to doing that, but I think having it nice and low down like that will be for the best.

Originally they were charging me for the wall mount, so no idea if I should ask for that back, or if the added hassle of mounting to the floor basically cancels that out.

P.S. ignore the weeds, I hate gardening so I have been!

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HungryHippos said:
Ah yeah those were one of the models I was originally looking at, should be good, apparently the MHI stuff is similar to their electric stuff in terms of quality.

My install begins! :D

The outdoor unit was going to be wall mounted but actually putting it there, it basically fits perfectly on the floor, so in the end opted to basically attach it to the slabs below.

If I come to re-do patio some time the system will need to be de-gassed, moved, patio done, then probably put back on anti-vibration feet. Bit of a cost to doing that, but I think having it nice and low down like that will be for the best.

Originally they were charging me for the wall mount, so no idea if I should ask for that back, or if the added hassle of mounting to the floor basically cancels that out
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Woohoo! Looks good so far. The internal units are good looking units. I still like the look of mine though :) I originally wanted my external unit on feet and not wall mounted but the same as you have mentioned, I thought I might want to change the patio in the future. Mine is still low down, its about 300mm off the floor. The guy brought both feet and bracket him in case I changed my mind on the day. You could check with him about the cost but they no doubt cost very similar. I got the cost of the condense pump (£90) knocked off my install as it didn't need to be used in the end.
HungryHippos said:
Read your whole link, very cool nice job on hiding the ethernet cabling, and the floor looks great! :cool:

I do quite like a nice oak floor, considered it for my kitchen, but decided to go tiling in case I get a leak, don't want to ruin the flooring as wood + water = long term damage.

Also props for being able to do a lot of the work yourself, saves you cash and gets you the result you want!

Not sure how best to tackle my ethernet situation. Fibre connection comes in to the cupboard under the stairs, ideally I'd like to run it so that it has ports in my lounge near the TV, and then at least some more near to my PC in the office upstairs, some more to the master bedroom where I would like to put a TV, and maybe more for some kind of wireless AP.

This has somewhat come about because I can get 900mbit fibre now, but my powerline caps out at about 250mbps :D
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Appreciate that, thanks! The pictures do not quite do the floor justice as it was October when I was finishing I think and was often getting dark and the living room only has 1 light pendant for some reason. I wouldn't put wood floor in the kitchen either though. Hopefully I don't get a flood and it gets ruined, insurance job if it does though.

My friend installed a network cable from my lounge to my living room on my old house, simply run a cable up the outside wall and drilled through to each room (well his dad drilled through for us). The network install was all new to me, I watched a video on how to crimp the connectors etc and away I went. I bought a cable tester to make sure everything was working correctly.

I should have done this ages ago too but here is the second stage network cable install to my office: https://imgur.com/a/bt5E4j0

I had toyed with the idea of getting a data point in every room in the house but I don't plan to have more than one main desktop and a 3-4 wifi devices in the house so it would be a lot of effort for no reward for me.
 
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