Fitted Air conditioning

Author
Discussion

heisthegaffer

3,346 posts

197 months

Wednesday 22nd June 2022
quotequote all
Hoping to get A/C at our new house, Panasonic.

Had Mitsi at previous house and really missed it.

On a related note, I'm mulling over ASHP. Can these cool as effectively as A/C or not? We are buying a 20 year old 4 bed detached house where the current owner says it is a nice warm house. Appreciate a lot to consider but how suitable would this be for ASHP?

SoliD

1,112 posts

216 months

Wednesday 22nd June 2022
quotequote all
ASHP can't cool at all. No point getting ASHP and aircon, I'd just plump for the AC now at 0% VAT and don't worry about grants, will be the same level of efficiency without having the redo all your piprework and rip out what is probably a fully working gas boiler.

That one with unit on the front of the house, I didn't think that was allowed under the current building/planning regs?

mfmman

2,362 posts

182 months

Wednesday 22nd June 2022
quotequote all
kambites said:
I certainly won't put the unit at ground level though.
You will lose more efficiency in making the outdoor coil a pain in the ar5e to clean and therefore never doing it, than you will in another 3m of pipe run

Ambleton

6,646 posts

191 months

Wednesday 22nd June 2022
quotequote all
kambites said:
We don't have the problem of neighbour's windows facing the side walls of our house.
Our house is set back maybe 4m or so from the neighbours house. So although the unit would be on the side of thier house, it would have been right next to and in front of the window on the front of our house.

Also, the passageway (1.2m wide) between the houses is ours so it would've been overhanging onto our land, dripping water and meaning any servicing etc would have to be done from our land. Plus failure, falling off etc... definitely prefer it on the front of his house, even though its challenging on the eye....

Edited by Ambleton on Wednesday 22 June 23:24

CoolHands

18,496 posts

194 months

Wednesday 22nd June 2022
quotequote all
May have been mentioned, but how much does one of these cost to run a day in £? Eg in the summer, like now, and you want it on in the evening to cool the room. Roughly

heisthegaffer

3,346 posts

197 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
CoolHands said:
May have been mentioned, but how much does one of these cost to run a day in £? Eg in the summer, like now, and you want it on in the evening to cool the room. Roughly
The Panasonic I looked at was 0.7kwh so I calculated it to be c. 30p an hour (based on electric being 40p p/kwh)

Having said that, I may have just been looking at the indoor unit although I believe the there is only one power source. At least there was on our last install albeit it was 15 years ago plus.

k99

544 posts

167 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
CoolHands said:
May have been mentioned, but how much does one of these cost to run a day in £? Eg in the summer, like now, and you want it on in the evening to cool the room. Roughly
You’d gladly pay double what it costs to run when you experience the delight of a cool room in 30c temperatures.

Blue Oval84

5,276 posts

160 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
I use (very) roughly about 4-5kWh per day when I run it all day in the living room and bedroom for most of the day. The cost doesn't even register versus the discomfort of not having it on!

ChocolateFrog

24,847 posts

172 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
CoolHands said:
May have been mentioned, but how much does one of these cost to run a day in £? Eg in the summer, like now, and you want it on in the evening to cool the room. Roughly
For what you get it's worth every penny.

We've got 2 under 2 both of which end up in our bed by the end of the night.

Fitting AC was one of the best things I ever bought, along with a super king bed.

MattyD803

1,689 posts

64 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
SoliD said:
ASHP can't cool at all. No point getting ASHP and aircon, I'd just plump for the AC now at 0% VAT and don't worry about grants, will be the same level of efficiency without having the redo all your piprework and rip out what is probably a fully working gas boiler.
'

Careful with terminology here. A split "Air Conditioning" unit, is for all intents a purposes, an Air Source Heat Pump, as they can nearly all provide both heating and cooling. I think I know what you mean though, you are referring to an outdoor unit which works via heat pump boiler (integral or otherwise) to provide LTHW heat only.

I would agree with what you have said though, if you are considering adding the provision of cooling to your property and at the same time looking for future proofing the heating of your home, you'd not go far wrong to install a series of split units or indeed a multi split or VRV system, which will provide both heating and cooling (via blown air), with no need to worry about having to find space for a heat pump boiler, uprating radiator size or adjusting pipe work.

Coefficient of Performance (aka Efficiency) of a well designed and good quality split system operating in the winter in the 0-15 degree outdoor ambient range (which is pretty typical for most of the UK) would be around 2 (200%) to 4.5 (450%). Below -5 however, and most units will struggle in reality and you'd be grateful for having kept your gas boiler and radiators.

Edited by MattyD803 on Thursday 23 June 09:02

kambites

67,460 posts

220 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
Interestingly from reading around it looks like you need planning permission to put the unit within one meter of a boundary, but not to put it on the front of the house. Which probably stops many people from putting it on the side of their house.

SoliD

1,112 posts

216 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
CoolHands said:
May have been mentioned, but how much does one of these cost to run a day in £? Eg in the summer, like now, and you want it on in the evening to cool the room. Roughly
So last week was the first time I had used ours in anger, had it on most of the day, about 1kw/h for the first hour and then it dropped to 4-500w/h keeping the temperatures in check and this was for a 4 bedroom ceiling ducted system. Getting solar next week, so summer costs for me should be 0.

SoliD

1,112 posts

216 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
MattyD803 said:
Careful with terminology here. A split "Air Conditioning" unit, is for all intents a purposes, an Air Source Heat Pump, as they can nearly all provide both heating and cooling. I think I know what you mean though, you are referring to an outdoor unit which works via heat pump boiler (integral or otherwise) to provide LTHW heat only.

I would agree with what you have said though, if you are considering adding the provision of cooling to your property and at the same time looking for future proofing the heating of your home, you'd not go far wrong to install a series of split units or indeed a multi split or VRV system, which will provide both heating and cooling (via blown air), with no need to worry about having to find space for a heat pump boiler, uprating radiator size or adjusting pipe work.

Coefficient of Performance (aka Efficiency) of a well designed and good quality split system operating in the winter in the 0-15 degree outdoor ambient range (which is pretty typical for most of the UK) would be around 2 (200%) to 4.5 (450%). Below -5 however, and most units will struggle in reality and you'd be grateful for having kept your gas boiler and radiators.

Edited by MattyD803 on Thursday 23 June 09:02
Indeed, sorry yeah, was just going by the common terminologies used, as above I found my AC to be using about the equivalent amount in £ of electricity as gas last year when it was 5-10c, but when it goes below this the gas is more efficient £ for £. Hoping to offset this with Solar and Battery storage to minimise gas usage, along with increased insulation added this year to walls and ceilings.

essayer

9,008 posts

193 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
CoolHands said:
May have been mentioned, but how much does one of these cost to run a day in £? Eg in the summer, like now, and you want it on in the evening to cool the room. Roughly
Our Mitsubishi split unit is about 1kW cooling a south facing room to 20c, so 3-4 hours late afternoon will be about 4kWh or 60p

kambites

67,460 posts

220 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
essayer said:
CoolHands said:
May have been mentioned, but how much does one of these cost to run a day in £? Eg in the summer, like now, and you want it on in the evening to cool the room. Roughly
Our Mitsubishi split unit is about 1kW cooling a south facing room to 20c, so 3-4 hours late afternoon will be about 4kWh or 60p
You're doing well if you still have an electricity tariff at 15p/kwh!

essayer

9,008 posts

193 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
kambites said:
You're doing well if you still have an electricity tariff at 15p/kwh!
until September.. then no more air con biggrin

fastbikes76

2,450 posts

121 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
CoolHands said:
May have been mentioned, but how much does one of these cost to run a day in £? Eg in the summer, like now, and you want it on in the evening to cool the room. Roughly
As everyone else echos, the cost is so insignificant it’s not worth considering.

I have a 27k BTU unit which does 3 bedrooms. With all three units on full pelt and turbo mode, it consumes a maximum of 1kw initially, once we’re nearer required temps it throttles right down to around 500-600w.

I would estimate on a really hot day if you run it for a few hours, you would use a £1 leccy give it take. Now if I offered you a great nights sleep in a cool comfortable room for a £1 , you’d snap my arm off biggrin

I




heisthegaffer

3,346 posts

197 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
MattyD803 said:
SoliD said:
ASHP can't cool at all. No point getting ASHP and aircon, I'd just plump for the AC now at 0% VAT and don't worry about grants, will be the same level of efficiency without having the redo all your piprework and rip out what is probably a fully working gas boiler.
'

Careful with terminology here. A split "Air Conditioning" unit, is for all intents a purposes, an Air Source Heat Pump, as they can nearly all provide both heating and cooling. I think I know what you mean though, you are referring to an outdoor unit which works via heat pump boiler (integral or otherwise) to provide LTHW heat only.

I would agree with what you have said though, if you are considering adding the provision of cooling to your property and at the same time looking for future proofing the heating of your home, you'd not go far wrong to install a series of split units or indeed a multi split or VRV system, which will provide both heating and cooling (via blown air), with no need to worry about having to find space for a heat pump boiler, uprating radiator size or adjusting pipe work.

Coefficient of Performance (aka Efficiency) of a well designed and good quality split system operating in the winter in the 0-15 degree outdoor ambient range (which is pretty typical for most of the UK) would be around 2 (200%) to 4.5 (450%). Below -5 however, and most units will struggle in reality and you'd be grateful for having kept your gas boiler and radiators.

Edited by MattyD803 on Thursday 23 June 09:02
Thanks both. Really interesting and it's worth thinking about. Our new house I would hope is well insulated and if we have air con in our and our sons bedroom plus log burner in lounge with a moderate chance of prolonged sub zero temperatures, it could be of consideration.

Only problem I can see is where we locate the outdoor unit but we have a bit of time to consider.

In my head is expect the unit and install to be c. £10k so down to £5k with the new grant?

CoolHands

18,496 posts

194 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
Does anyone know, when they offer a package / kit and it comes with say 5m of piping, if you need to situate your unit further away what’s the solution? Would you then need to employ a AC engineer?

Matt p

1,036 posts

207 months

Thursday 23rd June 2022
quotequote all
It’ll be down to how much charge is in the unit upto a given max pipe run. This will include meters head and bends not just length.

You may need to add additional refrigerant too, in which case yes an A/C tech will help.