DaveAndAnnaUK

The installation company are booked to repair the system on the 6thApril. Cheers

The installation company has contacted me again and stated they are acquiring the parts to repair the system and will return it to working order. I await a date for them to carry out the work and will let you know how it goes. Thank you for all the interest and advice. Cheers Dave

Latest update, contacted the MD of the MHRV company, who had his top man contact me and replied back with a list of things that are wrong with the installation. The main one that could have caused the problem being the drain is fitted in the wrong position. The plumber fitted it after the T junction and it should be between the machine and the T junction. I sent the reply to the installation company, who have contacted me this morning and will let me know what can be done. Hopefully it will be working again soon as having to open windows when having a bath and then jumping out to close it when rain starts being blown in is a pain. The only place we have found any mould while the unit hasn't been working, is right at the bottom of the rear bedroom window. We shall see what happens! Cheers Dave

I have found a very useful channel on YT called Tec Tube, check it out. Cheers Dave

Thanks for your reply, the unit is connected to a switched, fused spur, so is isolated. Does anyone know just what type of mould might be in the unit and how harmful it is likely to be? Anna had a look yesterday and says it looks like it is drying out. The only pipes connected to the unit are those to the vents in the roof. The problem with Portland is it gets very windy. We know from our neighbours, when the wind blows they know about it. They step into our house, close the door and forget all about the weather outside as they cannot hear it. That's another reason for not wanting trickle vents. When the unit was running it did give a nice, pleasant, fresh atmosphere. It was nice to have a bath with no condensation and only a slight increase in noise, as the unit was in boost mode due to the bathroom lights being on. We did have an issue with the way the cooker hood and the bathroom light switch had been wired to the unit. When the cooker hood was opened, the bathroom lights come on! I spoke to an engineer about it at the same time I reported that the unit was continuously running on boost without the summer overide lights and we were going to get her to guide an electrician as to how to resolve the issue. I don't ever remember the unit going into boost without the lights on, while having a bath. So it couldn't have been that humid. Now in order to prevent condensation while having a bath, we open the rear bedroom window and leave the doors open to avoid a draughty bathroom. I haven't had hold of the filters, so don't know what size they are. Interesting point about vehicle pollen filters, but! Of course what does it say in the instructions about maintenance! Filters cleaned or changed every 12 mths and the system serviced. What will the company ask for should a warranty claim be made? Service history please! Oh dear it appears you haven't followed our instructions and had the unit annually serviced! Sorry the cost of the parts required are...! You know when you can tell someone hasn't read all the email! Well it was clear the email stating the unit was commissioned in January 2021 hadn't been read and understood. I am still waiting for the guy I have been dealing with at the installation company to get back to me. Perhaps he didn't like it when I told him, if I had to pay for a new unit to be fitted, I would sell the old unit in the carpark at the next Home Building and Renovation Show! Oh well give them some more time, there aren'tmany installers in the South West are there! Who knows, the two companies might be talking to each other. If I disappear, I love my life and don't feel at all suicidal ! Get Project Veritas on the case! LOL Cheers Dave

Hi, You are beginning the same journey we have done. Unfortunately the world has gone crazy and especially in the building trade, nothing is guaranteed. Before doing anything on the house, contact all the suppliers you expect to use and ask how sure they are they will be able to supply and how stable prices are likely to be. We fitted MHRV and our post is "Death of an MHRV unit", you might like to take everything we have experienced before starting that project. If you are thinking of doing it to save money on heating bills, forget it! All the walls and ceilings in our house are fermacell and I dread to think how much it costs and the supply issues I would encounter now. As I said at the beginning, the world has gone nuts! Neil McCoy Ward (Can be found on Odysee and YT) owns a few letting agencies and gives good advice, you might want to check him out. We lived in a touring caravan while doing up the house. Good thing about that is, should the worse come to the worst, you can hook up and leave at short notice. Also it gives you somewhere clean to relax at the end of the day. Just get one that is made for year round use. and welcome to the South! Cheers Dave

According to the instructions, the unit should be serviced and the filters cleaned or replaced every 12mths. Well ours didn't reach 12mths, so it has never been opened since commissioning last January. So due to the installer being three and a half hours away, the service including new filters is £305! The five year warranty covers parts and labour for the first year and then only parts for the remaining four years. So when it states five year warranty, always ask if that is for parts and labour. There arn't many installers, so check how close they are to you, as it adds a lot to the cost paying for travel time. So the annual cost of running the unit every twelve months is £305 servicing plus electricity on our tariff is £84, so a total of £389, £7.48 per week. Lets say the unit lasts five years and then needs replacing. Forgetting price increases, the unit costs £831 inc VAT and £305 to install(Probably more as they would probably send two people to install), so a total of £1136! Oh and don't forget a plumber for the condensate drain! So that's £227 per year just to have the unit. How much are these units supposed to save in heating bills? When we have been away on holiday for four weeks(Before all the nonsense!) We would enpty the fridge, turn everything off and leave knowing nothing apart from an outside source could harm the building. Well with MHRV you cannot turn the electric off and if it goes wrong, well you might come back and find something like our video, then add two to three months to get it fixed. We went to a few Building & Renovation shows and attended the seminars. I don't think they would like me turning up and asking questions today! Perhaps there needs to be a new building regulation, which states that all systems fitted into a building must be capable of being turned off without causing damage to or a health risk from the system. This isn't the case with MHRV and as we know all to well, everything fails at some point. On aircraft everything has a set number of hours use and if critical is replaced regardless of condition. So to apply this to MHRV, if it hasn't already had new parts, at five years, its time for a new one and you know the price. Our dishwasher and washer-dryer are both Miele and they weren't cheap, but we have had them both for over twenty years and only needed them servicing once. If either of them fail, guess what they will be replaced with! The MHRV only has a PCB and two motors. I have been told it is common for the PCB to fail and when I reported the the company that it was running on constant boost, the engineer didn't sound at all surprised that either the humidity sensor or the PCB might have failed. Why place the PCB inside the unit? If it has any chance of coming into contact with moisture, then it makes sense to mount it outside the main unit and much easier to replace and less likely to fail. If I put a five year warranty on something, I would want it to last five years! Oh well, what's happening to the Canadian truckers? That might be why we cannot get parts! Cheers Dave

Anna has some humidity sensors that need new batteries, so I'll have her sort them out. Please could everyone reading this who has a MHRV, please read their instructions and see if they say anything about what to do if the unit fails. Considering my experience of lead times between two to three months, there is easily enough time for mould to grow, as we have found. Have the manufacturers bothered to consider this when designing the system? Anyone done a quick check on their system (Working!) to see if there is any mould? Not got much to do this weekend, so might as well do some research. Anyone got links to building research studies? Found some the other day, but they were to coffee morning chats on Zoom. Do you have loads of website bookmarks? Try out LIRE, it makes life so much easier keeping up to date with the latest articles from your favourite websites, unfortunately this one doesn't work with it for some reason. Well Portland was 10 degrees and 91% humidity this morning at 08:30. Will get the sensors sorted and see what the difference is inside. Cheers Dave

Hi Dave writing, on the evening we discovered dripping, well I'm blind and so tend to hear things more than others! I went into the loft with Anna and felt the pipes. They felt warm to the touch which I thought was wrong as it was only around five degrees in the loft and immediately thought the insulation wasn't up to the job. All the flexible pipes that connect to the unit have what I call thin insulation which isn't sealed either end. I wonder what they use in Canada, where temperatures are far lower, minus twenty as it is now in places. Have you seen the truckers convoy? As for getting in the unit, Anna has tried and God knows what it might be like in there! I'd rather not know as I'm already annoyed enough as it is. Wonder how many have had a look at their units, to see if they too have any mould growth. I would like to hear from them if they have. The pipes clearly aren't insulated enough and I'm betting the unit itself isn't insulated enough to stop condensation on the inside. I wonder how much research went into the design of these systems. Non one turns a fridge off without leaving the door open or it gets horrible, pretty quickly. Well what are you to do with the MHRV if it fails? Its not sealed like a fridge! This is another point I am taking up with the company, there are no instructions on what to do when the unit fails and when I informed them the unit wouldn't start, no advice was given on what to do with it. For anyone who hasn't already had experience with MHRV installation and service, expect long lead times! Expect it to take months to have anything done! If I were to order a new unit now, it would be the end of April before it could be fitted. The installation company is three and a half hours away and so some of the cost is for seven hours travel time. This is something else, the company selling the MHRV system doesn't install it Plus the installation company won't connect the condensate drain! Have to have a plumber connect it and send them a photo for them to send the commissioning certificate! Ridiculous ! By trade I have been a mechanical maintenance engineer and then an aerospace engineer, so before losing my eyesight I used to do everything both car and house. I hate garages and I hate dishonest tradesmen! Whenever I took a car to a garage I ended up fixing it myself. I did most of the work on the house having friends and neighbours helping with what I couldn't see. Again when builders had to do jobs for me, I would find the problem! Builders don't seem to know how to use spirit levels! Have you noticed this? I'm forever being told it doesn't need to fly! well my friend and his son fitted a new shed roof and it flew off in a storm, so of course I told them it wasn't supposed to fly. Why am I telling you this? So you will realise how annoying all this is when you trust a company to design a system and then another to install and commission, then discover it clearly isn't up to the job. I used to make planes and you know what happens if they fail! What was the purpose of installing MHRV? To avoid installing trickle vents! What's the point of triple glazing and then putting holes through the frame that also allows noise through. Second to constantly have clean fresh air. Well, now I know the ducting contains mould, so now the system itself is a health risk! Which neither I nor anyone else could see. I have sent an email to the managing director and have been contacted by the person assigned to deal with my complaint, so we will see what happens. Hopefully lessons will be learnt and designs improved so others don't suffer the same fate. Thankyou for listening. Ok nurse Anna, what's for supper? Cheers Dave

MJNewton, I tried opening the front of the units, removed all the screws but it won't budge at all, I suspect is it somewhat corroded to the main box due to the amount of water inside it. Anna

Hi Jack Sorry for not replying sooner, I have been sorting out all my emails into one folder, so I can easily check dates. I believe it was the last weekend in October that we tried turning it back on. So I would say it was sometime in early October we turned it off. The company gave no advice as to what to do with the machine when not working! I have had Anna look through the paperwork and she hasn't found anything other than it says the machine must be in continuous operation. Well if it stops, what action should be taken? Seal up all the vents? Disconnect all pipes from the machine?There should be a notice on the machine what to do and I did inform the company and nothing was said about what to do with a machine that wasn't working. While the machine hasn't been working we have had the windows open whenever possible, basically, back to life without MHRV. In the past we have been on holiday for four weeks at a time and if, in that time the unit was to fail, who would know? Until turning on the bathroom light and not noticing there is no boost, there would be no indication something was wrong. How long does it take for mould to form? As for the ducting, below the loft, everything is rectanglar and there isn't a cat in hells chance of cleaning it by hand. Are there any mice that like eating mould? LOL Well see if I can get Anna to upload more photos and then send a message to Mr Glover, the managing director! See if I can get his opinion since his employees weren't keen to provide his contact details! I'm sure they could do better than send an email to enquiries@.... FAO ! Cheers Dave

Hi The house is a 1940s ex council house and has been totally stripped and refurbed. All walls over insulated and made as air tight as possible. All walls and ceilings are fermacell and windows triple glazed. Dishwasher and washerDryer are both condensing and only hang washing over bath if unable to hang outside. Due to insulation, only heating downstairs is a small oil radiator and a real flame electric stove. Upstairs has boiler fed radiators , which rarely need using. In summer we normally have all the doors and windows open as the weather is so nice. The biggest difference I noticed was the front bedroom which is south facing, didn't get as hot with the window closed. It was like an oven with the window and bedroom door closed when the sun was shining before. The unit is connected to a switched, fused spur in the loft. I'm waiting for Anna to upload photos showing the ducting installation in the wall and kitchen, living room ceiling. All the ducts are solid apart from those connected to the unit itself. Cheers Dave

This is something I am wondering too! The thing is, it hasn't been very cold, so if the beast from the east arrived, what would it be like then? Something els is the humidity on Portland is usually around 80%. I read the preferred humidity level should be between 33-50%. Well if the air coming in is at 80% or worse still, it is foggy, which is also common on Portland, then what chance do we have! Back in August, warm weather, the unit basically ran on boost all the time. The summer override lights were initially showing, but when the weather cooled it continued boosting with the summer override lights not showing, which is when I decided something was wrong. I contacted the company, who said either the PCB or humidity sensor could be at fault. They said I could disconnect the humidity sensor, but being blind and my wife not wanting to play with it in case of cutting wrong wire, we left it alone. Then we turned it off for an hour and turned it back on. The unit again ran on boost and was left on to see if it was going to slow down. It didn't and then we turned it off. After a couple of weeks we tried turning it back on and then nothing! Called the company and they said again it could be the PCB or as the motors are supposed to be continuously running, they might have seized! I got them to quote for parts as the unit was out of warranty. We purchased it back in 2016, but weren't able to have final installation and commissioning done until January 2021. This was due to me breaking one ankle after the other. One of them now has three plates and fifteen screws in it! Plus lots of other rubbish getting in the way, resulting in us having to get the builders in to finish. So back in January 2021 the unit was as new and a commissioning certificate issued February 2021. Nothing was said about changing filters earlier than at normal service intervals and so we let it do its thing and here we are! Not happy!

link to the video, more pics later

Hi all, Dave here(The blind one), Sorry for not replying sooner. We have a video of the installation, but it is too big to post here. Please could someone recommend the best way to give you all access to the video. Cheers Dave