Simon Brooke

My Ventaxia has a silent running mode which I have assumed means that the fans are running at minimum rates. The time period is adjustable via the touch screen.

After two years of living in our new self build we are generally very happy with our passiveish house. We have an underfloor system fitted but not really operational as the Sunamp is not man enough ( though does provide our hot water very well). We would like an ashp but only need input for a month or so and therefore reluctant to spend big money. I am now considering a second hand ashp and would really like it to be reversible so that we can cool as well as heat the slab. Getting information from dealers or manufacturers as to which model would be suitable is proving difficult. I do have access to a five year old Daikin EDHQ014 B6V3 but the online manual indicates that cooling is an option but not applicable to all models? Does anyone have a recommendation for a model / manufacturer which would easily switch from heating to cooling? Also is it sensible to think of a five year old model or should I stick to new? Any advice gratefully received.

Simplest and cheapest would be to just move it. The boiler should have a few years of life left in it. The only issue for me would be whether you are happy with water pressure for showers.

Shutting off the bedroom heating has made a big difference. Last year when we ran the underfloor heating as recommended we found that the 9kw Sunamp ran out of puff very quickly leading to cold water rather to often. As noted on other Buildhub posts the mvhr is not that efficient in redistributing heat so we have an approx. 2 degree difference in the room temps. The cooler bedrooms suit us , the only downside is that the bathrooms which are part of the bedroom loops (bungalow) are a bit chilly and definitely need the towel rail boost. I recognise that our approach is a compromise and does make proper use of the underfloor heating but the costs of an ashp ,both capital and servicing , coupled with the disruption to the finished build are putting us off that route.

We are now in our second winter with a system very similar to yours although I suspect your mbc frame will have a better airtightness rating than ours. Sunamp themselves have accepted that their spec of a 9kw battery is insufficient and are exploring ways to help which may involve a second battery and an ashp. This help does seem a long time in arriving though! In the meantime we have been experimenting with the underfloor heating using the Sunamp and believe we are quite close to a solution that will work for us. We have closed the loops that feed the bedrooms so now only have underfloor heating running in the daytime living areas. We are on economy seven and start the heating at 1.30am which gives the battery 1.5 hours of top up. The heating then continues to 4am which gives a further 3 hours to recharge the battery for the day's hot water. In addition we have two electric towel rails which are on for a total of 4 hours . Temperature in the living room is 21 degrees this morning which is fine for us. We have consistently used 19 kw of cheap rate eletricity over the past 30 days which I estimate is split roughly 50/50 hot water and heating. I am hoping we will need heating for 100 days each year but time will tell. If we do conclude that we need additional then a Willis heater seems the simplest add on with no maintenance costs. Hooe this helps.

It seems to me that bco's primary interest is to get a bit of paper on file and tick off that particular box. That said I must admit I struggled to get the system balanced and sought professional help. It turned out the planned figures calculated by the supplier were not achievable but for a couple of hundred quid I was reassured that the system was ok and the bco was also happy. In the scheme of the build I concluded the cost to be well worth it.

Yes you will need a test. But look at this as a positive. If you choose a sensible person to do the test they will do it in two steps. In our case this flagged up leaks which I had not spotted but could be fairly easily resolved before a second, final test. That being said we didn't achieve quite what we wanted.

Obviously, not knowing your personal financial any thoughts are guesses. We employed an accountant for about £500 as we planned to sell a field which would result in a capital gain mixed in with doing a barn conversion whilst living in the main house. The advice was fine but our income, due to doing the build, was very low and the cgt exemption is quite generous. You also need to guestimate how much gain there is likely to be on the existing house to be mothballed. You may conclude that in reality the gain may not be great enough to worry about. Of course , if it is greater than you think you are still ahead and paying tax is not the worst thing in the world.

Not that scary. As you say the manager is away at the moment and those present could not remember the fix and asked for details.

Thanks

SORTED! I eventually decided to call the Eddi technical line. Explained the problem and was told to go into settings and check the'hot setting delay'. That was showing zero. I was advised to increase it to about 30 minutes. This was done as an upgrade to cater for the sunamp issues. So we seem to be up and running which is great. Thanks for all the contributions. I did later speak with sunamp technical and will be sending them the info. for their files! During the conversation I pointed out what a pain it is not being able to see at what stage of charge the battery is. Apparently they have some software and a gizmo which they use for testing that would in effect show the charge level and could possibly be retro fitted. It was suggested I write to the company and request that it be released. I will do this and report back. In the meantime I have a final basic question which is, if I have a 9kw battery does it take 9kw of electrical input to fully charge?

Forgot to attach photo.

Ok definitely a finder. I have spoken to the technical director, which was good of him as he is off sick at the moment, and his initial view is that unlikely to be the battery. He has agreed I can phone him this morning with the control panel exposed and he will interpret any lights that may come on. As an aside if it proves to be the finder will a replacement 'simply' fit into the same bar?

Ok will do tomorrow am.

The brown reset button seems to be set, so that is one easy solution ticked off.