SEG - safe for now?

[jack]

51 minutes ago, Roger440 said:

What would happen is it would be a disaster. Many people would have long periods with non functioing equipment, that they cant possibly hope to understand.

 

There is no technical or practical reason why it needs to be a disaster.

 

... but based on all evidence of what happens when government and/or big business tries to implement complex things for civilians, yes, the net result would be disaster.

[Roger440]

8 minutes ago, jack said:

 

There is no technical or practical reason why it needs to be a disaster.

 

... but based on all evidence of what happens when government and/or big business tries to implement complex things for civilians, yes, the net result would be disaster.

 

The practical reason is, lack of enough people with the skills or knowledge to deliver at scale. That cannot be fixed.

 

We have created a situation where anyone that uses their hands as part of their skill set is a failure. Should have studied harder, etc, etc. Add to which, the majority of the people smart enough to understand the complexities of intergrating these systems are unlikey to want to do practical work in often cold, miserable conditions and having to deal with retail clients. This doesnt just apply to this situation either.

 

Anyone that can understand AND install will never be short of work. But its NEVER going to happen succesfully at scale.

 

You are of course correct that the government will force it, loads of companies will pop up, do a crap job and go bust. Leaving the homeowner holding the problem. See recent thread on here. Owner best part of £20k out of pocket with a system that doesnt perform. And thats without strapping on a bunch of additional complications as suggested earlier.

 

 

 

[SteamyTea]

2 minutes ago, Roger440 said:

We have created a situation where anyone that uses their hands as part of their skill set is a failure

So no problem paying the MCS to have a connected PV system.

Or a plumber to fix a leaky tap.

 

Where I agree is that some products and services are underpriced, and other are overprices.  Frequently it has nothing to do with supply and demand, more to do with customer ignorance and an ability to say 'no'.

[Roger440]

5 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

So no problem paying the MCS to have a connected PV system.

Or a plumber to fix a leaky tap.

 

 

Not sure what you are saying?

[Kelvin]

1 minute ago, SteamyTea said:

So no problem paying the MCS to have a connected PV system.

Or a plumber to fix a leaky tap.

 

Where I agree is that some products and services are underpriced, and other are overprices.  Frequently it has nothing to do with supply and demand, more to do with customer ignorance and an ability to say 'no'.

Heating engineers that understand ASHP/UFH are in short supply though. The people we sold our house to 18 months ago have a fault with the heating. They managed to get one guy out three months ago. He seems to have made it worse and swapped a number of unnecessary parts and they can’t get anyone else. Three of their neighbours also have problems with their systems (all identical) and can’t get anyone out. We are going to struggle to mass adopt ASHPs if the industry can’t pick up the pace and re-train their people. 

[Roger440]

3 minutes ago, Kelvin said:

Heating engineers that understand ASHP/UFH are in short supply though. The people we sold our house to 18 months ago have a fault with the heating. They managed to get one guy out three months ago. He seems to have made it worse and swapped a number of unnecessary parts and they can’t get anyone else. Three of their neighbours also have problems with their systems (all identical) and can’t get anyone out. We are going to struggle to mass adopt ASHPs if the industry can’t pick up the pace and re-train their people. 

 

As i said up there, its not going to happen. Not ever. Its impossible.

[SteamyTea]

17 minutes ago, Kelvin said:

Heating engineers that understand ASHP/UFH are in short supply though

So paying the 'engineers', a greater, or lesser, amount of money would not make any difference then, they would still do a crap job.

[SteamyTea]

20 minutes ago, Roger440 said:

Not sure what you are saying?

Well you said

31 minutes ago, Roger440 said:

We have created a situation where anyone that uses their hands as part of their skill set is a failure. Should have studied harder, etc, etc

 

[Kelvin]

5 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

So paying the 'engineers', a greater, or lesser, amount of money would not make any difference then, they would still do a crap job.

Like every single trade, service, product in life there are good and bad no matter the cost. 
 

You just need to read the stuff on here relating to heating systems and especially ASHP to see that it’s relatively complex when there are problems. 

[Roger440]

7 minutes ago, SteamyTea said:

Well you said

 

🤷‍♂️

[Dillsue]

1 hour ago, Roger440 said:

 

As i said up there, its not going to happen. Not ever. Its impossible.

Not sure that's right. It's not going to happen overnight but if it needs to happen, it will.

 

Take the comments made about plumbers and ASHPs. I know 2 plumbers and they struggle with basic conventional heating system controls using a timer/room stat/zone valves. They've got little chance of being retrained in a field they already struggle with and theres next to no chance of the understanding the workings of a heat pump and associated control system. On top of that they have no chance of fixing a poorly specified  system that needs a redesign. What we're going to have to do is wait for a generation of young trainees that cut their teeth on heat pumps and more complex controls to find their way into the market. That's years away but they will get out there in time.

[jack]

2 hours ago, Roger440 said:

As i said up there, its not going to happen. Not ever. Its impossible.

 

I agree with the general thrust of your comments, but the problem isn't "impossible", it's just going to take a generation to sort out.

 

People said that about operating a computer 40 years ago but look where we are.

[ProDave]

2 hours ago, Kelvin said:

Heating engineers that understand ASHP/UFH are in short supply though.

Heating "engineers" that UNDERSTAND any form of heating are in short supply.

 

Most will wire a standard S plan or Y plan heating system with a standard boiler by connecting the wires according to their colour in a standard wiring centre from the standard drawings.

 

If it then does not work, they are stumped.

 

If there is just one thing a little out of the ordinary they are stumped.

 

I have lost count of how many wrongly wired / not working heating systems I have found and had to correct.

 

And none of them understand a 3 port mid position valve and know the symptoms if it has failed and the heating or hot water has stopped working.

[Dillsue]

3 hours ago, Roger440 said:

Given that the level of complexity you describe, is beyond my ability to understand, and i understyand much more than the man on the clapham omnibus, i will resist it for as long as possible, because out in the real world, there is simply no support if you dont understand it yourself

I'd be surprised if a PV system is beyond your ability to understand, its more likely that your interests lie elsewhere. If I remember correctly you had a thread about insulating a large car workshop where you discussed roof construction in quite an informed way so you wont have any problem with the mounting and mech installation of PV panels. PV panels produce DC power in the same way a battery provides DC power for a car which Im sure you understand. Connect batteries together as on many wagons and you increase voltage to 24volts....PV panels are the same. If you want to run 240v equipment off a battery in a car/camper/caravan youll pop an inverter in a cupboard. That's the same function as a PV inverter.

Much of the functionality of a PV system uses quite simple principles well within the grasp of an awful lot of people......if they want to understand it.

[Roger440]

19 minutes ago, Dillsue said:

Not sure that's right. It's not going to happen overnight but if it needs to happen, it will.

 

Take the comments made about plumbers and ASHPs. I know 2 plumbers and they struggle with basic conventional heating system controls using a timer/room stat/zone valves. They've got little chance of being retrained in a field they already struggle with and theres next to no chance of the understanding the workings of a heat pump and associated control system. On top of that they have no chance of fixing a poorly specified  system that needs a redesign. What we're going to have to do is wait for a generation of young trainees that cut their teeth on heat pumps and more complex controls to find their way into the market. That's years away but they will get out there in time.

 

I refer you back to my earlier comments. The majority of those smart enough to deal with the complexities are not going to be found on building sites in all weathers. Its just not going happen. 

 

If you have that level of ability, you will use it more effectively elsewhere. Most likely from a desk. And as i said, this problem extends well outside heating. Automotive is exactly the same. The cars have developed very quickly, the people in the trade not so much. Many are completely out of their deptch, much the same as prodave says.

 

And who is "training" anyone these days? Those days are long gone. 

 

Maybe "ever" was a little strong, but certainly not in any sensible timescales and definitely not for when starmer turns of domestic gas supplies in 2030.

[Roger440]

16 minutes ago, Dillsue said:

I'd be surprised if a PV system is beyond your ability to understand, its more likely that your interests lie elsewhere. If I remember correctly you had a thread about insulating a large car workshop where you discussed roof construction in quite an informed way so you wont have any problem with the mounting and mech installation of PV panels. PV panels produce DC power in the same way a battery provides DC power for a car which Im sure you understand. Connect batteries together as on many wagons and you increase voltage to 24volts....PV panels are the same. If you want to run 240v equipment off a battery in a car/camper/caravan youll pop an inverter in a cupboard. That's the same function as a PV inverter.

Much of the functionality of a PV system uses quite simple principles well within the grasp of an awful lot of people......if they want to understand it.

 

I doubt i qualify as your regular man on the street though. Ive done a proper 4 year appenticeship, both mechanical and electrical. Where i fall over is electronics.  If i could do everything i wanted without any electronics id be doing it. As well as being simple, it would be future proofed.

 

As for understanding, a straightford PV installation, sure, but what was being talked about was the intergration of those systems. And ive got enough experience to know that the problems are nearly always at the interface. 20 years on railway vehicles tells you that.

 

Add in multiple sets of software, and now you have a recipe for trouble. With different system interfacing with each other, a change of software on one has the potential to stop the whole show. 5 years after it was installed, imagine trying to unravel that. 

 

The kind of person who can come in and sort it out, are simply not going to be available in numbers, especially not in a domestic setting. 

 

So, i still say, its not going to happen. Because it cant.

 

For any company that can come up with simple to install solutions, simple enough for the current workforce to grasp, will be able to print money. Sadly it appears every solution requires ever more complexity.

 

Edited January 20, 2023 by Roger440

[Roger440]

17 minutes ago, Dillsue said:

I'd be surprised if a PV system is beyond your ability to understand, its more likely that your interests lie elsewhere. If I remember correctly you had a thread about insulating a large car workshop where you discussed roof construction in quite an informed way so you wont have any problem with the mounting and mech installation of PV panels. PV panels produce DC power in the same way a battery provides DC power for a car which Im sure you understand. Connect batteries together as on many wagons and you increase voltage to 24volts....PV panels are the same. If you want to run 240v equipment off a battery in a car/camper/caravan youll pop an inverter in a cupboard. That's the same function as a PV inverter.

Much of the functionality of a PV system uses quite simple principles well within the grasp of an awful lot of people......if they want to understand it.

 

And im still going round in circles on the roof of the workshop. Though in fairness im too tight to just replace the roof with a composite steel affair. But at nearly £40k, im sure you can see why.

[Kelvin]

The car comparison is definitely valid especially with EVs. The dealers are really struggling with EV fault diagnosis for example. But this isn’t a new thing. I have a friend that is an expert in his field of electronics. When he was young he worked at a Renault dealership. He diagnosed all the electrical faults as most of the mechanics just couldn’t. This was many many years ago. It’s just become far worse. Nowadays they plug in the diagnostic computer and it tells them the component to replace. I had an RS4 which was unreliable pos. Audi really struggled trying to diagnose any electrical faults with the car. Fortunately it was all done under warranty. 

[Dillsue]

4 hours ago, Roger440 said:

 

I doubt i qualify as your regular man on the street though. Ive done a proper 4 year appenticeship, both mechanical and electrical. Where i fall over is electronics.  If i could do everything i wanted without any electronics id be doing it. As well as being simple, it would be future proofed.

 

As for understanding, a straightford PV installation, sure, but what was being talked about was the intergration of those systems. And ive got enough experience to know that the problems are nearly always at the interface. 20 years on railway vehicles tells you that.

 

Add in multiple sets of software, and now you have a recipe for trouble. With different system interfacing with each other, a change of software on one has the potential to stop the whole show. 5 years after it was installed, imagine trying to unravel that. 

 

The kind of person who can come in and sort it out, are simply not going to be available in numbers, especially not in a domestic setting. 

 

So, i still say, its not going to happen. Because it cant.

 

For any company that can come up with simple to install solutions, simple enough for the current workforce to grasp, will be able to print money. Sadly it appears every solution requires ever more complexity.

 

No electronics knowledge needed to install or fault find on PV systems. Maybe if youre an enthusiast wanting to build your own bits and bobs but that's far from the norm. Electrics yes but no electronics 

No software knowledge needed either. Configuring a PV system even with batteries and comms to energy meters is no more complicated than navigating a modern cars menus. In fact using Solaredges setapp tool is easier and more intuitive than resetting the tyre pressure monitoring on my wife's Jazz!

I've no experience with anything other than Solaredge kit and that works off the shelf, in my experience. A breeze to install and straight forward to configure. I'm sure theres plenty of other systems that are equally straight forward

[SteamyTea]

5 hours ago, Roger440 said:

Automotive is exactly the same. The cars have developed very quickly, the people in the trade not so much. Many are completely out of their deptch, much the same as prodave says.

42 years ago when I studied Automotive Engineering, we were offered a choice of modules, one was Vehicle Electronic Systems.  None of us picked that option, much to the relief of the lecture who admitted later that he knew little about it.

 

Chatting to an old colleague at my old college, he now teaches a course about servicing and repairing EVs.  Has been doing it for about a decade.

Eco-Drive has been around about 20 years.

http://www.eco-drive.co.uk/

The guy who set it up used to run around in a little Peugeot 106 Electrique, he could get from Penzance to Truro in it.

[Roger440]

30 minutes ago, Dillsue said:

No electronics knowledge needed to install or fault find on PV systems. Maybe if youre an enthusiast wanting to build your own bits and bobs but that's far from the norm. Electrics yes but no electronics 

No software knowledge needed either. Configuring a PV system even with batteries and comms to energy meters is no more complicated than navigating a modern cars menus. In fact using Solaredges setapp tool is easier and more intuitive than resetting the tyre pressure monitoring on my wife's Jazz!

I've no experience with anything other than Solaredge kit and that works off the shelf, in my experience. A breeze to install and straight forward to configure. I'm sure theres plenty of other systems that are equally straight forward

 

I think you over estimate my abilities. I cant manage to operate my phone. Took me 4 years to find out where the settings button has disappeard too. Anything with menus, and i done. I dont get the fascination with "hiding" stuff.

 

A nice button works for me every time. Its why ive bought my last new car some time back.

[Roger440]

5 hours ago, Kelvin said:

The car comparison is definitely valid especially with EVs. The dealers are really struggling with EV fault diagnosis for example. But this isn’t a new thing. I have a friend that is an expert in his field of electronics. When he was young he worked at a Renault dealership. He diagnosed all the electrical faults as most of the mechanics just couldn’t. This was many many years ago. It’s just become far worse. Nowadays they plug in the diagnostic computer and it tells them the component to replace. I had an RS4 which was unreliable pos. Audi really struggled trying to diagnose any electrical faults with the car. Fortunately it was all done under warranty. 

 

I ran an automotive workshop for nearly 15 years. Its a nightmare.

 

I did once employ someone good at sorting out electronic faullts. Problem was, he was crap at mechanical work. The reality of a smallish workshop is that we never had enough faukt finding work to keep him fully occupied. He left.

 

A guranteed certainty, was if someone started revving an engine, that meant they had run out of ideas.

 

The bit i could never get to sink in was, if the diagnostics say its, say, a MAF circuit sensor high, error, they just could not grasp that it might be the wiring to it, not necessarily the MAF. They also couldnt grasp that i cant charge for said MAF as it wasnt defective and hadnt fixed the problem. Id say 90% of sensor faults were never the sensor. Except O2 sensors.

 

Or cars running rich, which throws up a multitude of errors, so off they go changing sensors and stuff, when its just a hole in the boost pipe. 

 

Glad i no longer do it.

[joth]

20 hours ago, Drellingore said:

22 hours ago, jack said:

Is there any particular reason to specifically target "covering our own usage"?

 

Nah, not really. It's an emotional starting point.We don't want to be off-grid, but we'd like to not need it.

 

So with 22kW you might covering your average  use in December, but there will guarantees still be days you need to import energy unless you put down 6 figures on battery storage (and even then, you might only achieve 99percentile cover).

 

For the emotional goal, how about starting with covering your average usage across the year rather than the darkest month?

 

A 10kWp system should  generate 8MWh or more a year which would cover your annual demand.

On 3ph you can install 12kWp without requesting DNO permission 

[joth]

15 hours ago, Roger440 said:

 

I refer you back to my earlier comments. The majority of those smart enough to deal with the complexities are not going to be found on building sites in all weathers. Its just not going happen. 

 

The problem is that heating system design work appears to require trudging about in mud and rain on a building site.

My architect, structural engineer, lighting designer and MVHR designer some how all sat in comfy warm offices and did a perfectly good job. But my ASHP heating engineer, despite having the exact schematic I wanted supplied to him by the manufacturer *and* by me in my tender pack, still turned up with a bag of different parts, spent a while trying to convince me the design in his head was better than what they tendered, struggled to even read a plumbing schematic, didn't have couplers for the parts being installed, installed some parts upside down and other things like pumps in completely the wrong place, installed a mid position valve rather than 2 zone valves, required 6 returns to site to debug it all into working, etc etc etc the list goes on.

 

So for me the issue is not that the installer wasn't smart enough to do the design: I'd already paid the smart people to do the design. The issue is that the installer is attempting to be smarter than they really are by doing redesign work on the hoof rather than meticulously follow the design given to them. 

It's like a builder deciding to alter foundation depths and move some supporting beams or change insulation thickness on the fly. Bad practices that used to be the norm but are being slowly pushed out the industry. 

My hunch is the scalable central design will only be financially viable if coupled with a monitoring and maintenance contract, probably with capital outlay financing rolled in. It's not impossible, but will take some major players to make it happen. Octopus are closest now, but BG HomeCare + Hive   surely has to be planning how to pivot into this

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[SteamyTea]

17 minutes ago, joth said:

The issue is that the installer is attempting to be smarter than they really are by doing redesign work on the hoof rather than meticulously follow the design given to them. 

I learn a lesson like that when doing my apprenticeship.

I was learning to be a toolmaker and a fitter asked me to change something, move a tapped whole to make fitting easier.

When the design engineer found out he went ballistic at me, pointed out that he was the engineer and the fitter was just a lazy, gobby twat.

Me, being me, asked the design engineer to show me the problem, which he eventually did and it all made sense (new tapped hole ended very close to the very high pressure hydraulic channel).

So designers have to communicate with everyone that is involved.  Which is what is really happening on Buildhub, we all chip in and hopefully a few decent solutions come out in the wash.