Heatgeek website

[S2D2]

  On 16/12/2024 at 19:36, JohnMo said:

Then why not do MCS certified scheme, then it would cost the best part of nothing.

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A good option if you have the skills. I don't, so for the time to learn and then do it, £2k seems a fair labour price.

 

I do remember from the BUS form I had to sign that the quote has to be above £7.5k. So that puts a lower limit on costs, essentially making it a "your labour vs theirs" comparison.

[JohnMo]

  On 16/12/2024 at 20:19, S2D2 said:

I do remember from the BUS form I had to sign that the quote has to be above £7.5k.

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Has to be above £7500 to get full grant.  If it cost £6k you get £6k, not the full amount.

[S2D2]

  On 16/12/2024 at 20:28, JohnMo said:

Has to be above £7500 to get full grant.  If it cost £6k you get £6k, not the full amount.

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Ah okay, they must have put that value in as they applied for the grant. Good to know!

[markocosic]

  On 13/12/2024 at 15:27, bradders3109 said:

Is the demand for heat pumps so high that installers are now just thinking of a number and then doubling it when it comes to quoting?

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The demand for competent installers who are also MCS union members is indeed that high. 

 

With heat geek the installers set their prices. Yours are evidently ashamed of publishing their true labour rates so are obfuscating then with fictional material expenses; nevermind the markup on materials supplied. Biggest risk to their brand in my opinion - it being difficult to keep installers weary your hat on the ed straight and narrow.

 

My business partner had over of their installs. All rads brought back to manifolds. All the/dcw brought back to manifolds. Build a new build UVC cupboard and run it to a heat pump just outside the wall. Convo something like: "It'll take 5 days. It'll be done properly. I charge £1200 a day." Healthy day rate. But did exactly what he said on the tin and when it was said on the tin without needing a hand held or adult supervision.

 

The folks quoting you weren't honest. Some integrity ought to be part of the heat geek membership requirements...

[MrPotts]

From what I read on various forums you have 3 choices, pay an exorbitant price for an MCS install, and cost the tax payer £7.5k, but likely get a decent install or pay a local non MCS half the MCS price and risk getting a poor install (but save the taxpayer money) or manage the install yourself and buy the kit and labour separately but you have the responsibility. Not great choices are they.

[markocosic]

They are for the MCS union. 😉

 

Non MCS installs have an added tax by the way - planning consent  - you pay the taxpayer rather than getting paid.

[Marvin]

  On 28/12/2024 at 10:07, MrPotts said:

From what I read on various forums you have 3 choices, pay an exorbitant price for an MCS install, and cost the tax payer £7.5k, but likely get a decent install or pay a local non MCS half the MCS price and risk getting a poor install (but save the taxpayer money) or manage the install yourself and buy the kit and labour separately but you have the responsibility. Not great choices are they.

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Hi @MrPotts

 

Sounds a bit like solicitors:

 

Either pay a lot of money for someone to represent you who is suitable qualified and experienced and knows what their doing and will take the responsibility for any errors, OR, learn all about the law regarding your case and represent yourself, taking responsibility for your own failures.

 

In my humble opinion (having designed and installed my own system with guidance from the manufacturers) unfortunately, in retro fitting ASHP's to existing properties there are many many variables, and so a conclusion has to be made based on the individual property requiring a lot of knowledge, understanding and experience. Also I would like to point out that any MCS install needs to be part of the listed MCS accredited installers/companies which cost money and training to achieve.

 

Unlike a boiler, for best results, an ASHP system works most economically when running low and slow, that's low temperature heat and over longer running time.  A lot of people don't understand this principle for an efficient ASHP. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[SteamyTea]

  On 28/12/2024 at 11:05, Marvin said:

Unlike a boiler, for best results, an ASHP system works most economically when running low and slow, that's low temperature heat and over longer running time.  A lot of people don't understand this principle for an efficient ASHP. 

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The same is true for modern thermal condensing boilers as well.

The biggest difference is that the efficiency of an ASHP is affected by the outside air temperature a lot more than a traditional boiler.

[marshian]

  On 28/12/2024 at 14:06, SteamyTea said:

The same is true for modern thermal condensing boilers as well.

The biggest difference is that the efficiency of an ASHP is affected by the outside air temperature a lot more than a traditional boiler.

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Agreeing with you ST

 

Typical boiler efficiency improvements going from non condensing operation ie 70 deg flow and a 55 deg return to a lower 55 deg flow and 40 deg return is around  6 %
 

Going to the next stage that is from above to a 35 deg flow and 27 deg return is another 5 % improvement

 

Flip those figures round and compare SCOP’s or COP’s when increasing flow temps and I bet it’s a lot more significant

[JamesPa]

  On 28/12/2024 at 15:07, marshian said:

Agreeing with you ST

 

Typical boiler efficiency improvements going from non condensing operation ie 70 deg flow and a 55 deg return to a lower 55 deg flow and 40 deg return is around  6 %
 

Going to the next stage that is from above to a 35 deg flow and 27 deg return is another 5 % improvement

 

Flip those figures round and compare SCOP’s or COP’s when increasing flow temps and I bet it’s a lot more significant

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If my own house is anything like typical there is another advantage of operating low and slow, namely comfort.  I have moved progressively from a boiler at 70C to (the same) boiler at 50, to an ashp with weather compensation at 30-45.  Each gave a significant step change, for the better, in comfort.  The reduction in temperature gradients in both time and space makes a material difference.

 

The UK has been missed out on the advantages of low temperature, weather compensated heating for 20 years, other countries (in the EU) are more advanced.  How come we were so stupid?

Edited December 28, 2024 by JamesPa

[JamesPa]

  On 16/12/2024 at 20:19, S2D2 said:

  On 16/12/2024 at 19:36, JohnMo said:

Then why not do MCS certified scheme, then it would cost the best part of nothing.

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A good option if you have the skills. I don't, so for the time to learn and then do it, £2k seems a fair labour price.

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For what it's worth I just had my ashp (retrofit) install done.  Four rad upgrades, a new UVC connected to existing plumbing, and of course the ashp itself.  It was literally a one person install (elec circuit was pre-installed) and it took him six days total, averaging at least eight hours per day.  I watched him throughout and he barely stopped, and generally worked pretty efficiently.  Admittedly he spent quite some time on leaky joints between new and existing plumbing, but in fairness that happens.

 

I wouldn't do that job for £2k (neither did he, total price 12.5K less BUS!) given that he has to spend time in addition getting work, buying stuff, doing accounts etc.

 

Obviously if it's a totally new build many of the miscellaneous embuggerations vanish, but the potential for time to disappear perhaps shouldn't be underestimated.

Edited December 28, 2024 by JamesPa

[SteamyTea]

  On 28/12/2024 at 16:54, JamesPa said:

How come we were so stupid

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And uneducated.

 

The physics/science is taught at GCSE level (remember me putting those exam papers up), so no real excuse for anyone not to understand how they work.

The question should be 'why have we not changed?'

[JohnMo]

  On 28/12/2024 at 17:27, SteamyTea said:

And uneducated

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And at the time they trained 100s of thousands of installer about condensing boiles - must have been in one ear out the other.  Legislation is the only way things change.  But the defaulte settings on most boilers is a flow temp of 70 or 75, which is the manufacturers also playing dumb.

[JamesPa]

  On 28/12/2024 at 18:06, JohnMo said:

 

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  On 28/12/2024 at 18:06, JohnMo said:

And at the time they trained 100s of thousands of installer about condensing boiles - must have been in one ear out the other.  Legislation is the only way things change.  But the defaulte settings on most boilers is a flow temp of 70 or 75, which is the manufacturers also playing dumb.

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Sadly I believe you are right.  Yet much of our political class and media argue relentlessly for deregulation without ever contemplating, it seems, that a 'free market' might not always act in the consumer interest!

Edited December 28, 2024 by JamesPa

[SteamyTea]

  On 28/12/2024 at 18:06, JohnMo said:

Legislation is the only way things change

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Generally taxation is more effective.

 

  On 28/12/2024 at 18:24, JamesPa said:

it seems, that a 'free market' might not always act in the consumer interest

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“It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own self-interest. We address ourselves not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities, but of their advantages”

Smith. A, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, Volume I , (1817)

[marshian]

  On 28/12/2024 at 16:54, JamesPa said:

If my own house is anything like typical there is another advantage of operating low and slow, namely comfort.  I have moved progressively from a boiler at 70C to (the same) boiler at 50, to an ashp with weather compensation at 30-45.  Each gave a significant step change, for the better, in comfort.  The reduction in temperature gradients in both time and space makes a material difference.

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Maybe a similar journey here except I wasn't confident going to ASHP from where I was with a condensing boiler

 

  On 28/12/2024 at 16:54, JamesPa said:

The UK has been missed out on the advantages of low temperature, weather compensated heating for 20 years, other countries (in the EU) are more advanced.  How come we were so stupid?

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I'm not sure we were stupid - More uninformed or un-educated

[marshian]

  On 28/12/2024 at 18:06, JohnMo said:

And at the time they trained 100s of thousands of installer about condensing boiles - must have been in one ear out the other.  Legislation is the only way things change.  But the defaulte settings on most boilers is a flow temp of 70 or 75, which is the manufacturers also playing dumb.

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Were they trained - really trained? The move to condensing boilers really was just swapping one box on the wall without a condensate pipe for another box on the wall with one - I don’t remember my gas engineer doing heat loss calcs or saying that I need to upgrade my rads to get the best efficiency out of my new “Goverment mandated boiler”

 

It was 2006 and the only question I remember is did I want a combi so I could lose the HW tank (which I didn’t)

 

My journey to lower flow temps only started when I started educating myself and the latest boiler replacement was mainly driven by the fact that previous boiler couldn’t run a flow temp below 50 without cycling 8-10 times in an hour

[Adsibob]

  On 28/12/2024 at 10:07, MrPotts said:

Not great choices are they.

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Welcome to the United Kingdom.

[Adsibob]

  On 28/12/2024 at 16:54, JamesPa said:

there is another advantage of operating low and slow, namely comfort.  I have moved progressively from a boiler at 70C to (the same) boiler at 50, to an ashp with weather compensation at 30-45.  Each gave a significant step change, for the better, in comfort.  The reduction in temperature gradients in both time and space makes a material difference.

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I’d be interested to understand why it’s more comfortable.

[Adsibob]

  On 28/12/2024 at 17:27, SteamyTea said:

The physics/science is taught at GCSE level (remember me putting those exam papers up), so no real excuse for anyone not to understand how they work.

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Of course there is an excuse. The education in this country is pants. Here are results for two random years (which are likely to be representative of other years given COVID hadn’t hit these results):

 

 

Given c. 43% got a 7 (which I think is a C in old money), the other c. 57% of students got less than a C. A grade C isn’t even that good, given grades A*, A and B are better. When hiring a heating engineer would you prefer him to have aced his physics exam, or merely passed it?

 

 Moreover, the level of teaching is so poor in most schools with so much focus on passing exams and league tables that unless the student carries on with the subject at A-Level, for something as technical as physics, it’s usually forgotten quite quickly. 

Edited December 29, 2024 by Adsibob

[S2D2]

  On 29/12/2024 at 18:48, Adsibob said:

I’d be interested to understand why it’s more comfortable.

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Like a smell you notice a change in temperature more, e.g. cold kitchen in the morning or radiant heat as you walk past a hot radiator. With little variance you forget the heating is on, it's just comfortable all the time so is ignored by your brain.

[SteamyTea]

  On 29/12/2024 at 19:00, Adsibob said:

The education in this country is pants

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While there are problems in education (I have been out of it for a decade now), I don't think that the basics curriculum and assessments are particularly bad, or of too low a standard.

The structural lack of investment in education is the real problem, and it is not just financial investment.

It goes wrong way too early in a child's learning to be put right later.

It also does not stop they day you leave school.

[marshian]

  On 29/12/2024 at 18:48, Adsibob said:

I’d be interested to understand why it’s more comfortable.

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Less temp swings - fabric of the building and furniture/furnishings all get to the same temp - don't need as high a target temp to feel comfortable because there aren't any cooler periods

[Adsibob]

  On 29/12/2024 at 19:20, SteamyTea said:

The structural lack of investment in education is the real problem, and it is not just financial investment.

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Agree 💯 

[JamesPa]

  On 29/12/2024 at 19:35, marshian said:

  On 29/12/2024 at 18:48, Adsibob said:

I’d be interested to understand why it’s more comfortable.

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Less temp swings - fabric of the building and furniture/furnishings all get to the same temp - don't need as high a target temp to feel comfortable because there aren't any cooler periods

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Exactly that.  You can't achieve this with 'high temperature' heating because it has to switch on and off to match the heat loss of the house and places near the radiator are much hotter than elsewhere.