Anyone have experience with Brink Air Comfort?

[Adsibob]

I have a Brink Flair 400 MVHR system. We've had it for about 2.5 years and been happy with it. No issues really.

We have lots of solar gain problems in the house. Despite specifying SN70/30 glass for most windows, this has not been enough. We have a fair amount of glazing and the house overheats from about May to September. Whilst we are looking to retrofit other options including external shutters on some veluxes and perhaps on some west facing windows, an appealling fix for our master bedroom is to install air con so that we can at least bring the temp to below 20C at night. A downside of this however is that it will dry our bedroom, given that MVHR already brings the RH down to 40% to 49% (and usually closer to the bottom of that range). One solution is to install the Brink Air Comfort module. According to ChatGPT:

 

What Brink Air Comfort Does

• Adds moisture (via cold water evaporation) to the supply air of your MVHR system.

• This humidified air is then delivered to every room with a supply vent, not just the bedroom.

• The system runs based on:

  • Indoor humidity sensors

  • Outdoor air humidity

  • User-set targets (e.g. 40–45% RH)

 It works with an inline unit which oridinarily is placed into the incoming inlet for the whole house. I'm considering doing it just for the bedroom duct. Anyone see an issue with this? It would impact pressure which is not ideal. Need to think how to resolve that and whether it will add noise, also not ideal. 

[Nickfromwales]

I've installed a few, and they do what they say on the tin.

 

The only way to get heat energy through airflow is to boost the flow rate quite significantly, so if using this for cooling or heating (tempering) of the air, with a view to manipulating room temps, then the audibility is the trade-off. If you're happy to have an AC unit plugging away, then this won't bother you, and it's a less obtrusive solution; nothing other than AC will replace AC btw, but fan coils are the in-between solution.

 

As far as introducing cold water evaporation, not so sure there, but are you better off with an Enthaply heat exchanger instead? A quick fix as I think you can just swap this out for the regular HEx. I'm not 100% sure, but I can ask.

 

https://www.brinkclimatesystems.nl/solutions/accessories/enthalpyexchanger 

[Nickfromwales]

Here’s one we installed in Oxford. The unit to the left is the Flair 400, and the air comfort is the unit to the right of it. 
 

[JohnMo]

We have exactly the same overheating issue. Prime reason for finding a reasonably price ASHP, and cool via the floor.

 

According to data sheet at a water flow temperature of 7 degs, and 400m³ h you get 1.5kW cooling - pretty much a waste of time in my opinion.

 

Not sure it does evaporation cooling according to reading the data sheet, it needs cooled water.

 

 

[Nickfromwales]

1 minute ago, JohnMo said:

We have exactly the same overheating issue. Prime reason for finding a reasonably price ASHP, and cool via the floor.

 

According to data sheet at a water flow temperature of 7 degs, and 400m³ h you get 1.5kW cooling - pretty much a waste of time in my opinion.

 

Not sure it dies evaporation cooling according to reading the data sheet, it needs cooled water.

 

 

Yup. The air comfort is an active heat exchanger, and requires a hydraulic connection to the ASHP for cooled or warmed water input. 

[JohnMo]

Datasheet extract - 

[Adsibob]

I'm a little confused by the reference to ASHP and the temperature of the water connected to the Air Comfort unit. We don't have ASHP. We heat our home with a gas boiler. That said, I did plumb in the larger diameter pipes for our underfloor heating system with the idea that eventually, when hopefully ASHP is more affordable and less bulky we could install that, but I still have 9 year warranty left on my boiler, so aren't exploring those options at the moment.

 

The change I'm proposing is to simultaneously install two things:

 

1. A split AC unit such as a 2.5kW Daikin Stylish in our bedroom; and
2. A Brink Air Comfort unit simply to add moisture to the air when the air con unit is running, because otherwise my understanding is that combination of AC and MVHR is air that is too dry to be comfortable for those with sensitivities to these things.

So my question was whether installing a Brink Air Comfort unit is feasible when installed on just one duct in a house, as opposed to the whole system. It should in theory be possible to just add moisture to the room with AC, given that room has its own dedicated duct from the MVHR, but the Brink Air Comfort will add resistance and that will surely impact the pressure and noise of the air supply. But maybe there are simple workarounds. Alternatively, we could add the Brink Air Comfort to the whole MVHR system, as this would add moisture to the air in the whole house. That is not terrible I suppose as we won't run the air con all the time. Probably just for 90 minutes before we go to bed to get the room to temp and then through the night to keep it at temperature. 

[JohnMo]

46 minutes ago, Adsibob said:

Brink Air Comfort unit simply to add moisture to the air

How? from reading up on it, it doesn't do it it's a heat exchanger in the air stream. Just AI says yes, doesn't make it real. Download the manual and have a read. If I am wrong I will happily eat my words.

 

I did look at an evaporator unit (different make) for the MVHR you need very dry incoming air for it being if any use. UK humidity made as good as useless.

48 minutes ago, Adsibob said:

little confused by the reference to ASHP

That's how it works needs cold water through a heat exchanger to cool the air. 

[Adsibob]

10 minutes ago, JohnMo said:

That's how it works needs cold water through a heat exchanger to cool the air. 

But I wasn’t planning on using the Air Comfort to cool the air - that’s why I’m confused. I’m just using it to add moisture. You are right though, that the marketing docs don’t appear to say anything about moisture addition

[JohnMo]

7 minutes ago, Adsibob said:

I’m just using it to add moisture

Save £1000+ and buy a humidifier?

 

When you look at Aircon, some will monitor the humidity and draw in fresh air to manage RH%.

[Nickfromwales]

14 minutes ago, Adsibob said:

But I wasn’t planning on using the Air Comfort to cool the air - that’s why I’m confused. I’m just using it to add moisture. You are right though, that the marketing docs don’t appear to say anything about moisture addition

Yup, you’ve got the wrong end of the stick here with what the Air Comfort does.

 

Just use the enthalpy HEx?

 

5 minutes ago, JohnMo said:

Save £1000+ and buy a humidifier?

It’d be way more than £1k installed etc. 

[Adsibob]

2 hours ago, Nickfromwales said:

Just use the enthalpy HEx?

But isn’t the regular HEx good for keeping the house damp free in regular conditions, ie when not using air con.Or with the enthalpy HEx, can you set the target RH% ?

[Nickfromwales]

5 minutes ago, Adsibob said:

But isn’t the regular HEx good for keeping the house damp free in regular conditions, ie when not using air con.Or with the enthalpy HEx, can you set the target RH% ?

I imagine it would be a balance with you checking flow rates vs results. Not sure if you can set the RH, but the manufacturers literature should make for good reading there?