Heat pump placement

[Big Neil]

..welllll that fan thing. Would it work better to put it inside a double garage so the air it was drawing was - i guess - warmer? At least on winter days it would cut down temp difference due to wind chill?

[PeterW]

Nope - air flow is huge so it would suck the air through every gap possible. 

[Big Neil]

so absolutely no benefit then? Any drawbacks? 

[jack]

If you mean an ASHP, that isn't how they work. The air in the garage would very quickly turn freezing cold if you did that. 

 

You want a constant supply of environmental air, from which you absorb heat (and that will happen even if the air temp is very cold). Not only do you want the exchanger outside, you want it in a clear space to that you get good airflow around the unit.

[Big Neil]

Bang on Jack - thanks - So not even if the second hand air was vented out side but drew from inside. Interesting, thank you.

 

 

on an unconnected topic for fear of cluttering the forum with even more of my ridiculous topics, in terms of heat recovery, is there anything to be gained from collecting heat from waste water. seems if you're constantly draining warm water from showers, dishwashers etc, that's also a bit of a waste?

[ProDave]

You can buy or make a waste water heat recovery system. Typically this would absorb some of the waste heat from say a shower waste and put it back into pre heating the cold feed to that shower.

[Onoff]

@jack...haven't you got a recovery thingy on your shower?

[jack]

26 minutes ago, Onoff said:

@jack...haven't you got a recovery thingy on your shower?

 

Yup. I assume it works!

[Guest Alphonsox]

https://www.heatraesadia.com/products/renewables/waste-water-heat-recovery

https://www.thegreenage.co.uk/tech/waste-water-heat-recovery-systems/

[jack]

46 minutes ago, Big Neil said:

Bang on Jack - thanks - So not even if the second hand air was vented out side but drew from inside. Interesting, thank you.

 

Not sure I follow. What sort of heat pump do you have in mind? Air source? Air to air (ie, air conditioner)? One inside an MVHR unit? Or one of those ecocent type units that use the internal great from the house to generate hot water?

[Big Neil]

Air Source.

[jack]

Right, I get you now. As Pete says, you'd need massive venting in the garage to allow this to happen (ie, to balance the airflow), and in any event, unless your garage has a lot of solar gain, you'd see little if any benefit. 

[ProDave]

I did deliberately place the ASHP on the south side of the house as in winter on a still day, the air is very noticeably cooler on the north side. But even that is probably very marginal given the volume of air it moves.

[Big Neil]

Thank you all. Most helpful