Ground Source Heat Pumps

beardymarrow

Patrol wrote: »

<snip>

Beardy, how does the H10 work. It looks like it needs a serial port or an additional USB adaptor and you periodically upload data to their website where it can be viewed and I guess expanded into more detail but that might be on a subscription basis.

It's really cool. The H10 is an interface that connects between a serial port, or a USB adapter (I bought the one sold by Husdata as it was reasonably priced and easier that way) on your PC/laptop (I use an old laptop that I have put in my boiler room but I have bought an Ethernet to USB adapter so I can get rid of that laptop and use my home server shortly) and the service port on the Rego.

The PC then logs all the data using the software provided (StatLink). What you log is completely configurable (the defaults are good), so I have mine set to log all the temps, all pump statuses, 3-way position, add heat etc. (basically all the data possible) every 1 min and save to csv file. You then use StatLink to analyse the data as graphs or Excel as you wish. It also shows the current heat curve settings, and a nice graphical display of current status of all the parameters.

You can even change settings from the PC. K1 settings you can change completely from the PC. You have to put the Rego into K2 or I/S mode phyiscally if you want to change those)

I've been able to see to the minute what is going on 24x7, and try out different things (DHW temps, DHW recirc pump timings, curve settings, GT5 influence etc. etc.) and see exactly what is going on (without sitting in the boiler room with a pen and paper going through the menus for hours :-)).

You can chose to upload to the web-site and view the data on there as well, should you wish. You get a free 1 month trial to try it. I've got that laptop set-up on TeamViewer so I can see it from anywhere I am, view data when on my lunch break at work, change settings if my wife phones me to tell me that she's too cold ('cos I changed something too far :-) ) or whatever.

Anyway, the proof of the pudding is that I've had it 2 weeks and have already saved 6kWh per day, so it's saving me at least £20 a month (and that's before I make some more DHW changes I have planned this weekend).

Patrol

Yep, that sounds good. I'll look into it. The website I saw looked like a lot of Kroner which I think was about £130, no mention of delivery costs. Was this the sort of figure you paid.

I'm back several steps but more certain of the issue now. Sticky 3 way switch as the heat pump is doing regular DHW cycles and yet the UFH is heating the floor to mid-winter levels without any heating cycles. & a Friday night of course so I'll see if some more WD40 gives a bit of leeway over the weekend. C1 is showing 8/30 to 24/30.

Given what I now understand I'll call the guy who installed it next week and see if he's amenable to coming out with a spare valve. Did your engineer have to drain the system down or anything as I can't see stop valves on any of the 3 pipes.

Edit; no hot water used but DHW has dropped 0.6C in 9 minutes. This is something like 5-10 times quicker than after the first use of WD40 and back to where I originally noticed there was a problem.

beardymarrow

Patrol wrote: »

Yep, that sounds good. I'll look into it. The website I saw looked like a lot of Kroner which I think was about £130, no mention of delivery costs. Was this the sort of figure you paid.

I'm back several steps but more certain of the issue now. Sticky 3 way switch as the heat pump is doing regular DHW cycles and yet the UFH is heating the floor to mid-winter levels without any heating cycles. & a Friday night of course so I'll see if some more WD40 gives a bit of leeway over the weekend. C1 is showing 8/30 to 24/30.

Given what I now understand I'll call the guy who installed it next week and see if he's amenable to coming out with a spare valve. Did your engineer have to drain the system down or anything as I can't see stop valves on any of the 3 pipes.

Edit; no hot water used but DHW has dropped 0.6C in 9 minutes. This is something like 5-10 times quicker than after the first use of WD40 and back to where I originally noticed there was a problem.

My H10 including the USB-Serial and delivery cost £134.95 delivery was 100kr). It arrived really quickly as well.

Does sound like sticking 3-way then. Clearly the UFH shouldn't get warm when only the DHW is on . That's exactly what I was getting with mine as it was leaking between A and B (stuck in the middle), so not only was it producing rad heat at the same time as DHW, but it then circulated the DHW heat around the rads when it was off. So it took ages to wamr up and then cooled really quickly.

Is it an ESBE or an LK Armatur? Mine was an ESBE and the guy said that he used to swap about 2 or 3 a week of those (basically every system problem he went to if it had one it was that causing the problem), whereas now they are using the LK, they don't get the same problem. It does seem a lot more robust in the way it works as well (rotates a valve instead of pushing a pin in and out). Didn't cost me anything to have it replaced as ICE (the supplier of mine) claimed it back from IVT on the warranty.

Mine's got stop valves on all 6 of the pipes as they exit the top of the GSHP, so all he did was switch off the rad out and DHW out ones, put a bucket under the 3-way to catch the tiny bit that was in it and job done. Took him about 10mins, and no system draining.

My DHW dropped 0.6c in 8mins yesterday, so about the same as you. The cycle is 13-15 Mins to heat up from 50c to 54c and then approx 2Hrs to cool back down to 50c (assuming no DHW is used). I'm not happy with how quickly my DHW cools either.

Patrol

It looked very similar to yours although the red piece is exposed and slightly proud of the black casing - yours looked to have a clear plastic section over it.

Mine doesn't seem consistent, sometimes it holds heat better than others when no water is used so I think it may opening and shutting to different degrees but the lever is moving the full range each time.

I thought I had asked for everything in the house to have stop valves, all sanitaryware has it but I don't think I explicitly included the heatpump. I'll find out how easy it is for someone to sort it out and also if they recommend adding valves while they are at it. I'm out of warranty so not as fortunate as yourself but it needs doing as I can't be running UFH year round at excessive temperatures.

Will try to check my cycle time.

beardymarrow

Hi,
I've just had an alarm on my GSHP. It's "Electric Anode" and the Info on the control panel says "Read the Manual". The strange thing is I have an E, so I don't have an Electric Anode. I acknowledged the alarm, but it stayed on, so I switched off and on the control panel and the alarm cleared, but then it came back a few hours later.

Any ideas how to get rid of it? I now I can probably ignore it, but then I'll never know if I get a real alarm as the alarm will always be on. Would it be worth completely powering down the GSHP to see if that clears it permanently?

Beardy

beardymarrow

Patrol wrote: »

It looked very similar to yours although the red piece is exposed and slightly proud of the black casing - yours looked to have a clear plastic section over it.

Mine doesn't seem consistent, sometimes it holds heat better than others when no water is used so I think it may opening and shutting to different degrees but the lever is moving the full range each time.

I thought I had asked for everything in the house to have stop valves, all sanitaryware has it but I don't think I explicitly included the heatpump. I'll find out how easy it is for someone to sort it out and also if they recommend adding valves while they are at it. I'm out of warranty so not as fortunate as yourself but it needs doing as I can't be running UFH year round at excessive temperatures.

Will try to check my cycle time.

Yeah, that's the old flaky sort then (you'll see why if you've taken the actuator off the valve body as the motor to pin connection isn't solid at all). Warranty from IVT is 5 or 10 years I think, isn't it? (depending on when it was installed) if supplied by an authorised partner (I think ICE is the only one in the UK from looking at the IVT web-site?).

The guy who came to mine said it wasn't too tricky to sort if there weren't stop valves, you just have to drain and re-fill the rad circuit. He was pleased he didn't have to, though. Not a big deal, but obviously more faff than if there are stop valves.

I looked when mine went (assuming I'd have to pay) and the part was about £40 for the valve and £30 for the actuator (http://eshop.fbcstore.co.uk/ZONE-VALVE but double check that's the right size pipe connector for yours). It's the sort of job I'd happily do myself, as the electrical connection is just a plug and you can't go wrong with the valve (unless you get A and B the wrong way round :-) ).

lovesgshp

beardymarrow wrote: »

Hi,
I've just had an alarm on my GSHP. It's "Electric Anode" and the Info on the control panel says "Read the Manual". The strange thing is I have an E, so I don't have an Electric Anode. I acknowledged the alarm, but it stayed on, so I switched off and on the control panel and the alarm cleared, but then it came back a few hours later.

Any ideas how to get rid of it? I now I can probably ignore it, but then I'll never know if I get a real alarm as the alarm will always be on. Would it be worth completely powering down the GSHP to see if that clears it permanently?

Beardy

The anode is in the top of the 300ltr DHW tank. Have sent you the pdf which shows how to check it out.

beardymarrow

lovesgshp wrote: »

The anode is in the top of the 300ltr DHW tank. Have sent you the pdf which shows how to check it out.

Thanks mate. My point was that the Rego is alarming for "Electric Anode" but on the external tank it's just a normal anode (unlike the C with built in tank which does have an electric anode), so the Rego can't know the status of it?

Patrol

I had 5 year warranty, saw it on the documentation when I checked recently and can remember the phone call 1-2 years back when they wanted to extend.

Without stop valves I think it's a job for an engineer and if drained then maybe valves can be added without too much more effort.

Good luck with the anode.I flicked through the manual and could only see the mention of a red light for integrated so no mention of an standard error. As you're in warranty I'd suggest speaking to Ice.

beardymarrow

Patrol wrote: »

I had 5 year warranty, saw it on the documentation when I checked recently and can remember the phone call 1-2 years back when they wanted to extend.

Without stop valves I think it's a job for an engineer and if drained then maybe valves can be added without too much more effort.

Good luck with the anode.I flicked through the manual and could only see the mention of a red light for integrated so no mention of an standard error. As you're in warranty I'd suggest speaking to Ice.

Good point about adding valves while it's drained. Well worth it, I'd say.