ECODAN , can I run just the heating without DHW?

Swizz

This is year 7 of our ECODAN heat pump, and, as the installer gave us no clue as to how it works, it's been a long learning curve.
We were without it for several weeks as there was a fault, and we realised in that time we didn't need a whole tank of hot water for just the 2 of us, as we have electric showers and a dishwasher.
Now that we need heating, I was wondering if we could just operate the heating only, and leave the tank?

MultiFuelBurner

Yes the controller will allow you to select whatever you want. 

Do you have an FTC 4 or FTC 5 controller (I think they were the options 7 years ago)

Do you have a device with a screen like this?

MultiFuelBurner

Swizz said:

This is year 7 of our ECODAN heat pump, and, as the installer gave us no clue as to how it works, it's been a long learning curve.
We were without it for several weeks as there was a fault, and we realised in that time we didn't need a whole tank of hot water for just the 2 of us, as we have electric showers and a dishwasher.
Now that we need heating, I was wondering if we could just operate the heating only, and leave the tank?

This YouTube video is good as it immediately shows you how to stop the how water on the controller

https://youtu.be/ROXXpyBxAg4?si=EL6UcOp8Z4hR0x4Q

Swizz

Thankyou for that, will attempt to turn it off.
After all this time of running it probably incorrectly, we have tried a compensation curve today..however, the rads aren't getting warm at all....   

Alnat1

Swizz said:

Thankyou for that, will attempt to turn it off.
After all this time of running it probably incorrectly, we have tried a compensation curve today..however, the rads aren't getting warm at all....   

Is the house warm? What temperature does the thermostat show? The water in the radiators may only be "tepid" but if that is warm enough to heat the house then it's all working well.

MultiFuelBurner

Swizz said:

Thankyou for that, will attempt to turn it off.
After all this time of running it probably incorrectly, we have tried a compensation curve today..however, the rads aren't getting warm at all....   

Hi Swizz it really is trial and error with heat pumps not one setting fits all. To be honest not unlike gas boilers when installed and left at the highest temperatures so customers feel like they have got good value for money from scolding radiators.

The trick is to work out the least amount of flow temp required to keep your property at a temperature that is comfortable for you (not something that anyone can judge but yourself)

So as an example out house is running the weather compensation curve but one we have edited on the FTC controller and looking at their service menu (in that YouTube link above) and thermistor settings with a temperature outside of 5-6oC our flow temp is 35oC. The heating is on a schedule and comes on at 2am and downstairs when we came down at 05:30am it was 20oC all over which is comfortable for us and we are using about 10kwh a day to keep the house comfortable for us.

matelodave

You dont need a red hot radiators to heat the house, letting them idle away at a lower temperature will not only save you money but you will should end up with a more even temperature, especially if you are at home all day.

To get the best performance and economy out of a heat pump you should not run it like a gas or oil boiler - low and slow is better.

The optimum flow temperature is the the lowest you can get away with whilst heat the house to your desired room temps in a reasonable amount of time. Properly set up, weather compensation should adjust the flow temp to take into account how cold it is outside. 

As pointed out by MFB above, there are lots of video's on YouTube to show you how to tweak and adjust your system. The secret being to  list down the the settings that you've already got (so you can restore it if it all goes wrong)

Just adjust one thing at a time and let the system settle down for a couple of days to see the effect before adjusting something else. 

Swizz

Thanks for your advice
Nothing happened until I adjusted the room thermostat upwards to 22..because I'm presuming below that , the room was too warm( our lounge is upstairs,wood burner in the evening) perhaps I should move thermostat to hall? I got a bit confused as I thought WC overrode the wireless thermostat.

MultiFuelBurner

So you have two options both which we have tried

Weather compensation and set your thermostat to say 18oC-22oC whatever is comfortable to you and yes the heat will cut in and out with the thermostat cut off. Moving it to the hall will help if you want it to heat up rooms off the hall nicely.

Or Weather Compensation and let it continue at your WC flow rate depending on the outside temperature and set your thermostat to say 30oC. This way the system will continue the flow temp all the time rather than cutting in and out when the thermostat hits temp and can be an efficient way to run the system as well.

Personally we found not much in it 2-3kwh a day difference. Cheaper being the thermostat controling temp with WC.

matelodave

We have underfloor heating with zone control for every room however we've found that setting the WC on and adjusting the curve to suit our heat losses, tweaking the flow rates through the ground loops (trial and error) and then setting the room stats to a degree or two above what we want then the unit chunters away at a low temperature for most of the day rather than kicking in and out under control of the stats causing the unit to cycle on and off all day.

We drop the flow temp by three degrees overnight (21:30 to 05:00) but bring it back up again at around five in the morning otherwise it takes the place too long to warm up. This keeps the place cozy all day and the unit isn't kicking in an out all the time.

Underfloor heating is very slow to respond compared to radiators but you should save money by getting the flow temp as low as reasonable with lukewarm and running the unit longer rather that trying to blast the radiators at higher temperatures when the heatpump has to work much harder at lower efficiency

Swizz

I set it to this today...40⁰ was too hot last night, do you think it will suffice?