Detached property, hosted by Christine

Vaillant air source heat pump in a 1945 - 1964 property

Christine

Heat pumps receive a very inaccurate negative press, I have been in a variety of homes with heat pumps, and the owners are happy with them. My hope and expectation is that I will have a relatively quick return on this investment, I have solar panels, I plan to get a battery soon and move onto a Octopus Cosy tariff, this should reduce my running cost substantially. Ours is an average house and the heat pump cost when you consider all the extras was relatively inexpensive. The large initial outlay is mostly due to the system change, not the heat pump cost which was £4000, if heat pumps are mass produced their costs should be similar to gas boilers

Joined the network in 2024

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About this property

Woking, GU21

4 bedrooms

Air source heat pump

Installed by Econic Energy ltd

See other installs

EPC rating: B, due to solar panels though otherwise a C

Cost of energy bills per year: £1500

Installing the system

House is a detached 1950s property with cavity wall insulation, loft insulation and recently installed double glazing, all standard insulation measures. The only additional measure is insulated hot pipe runs between the floorboards. Our 16-year gas boiler had stopped working, I work in the energy efficiency/retrofit industry, so I had several contacts to recommend good installers. We chose a small company called Econic. The installation took one month from my initial enquiry to commissioning, this was a very quick turnaround.

We claimed the BUS grant of £7500 and we contributed £6450 ourselves so the total cost was £13950, that included the cost of the heat loss survey, the heat pump (£4100) changing from a vented (gravity fed) hot water system to an unvented system, upgrading 5 radiators, a power flush clean of the whole system, installing an electric sub meter for the pump (not necessary) heating controls and all the labour costs.

Before we installed the heat pump, we had some issues with our existing system that we wanted resolved.

1. The radiator in the lounge was inadequate, this was due to a few factors, it was the last radiator in the line, it was poorly positioned, and undersized for the room.

2. We have an occupancy of 4.5, the cylinder was undersized for our needs, and we had very poor water pressure from our gravity fed water system

I estimate replacing the gas boiler would cost between £2,000 - £3000. In addition, we changed from a vented to an unvented hot water system, we had new pipe work fitted to support another radiator in the lounge, and we upgraded 4 of our very old radiators for modern column radiators and replaced another radiator with an existing radiator. Finally, we had a compensation controller fitted, and a separate meter installed so that we could monitor the heat pump electricity usage. Although we paid £6450, I felt I got a lot of extras included in that cost.

The installation took 5 days. We were never without hot water in the evenings. The plumbing team were excellent, they managed to fit a 210-litre cylinder into our small airing cupboard, they checked in with us on every decision, made minor changes with no fuss, took a lot of care to protect carpets and clean up after themselves daily.
I highly recommend "Heat Geek, Buying a Heat Pump Video" as a great source of technical information.

Living with a heat pump

It has been installed for 6 weeks and we haven’t had very cold weather yet, but the compensation controller and the internal thermostat keep the house at a very ambient temperature, we have it set to 17° at night, 19° day, evening 21°.

With our gas boiler we controlled the heating tightly so managed to keep our costs relatively low for the house size. With the heat pump I rarely adjust it, it seems to stay at an ambient temperature all the time as it is responding to the outdoor temperature and is sophisticated enough to anticipate indoor temperature falls, based on the outdoor temperature dropping. The house never overheats, it just seems to stay at a very even temperature.

Previously I was actively controlling the temperature in individual rooms, with the heat pump I have adjust the room TRVs once initially. With a gas boiler the radiators emit intense heat, then they cool and reheating again, these fluctuations contribute to the “feelings” of draughts or cold, our sense of comfort is relative.

I am not using the immersion to heat the hot water, the water temperature is set at 46°, which the heat pump can deliver, furthermore it is programmed to raise the temperature 60° weekly to safeguard against legionnaires disease. The power in the shower is a massive hit with the family. it was great to remove all the water tanks in the attic.

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