Fitted Air conditioning

[Harry Flashman]

LastPoster said:

EmilA said:

The Argo and Electriq units from Applicances Direct, has anyone had any actual issues with them?

Having spoken with 2 AC installers they both pushed Mitsubishi, Fujitsu etc my way and said the Argo etc are poor quality and always have issues. I think its more of a sales pitch than anything as I don't recall anyone having faults with the systems on here?

One has quoted £600 to fit or £1200 supply and fit (price are per unit). Waiting on another quote. It may just be more effective for me to get another portable one as I don't see ourselves staying in this current house for more than another 2 summers if that..

If you had the opportunity to sell a product with a cast iron guarantee, excellent aftersales support and low risk of a warranty claim (installers get almost no labour allowance payment for warranty claims) vs. one with no reputation for any of those things and therefore taking the risk yourself, which might it be? Remember that unlike your car, the owner won't be bringing it to you for repair either.

In the past, when selling cheapo portables, the supplier was unable to get us any parts and no stock for a replacement unit. We ended up refunding the customer. So labour and travel costs for original survey, delivery and set up, return to site when reported not working and finally collection. We stopped selling cheapo portables

This is an excellently made point.

[MrJuice]

Thoughts on this pricing:

Daikin

Indoor Unit
FTXM71R

OUTDOOR CONDENSER
RXM71R


OUTHOUSE
INDOOR
FTXM42R

OUTDOOR CONDENSER UNIT
RXM42R

£5400

Or the following Panasonic units:

Lounge

Indoor
CS-TZ71ZKEW
7.1kW

Outdoor condenser Unit.
CU-TZ71ZKE



Outhouse
Indoor Unit.
CS-TZ42ZKEW


Outdoor condenser Unit.
CU-TZ42ZKE

£4600

Both supplied and fitted

[Bluemondy]

Just agreed a quote,

2 x 7kW External units,
3 x 2.5kW Internal units,
1 x 2.0kW Internal unit
1 x 5kW Internal unit.

supplied and fitted £6500. Fujitsu units.

1st week of August installation. Can't wait, these portable units are ok, but not efficient and ultimately not that cold on a hot day

[g40steve]

Bluemondy said:

Just agreed a quote,

2 x 7kW External units,
3 x 2.5kW Internal units,
1 x 2.0kW Internal unit
1 x 5kW Internal unit.

supplied and fitted £6500. Fujitsu units.

1st week of August installation. Can't wait, these portable units are ok, but not efficient and ultimately not that cold on a hot day

Looked at Fujitsu, but Wi-Fi modules were extra, it’s 2023!

[gangzoom]

Bluemondy said:

Just agreed a quote,

2 x 7kW External units,
3 x 2.5kW Internal units,
1 x 2.0kW Internal unit
1 x 5kW Internal unit.

supplied and fitted £6500. Fujitsu units.

1st week of August installation. Can't wait, these portable units are ok, but not efficient and ultimately not that cold on a hot day

The way I read that its to cool x5 interior areas? We are going to get air-con fitted to the bedrooms once our building works are done, just trying to work out which rooms to cool.

Does the KW figure mean when the whole setup is running its getting through 14KW (the 2 external units) or 24KW (all the units combined)? - We'll almost certainly increase our solar PV setup as well from current 4KW to adding another 4KW at a minimal, maybe 10KW if air-con units really do draw this much power!

Might end up having to go to 3 phase electricity after-all, 24KW for air-con, 7KW for EV charging (if 2 EVs 14KW) - thats alot of sustained power draw.

[Condi]

The Kwh is the output from the unit, not the electrical input. They work on about a 4:1 efficiency, so the 7kwh outside unit will at most be drawing about 1.75kw per hour. With 2 7kw external units it can't use more than about 3.5 kw per hour. When rooms are down to temperature and the units are just maintaining the temp they use very little electric.

[gangzoom]

^Thanks makes sense more.

Hopefully 8KW PV setup will be enough to run aircon+charge home battery during hot summer days. At night the usage will be low enough to run off the battery and/or cheap overnight electricity.

[MattyD803]

I have just taken delivery of my Daikin 2.5kW split which I'll install in the next week or so.....but with summer the way it is going, I expect I might be using it for heating more than cooling during August.....

[Bluemondy]

gangzoom said:

Bluemondy said:

Just agreed a quote,

2 x 7kW External units,
3 x 2.5kW Internal units,
1 x 2.0kW Internal unit
1 x 5kW Internal unit.

supplied and fitted £6500. Fujitsu units.

1st week of August installation. Can't wait, these portable units are ok, but not efficient and ultimately not that cold on a hot day

The way I read that its to cool x5 interior areas? We are going to get air-con fitted to the bedrooms once our building works are done, just trying to work out which rooms to cool.

Does the KW figure mean when the whole setup is running its getting through 14KW (the 2 external units) or 24KW (all the units combined)? - We'll almost certainly increase our solar PV setup as well from current 4KW to adding another 4KW at a minimal, maybe 10KW if air-con units really do draw this much power!

Might end up having to go to 3 phase electricity after-all, 24KW for air-con, 7KW for EV charging (if 2 EVs 14KW) - thats alot of sustained power draw.

4 bedrooms & living room (essentially the whole house) in reality I might have one of the bedrooms which doubles as an office going and the front room at the same time during the day. And conversely at night it will just be the bedrooms.

Also consider the 4:1 efficiency (1kw in electrical power gives 4kw of cooling).
Also factor in your electrical diversification factor. As an experienced DNO network design Engineer I'd allow about .3

So on a hot day, with everything going I'd expect about 3kw X .3 gives you about a KW constant load.

Which grades nicely on what I'm seeing using 4 highly inefficient portable units!

[mikey_b]

Agree with the above figures re actual consumption vs what the spec says. Also, those figures are for when it's running at full pelt, which it won't be for long. I have a 3.5kW Toshiba mini-split, but when running at full power (just turned on and the loft conversion bedroom is high-20s temperature) the smart meter only shows 1200W - for the whole house. Then, once the room has cooled, the power consumption drops right down and just trickles over.

Here's a smart meter reading from a day where the AC was used to cool the bedroom (we tend to go bed about 1130pm):


And a day where it wasn't needed:


As you can see, you get a spike recorded where it sucks on the power (it takes maybe 15-20 minutes of running hard before it has reduced the temperature in the room to the point it modulates down) and then for the rest of the night it doesn't consume much more than the normal background draw.

[g40steve]

mikey_b said:

Agree with the above figures re actual consumption vs what the spec says. Also, those figures are for when it's running at full pelt, which it won't be for long. I have a 3.5kW Toshiba mini-split, but when running at full power (just turned on and the loft conversion bedroom is high-20s temperature) the smart meter only shows 1200W - for the whole house. Then, once the room has cooled, the power consumption drops right down and just trickles over.

Here's a smart meter reading from a day where the AC was used to cool the bedroom (we tend to go bed about 1130pm):


And a day where it wasn't needed:


As you can see, you get a spike recorded where it sucks on the power (it takes maybe 15-20 minutes of running hard before it has reduced the temperature in the room to the point it modulates down) and then for the rest of the night it doesn't consume much more than the normal background draw.

Same here, Toshiba Haori, we see a spike then within 10 mins unit drops down & idles. Ours is in our sunroom & considering other rooms for not only the cooling but heating.

[Bluemondy]

g40steve said:

mikey_b said:

Agree with the above figures re actual consumption vs what the spec says. Also, those figures are for when it's running at full pelt, which it won't be for long. I have a 3.5kW Toshiba mini-split, but when running at full power (just turned on and the loft conversion bedroom is high-20s temperature) the smart meter only shows 1200W - for the whole house. Then, once the room has cooled, the power consumption drops right down and just trickles over.

Here's a smart meter reading from a day where the AC was used to cool the bedroom (we tend to go bed about 1130pm):


And a day where it wasn't needed:


As you can see, you get a spike recorded where it sucks on the power (it takes maybe 15-20 minutes of running hard before it has reduced the temperature in the room to the point it modulates down) and then for the rest of the night it doesn't consume much more than the normal background draw.

Same here, Toshiba Haori, we see a spike then within 10 mins unit drops down & idles. Ours is in our sunroom & considering other rooms for not only the cooling but heating.

Thanks Mikey & Steve, That's really useful to see the data from the real world.

Our full installation is mid august, but no smart meter, so this gives me a lot of confidence that I'll be seeing a large reduction in power usage compared to running 4 portable units and there inherent inefficiencies!

[Bluemondy]

g40steve said:

Looked at Fujitsu, but Wi-Fi modules were extra, it’s 2023!

After lengthy discussions today, we are upgrading to Mitsubishi units with the internal units being the "ZEN" models (in black). looks a lot better, a little better warranty and as you rightly point out.... WiFi!

[heisthegaffer]

Bluemondy said:

g40steve said:

Looked at Fujitsu, but Wi-Fi modules were extra, it’s 2023!

After lengthy discussions today, we are upgrading to Mitsubishi units with the internal units being the "ZEN" models (in black). looks a lot better, a little better warranty and as you rightly point out.... WiFi!

We don't have zen models but if the WiFi is the same, don't expect much. The app is clunky and it's not Alexa compatible (I don't think). The only smart aspect is Google. Home being able to switch on and off.

Unless someone else has had more luck than me!

[MrJuice]

Can you do this with AC:

I was thinking of one big unit to cover a 55sqm open plan room and then using the same unit to cool 2/3 other bedrooms with total floor space of around 35sqm. Either the lounge or bedrooms would be cooled at any given time. Not both

Is that possible?

[Bluemondy]

heisthegaffer said:

We don't have zen models but if the WiFi is the same, don't expect much. The app is clunky and it's not Alexa compatible (I don't think). The only smart aspect is Google. Home being able to switch on and off.

Unless someone else has had more luck than me!

According to the blurb it's Alexa compatible, but I'll know in 34 days!

What App do you use ?

[LastPoster]

MrJuice said:

Can you do this with AC:

I was thinking of one big unit to cover a 55sqm open plan room and then using the same unit to cool 2/3 other bedrooms with total floor space of around 35sqm. Either the lounge or bedrooms would be cooled at any given time. Not both

Is that possible?

Using a system with air ducts? Yes but very expensive and hard to install

Using a multi split system? No, in as much as a unit that will accept all of the indoor units you are looking for will automatically have the capacity to provide simultaneous heating or cooling to all of them. The outdoor unit 'knows' how many indoors are connected and their capacity and will throw a fault code if too much capacity is connected, It always used to be possible to fudge this but I don't know that it still is and I wouldn't recommend it

[MrJuice]

LastPoster said:

Using a system with air ducts? Yes but very expensive and hard to install

Using a multi split system? No, in as much as a unit that will accept all of the indoor units you are looking for will automatically have the capacity to provide simultaneous heating or cooling to all of them. The outdoor unit 'knows' how many indoors are connected and their capacity and will throw a fault code if too much capacity is connected, It always used to be possible to fudge this but I don't know that it still is and I wouldn't recommend it

Thanks

I heard about the air ducts system but I understand you can then only cool or not cool. You cannot control the temperature per room. Is that correct?

It would be okay for me to do air ducts now because house is being done and ceilings are down right now.

Are you saying the outdoor to indoor unit ratio has to be 1:1?

One AC man who came round was suggesting one outdoor unit to cool two rooms and another to cool three rooms.

[MrJuice]

Now I'm really confused

[LastPoster]

MrJuice said:

LastPoster said:

Using a system with air ducts? Yes but very expensive and hard to install

Using a multi split system? No, in as much as a unit that will accept all of the indoor units you are looking for will automatically have the capacity to provide simultaneous heating or cooling to all of them. The outdoor unit 'knows' how many indoors are connected and their capacity and will throw a fault code if too much capacity is connected, It always used to be possible to fudge this but I don't know that it still is and I wouldn't recommend it

Thanks

I heard about the air ducts system but I understand you can then only cool or not cool. You cannot control the temperature per room. Is that correct?

It would be okay for me to do air ducts now because house is being done and ceilings are down right now.

No, you can control the temperature per room, you cannot have hot air blowing into one room and cold into another though. I think it's a Daikin product and new to market so may not be widely available yet. Basically it shuts the air off once desired temperature is met

MrJuice said:

Are you saying the outdoor to indoor unit ratio has to be 1:1?

One AC man who came round was suggesting one outdoor unit to cool two rooms and another to cool three rooms.

Again no. What I though you were asking was could you have an multi split outdoor unit with the maximum capacity to only serve half the house or so at a time (so you can alternate between the two). No you can't.

Yes, you can have multi split systems with one outdoor and multiple indoors capable of either heating or cooling all indoor units at the same time or having cooling going in on one room and not in another (so avoiding over cooling or overheating). This is what I think you are looking for and what your man was proposing

You can also get multi split systems that will heat one room whilst cooling another but only on a commercial scale at present (so very expensive) I did install one in a house once, it was an expensive house!