Key Post: geothermal heating system/ground source heat pump

Thanks Yop and yes, the geothermal installer did say to me that I couldn't sew trees in that area of the garden also as the roots would interfere with the piping. However, that said he wasn't very keen on me going the borehole way - perhaps it means extra work for him in getting the job of the borehole done. I will be meeting him again anyways to go through quote so I will ask him more about his hesitancy re borehole method then. Again, thanks for your advice/opinion - much appreciated.
 
Could I ask advice regarding the correct/sufficient insulation with geothermal...the advice my geothermal installer has given is to go with 150ml fully filled (with platinum bead) cavity wall and use 100ml of kingspan insulation under floors (that is 75ml of my own insulation and 25ml of geothermal installer insulation). Is this sufficient insulation or should I go a bit higher? Also, when he says 'under floors', does he mean under the upstairs floors also or is there less insulation needed in those floors? He was against the partial fill cavity wall completely unless one is totally sure of their blocklayer. Thank you.
 
100ml of insulation on the floors is spot on, never mind his insulation, the pipes are generally clipped onto the insulation or mats left on top of the insulation the pipes laid into these.

I am confused as what u mean by the upstairs floors.
 
Thanks Yop. What I mean by upstairs floors are the floors on the 2nd storey of house i.e. floors of bedroooms etc. Also wondering do you think 150ml cavity fully filled with platinum bead is sufficient for walls of house. Thank u.
 
For external walls to b honest I am not qualified on this as regards cavity walls, we have a timber frame which has 150mm of rockwool on the external walls and that works for us. sorry
 
Thanks very much for that John - both myself and my sister are building early in New Year and we are just about at signing contract stage with Climate Control - we also had heard good reports so really must seriously consider your comment now. Thanks for tip off. Customer service is so so important when one is paying top money for a product. Must relook over all the other companies again that I got quotes off. Not sure if it is allright to mention companies on this site but I am just thinking now of rechecking out Nutherm - sales guy there was very helpful at initial stages but decided on CControl as more local to us and smaller heat pump. Will look into it straight away!
 
have to say that we went with climate control and found them really professional. We never had any problems and they called out a few times to look at our fill for the site, they even talked to our plumber and carpenter etc. They were also the crowd I found who new the most about their product, other people were give me really vague responses.


Eve
 
I have to say I am too suprised, I had an issue with pressure in the loop on Wednesday and I rang Brian with no issues.
But that does not mean you are not having an issue lad, keep on the blower to them.
 
Thanks Yop and Eve for your replies - I also had two helpful private messages from happy users of CControl too so I am back on track again now after the shock of reading ouch-stamper's message yesterday - going to meet another client of CC this evening anyways just to be doubly sure!!
Thanks again guys
 
Hi guys,

I'm thinking of heat pump for a new house build. I'm considering the options for the collector and one particular supplier is pushing a bored well water to water heat pump over the horizontal collector. Apparently, as the temperature of the well water would lend itself to a greater COP (12C well water - 6.5 COP). Two other heat supplier companies are set against this system - they think that it is too much trouble installing, requires far more maintenance, higher costs for drilling etc (although my thinking is that I'll be boring a well anyway) and there are risks of water contamination. The reasons why I'd opt for the bored well heat pump is that I would expect this costs to be lower given that there would be no site excavation as there would be for the horizontal collectors.

What do ye think? I went back to the first supplier and he claims that these companies are simply just trying to sell more pipe etc. This supplier is heating his 6100 sq ft house with one bored well heat pump. I did visit another installation and he was quite happy with the system - installed 2005.

This supplier also claims that aluminium rads (sized for 40C) would keep the electricity running costs lower that that for under floor whereas the other companies say the under floor is better. In any case I will at least go for under floor in part of the house as I have reduced space for rads.

Any thoughts are appreciated.

Cheers,
Martin
 
Martin

Who is the supplier with the 6100 sq foot house, even initials of company, if it is who I think it is then the words hole, talkin, through come to mind.

All I would say on the two points are:

Borehole - more expensive to install, not sure how much exactly, may 1.5k euro more. Higher COP, so more efficent. No large plot of area taken up with piping. If you are getting bored for water then you have the machine there, cost saving already.

UFH - would not touch rads with the ufh to be honest, even 40c, standard and well installed UFH will be maxing out at that and should run at 35C. We were advised to install tighter loops, wider coverage and therefore lower running temp, currently is 28C.

Best of luck with it
 
Hello All ,, The info here is great !! but like a lot of you my head is swimming regards it all , does anybody know of any UFH/Geo supplier/contrators in the Cavan/longford/monaghan area, I have being in contact with a sligo based firm for the last couple of months who have being very informative and never pushy as regards closing the deal. Having said that you should always get more than one opinion

Appreciate any info

MudHUt
 
Anne k said:
who supplies heliotherm?

Also has anyone used energy masters from Kerry?

they indicate that there system can supply rads but will check iwth them where the extra heat is coming from to increase from the 20 -22 degrees
Click to expand...

Hi Anne, did you go with Energy Master from Kerry... if so how did you get on with them and how is your system working now. We are planning on using geothermal and ufh and are looking for a supplier... also looking at Pure Energy... would welcome comments on both suppliers. Thanks
 
Hi, am just beginning to check geotherm, deep bore, as I cannot use garden loops. Seen a blog by 'Fisherman' yesterday where he says that Thermia.com Sweden can order from their factory in Poland, with hugh savings on costs. With price of fuel as is today, it can only make sense. Any advice gratefully received!
Napper
 
Hi,

Maybe I am alone, but I did not have a very satisfactory experience with Climate Control. They had a huge delay on getting the heat pump delivered to my house. When it did arrive it was faulty and the owner of the company tried a different "solution" every day. The solutions varied from cleaning the filters, to adding more gas, to taking out gas, to changing the limits on the heat pump, and so on.

In the long run (after about 6 weeks) they replaced the heat pump for a supposedly more efficient model. Guess what? It was faulty, or so they say. They then told me they were going to replace a couple of boards in it but that didn't help.

After the jigs and the reels it now seems to be working, but I am not fully convinced as it seems to be running none stop. I also went for those Fermacells that they sell for an attic conversion and as far as I can see they don't give out any heat.

That's just my experience.
 
kilros said:
I also went for those Fermacells that they sell for an attic conversion and as far as I can see they don't give out any heat.
Click to expand...

Isn't Fermacell a plasterboard variant?

[broken link removed]
 
Just got my geothermal heating, (heat pump and ground collector bed) up and working 2 months ago http://www.heatsource.ie its a Heliotherm Geothermal Heat Pumps,

thought id better put my bid in on this website as I used it a lot over the last 2 years to help me choose which one to go with.

So far the system works great, heatsource are very nice and easy to deal with, not had any electric bills yet so will let you know how it goes (although before it was working we used electric heaters which cost €150 a month to heat 2 rooms!!) , Very impressed with the all over room temp form the system I believe it is running the heating at about 29 degree, it has more pipes to allow it to do this and should mean lower running costs. Currently running it in My office 800sqft 50 meters from the main house we used insulated pipes to get the temp up here and it virtually loses no heat at all in the run there and back!. The system will eventually run the main house as well about 4000 sqft.

find a level ground area for the collector bed mine dropped by 2 meters over a 35x14 meter distance, usually you only need to dig down 1 meter but with mine it ment digging down 3 meters at one end, Got quite expensive to do this and then the additional for sand at the bottom of the bed, and a 3 meter deep manhole to put in caught me out. I am hoping that by having it deeper at one end will help the system collect heat in the winter and the shallow end should help in the warmer days!.. may be may be not.

Over all it costs a lot of money when I costsed it up there were a lot of systems and a lot of different prices rangeing from 15k - 36k , Heliotherm seems to be one of the best systems, and having heard other peoples horror stories who have used cheaper systems I glad I went with the Heliotherm system. It does use twice the amount of under floor heating pipes and I think more collector pipes so you can see why its more expensive. I hope to make that money back over the next 15-20 years.

The system uses a big tank of hot water which it heats to about 49 degree then fresh water is pump into a heat exchange which directley heats the water to 49 degree without actually touching the water in the tank (which stops and legonaires problems) (not tried this yet though as its for the main house) No back up system is needed ie no extra emersion etc to heat the water again which a lot of other systems needed.

I am hoping it only costs me €1000 a year to run, but I dont really have a clue yet what it will be. If it is around that level it will be well worth it for heating 2 buildings as relatives have oil boilers in there 3800 sqft houses and cost arround €3000 a year to run.

hope this helps.
 
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