Heat Pumps - Our 'Ugly' Truth! 

Glad to see you made the switch! We're now 9 years into heat pump ownership having come from an oil boiler. Same as you, our boiler was end of life (it had actually died in our case) so we took the plunge a few months earlier than planned. Ours is a 12KW Panasonic and heats water up to 65 degrees. We run it at 55 degrees in winter, although it adjusts itself for weather conditions. Payback was a little over 5 years so we're well in profit now. Best thing we ever did! It plumbed straight into our existing radiators and cylinder. The only additions were an expansion vessel near the heat pump and a small tank in the return pipework which moderates the return temperature so the HP isn't switching on and off all the time. Efficiency, as you say, is not as good on older HPs and, like MPG claims for cars, doesn't match the quoted numbers, but the savings are clear to see. Looking forward to updates on this project as time passes and you learn more.

As someone that fits all types of systems this was a no brainer for your property, it isn't suitable for everyone or all properties though. Good job on getting a Vailant though they're some of the nicest on the market with probably the best warranty support. It's nice to see a balanced video of get your property sized up for one (hopefully by competent engineers and not sales reps).

An excellent, well-balanced video. Many thanks. I am already using first4solar (halfway through installing solar+batteries) and my experience with them is top notch. EDIT: The replies to this are correct. 8 months later and still nothing installed. Nothing but a total lack of communication and missed install dates.

We've had our HeatPump for 4 years now and we wouldn't change it for the world. Clean efficient heating. We will be installing solar panels soon too (with battery) and we'll almost be bill-free! Our HeatPump installer is absolutely brilliant; very knowledgeable and honest from the start. He did mention that we would have to look at improving a few things to get it to run even better, but these were things that we knew already and that we were planning to do anyway (like installing a new front door cos ours is basically cardboard and also insulating our attic a little better) But as I say, we're super happy to have installed it. And just to let you know, I had to fight with my wife, my dad and my father in-law for 3 years before being allowed to have it installed, cos they all thought it wouldn't work.... (we're in Ireland btw)

I’m starting to look into this as well as solar, thank you, you are a god send when it comes to making sense of this stuff. It seems the big energy companies are over specifying their installs, in this case it seems best to some of the leg work yourself. Well Done and I hope it works as you think over the Winter!

Glad you have made the decision. I have been thinking for a while about installing a heat pump, but those bad reviews have held me back. I will need to do a survey to see how much it will cost. You have made my decision easier! Thank you very much!

Great to see you've made the leap to ASHP. You've got the right setup with solar PV and batteries to cut your costs down. Last winter on the old Octopus Go tariff we spent £100 a month with solar PV but no battery. We just got our 8.2kwh GivEnergy battery commissioned and running and about to move to the more expensive Octopus Go tariff (similar to your rates). We'll see how quickly the battery gives a ROI.

I would recommend going nowhere near first for solar, i ordered a battery from them with six to eight week delivery in February they still have not installed it, i have had install dates given and then cancelled at the last minute i must have spoken to almost all of their staff including the MD. All with no result., read their reviews i am not alone, there is a reason they want 50% deposit its so you cant run away , i have never used such a terrible company , and i work in construction, engage first for solar at your peril, you have been warned!

still on the journey for a solar system, 9 months and counting , prevarications abound, maybe its us, but glad your experience was more enjoyable than ours to date. i have viewed your channel and found your explanations very helpful , i even followed up on your recommendation for an supplier /installer . who knows if we will ever have a working system from them, maybe they will ring back or answer an e-mail. good luck with system , first 4 not in our case it would seem

Interesting video to see what you've done, especially as the gas boiler in my 50 year-old-house died a few years ago (she used to set the thermo at 25C!). We're in the tropics (down south) so have minimal heating needs otherwise, it's a woolly jumper time when chilly. Unfortunately, looking at the costs it's not for me as there's no money in the pot for a good number of years to come.

Good video, looking forward to seeing how you get on in the winter.

About 2 months back I got my own ASHP setup installed. For my house it wasn't practical to do ducted and as I live alone in a big 4 bedroom house I wanted to be able to heat individual rooms. I ended up with 6 indoor units. 3x 1.5kW, 2x 2.5kW, and 1x 5kW. Outside, I have 2 outdoor units, one on each side of the house controlling 3 indoor units each. One rated at 11kW capacity and the other I believe 13kW. Both are fused at 8 amps. (About 2kW) System has been working great. Got a GivEnergy 9.5kWh battery getting installed tomorrow with a 5.5kWh solar system and the 5kW Hybrid inverter. Unfortunaterly I have no hot water heating outside of the gas boiler though, problem for another time I suppose. :)

Hi EVM. Yes, your pump might be nice and quiet in summer when it’s not really doing much. However in winter when it’s near freezing, the pump is working hard and possibly doing a defrost cycle, please report back! Ours is occasionally very noisy. This is why it’s still important to site the pump carefully and to isolate it from the house - ie not attach it to the house but to have it free-standing.

We live in Denmark and have had a heatpump for 3 years without any problems. The house is from 1934 and we upgraded one radiator. The water temperature for heating is 38 C in winter and between 30-32 C in summer. But I wouldn't buy it to small. Some companies said we should have a 6 kW and some said 11 kW. Both would probably be able to heat the house but the small one might use to much energy from the electric heater and make it inefficient. The electric heater is used to raise the water temperature for tap water to the right level. We went for a 11 kW but one of my friends went for a 6 kW (cheaper to buy) in the same type of house. Their heatpump is not as efficient as ours and therefore much more expensive to run. In short... Make sure that your heatpump is the right size. Not to big and not to small

In winter it will use a massive amount of electricity though that's the problem, great video though really clear and well put together, keep us updated.

When I lived in Denmark. Our home had the joy of using wood pellets. I would dump a sack in the hopper in the morning and it was seriously toasty all day long. The burner lived in the cellar with some creative pipework to warm every room. It's going to be nice to see how you get on with the heat pump. Good luck

Really good to see a likeminded video. This has opened my eyes to heat pumps. We have just had a 8kwh solar panel array installed with 10kw battery. Great video, keep up the informative videos

I agree with you 100%! We replaced our Oil-fired boiler with an ASHP back in May and it heats our hot water to 50c very quickly indeed. We have a new 210 litres HW cylinder in our old airing cupboard, the HW system is now connected to the mains (no more shower pump!) and we had 3 radiators replaced with larger ones. We had a couple of chilly evenings right after installation and experienced rapid even warming of the house for the first time in 38 years. Of course winter will be the real test for the heating, but I'm already quite relaxed about the prospect. Our installer told us that he had been called to a new build which wasn't getting warm last winter. His diagnosis was that the builder had installed Swimming Pool Heat Pumps and, presumably pocketed the grant! Other owners in the same road have now contacted him.

Excellent choice, we had an Arotherm Plus 10kW installed back in July. Needed quite a lot of radiators replaced though as many pf the ones in the house were 70s/80s vintage......they would have needed to be replaced regardless..Currently heating DHW to 45 degrees, seems to suit the family at the moment.

interesting video thanks. I actually started watching your previous video from last year first where you said you decided a ASHP wasnt for you. Interesting to see your journey! I've had a similar journey and I have actually just actually installed an ecodan 14kwh heat pump last week - and am loving it so far. Id now like to get some more solar panels to add to our array to offset some of the additional electricity costs in summer. Were on the Octopus Tesla energy plan (using our powerwall as a virtual power plant in peak hours); so although we discharge the battery down to 20% each evening to supply the grid, we benefit from the lower day import rate. Keep up the great work!

Hi EVMan! Looking forward to seeing the numbers on the "whiteboard of truth" over the coming weeks! 🙂 We had Givenergy installed with 8.2kWh battery after watching you vids on that! We're looking at getting an ASHP too, we're even thinking of installing another 8.2kWh battery to support heating needs through winter (and charging it with cheaper electricity). Will you be reporting on the fluctuation of how many kWh the heat pump uses through each day? That would be really interesting, especially to see if the consumption of the ASHP mainly stays below the output capacity of the Inverter. Thanks for these vids, important times to be on the ball as things are changing so quickly! Dean

We installed a Daikin Altherma 3 heat pump in June. The peak power output is slightly more than yours but we have a larger, detached property. Flow temperature 46 C; SCOP 3.8. We opted for a Mixergy water tank which is programmable to make the most of cheap overnight electricity, though we also have solar PV and a home battery to offset the running costs. At current and projected electricity prices it will pay for itself within the warranty period.

we had a heat pump installed before last winter form an old oil burner, so happy with it cheaper by miles tons of hot water, very very happy with it

The increased cost of electricity is a concern when that heat pump is going to have to be run pretty much constantly through winter to be efficient! 😲⚠️🤔

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. I really like your content. Well explained and entertaining.

Great, informative video. Always good to hear experience from the horses mouth and someone who has spent their own $. Keep up the great work. We've got heat pump heating/cooling in house and recently added a heat pump to our outdoor pool and it's works fantastic. We also had some learnings from our install and will have a video out in the next few months if anyone's interested from an Australian perspective.

Informative video, looking forward to the follow ups. I'm actively looking at greener ways to heat our home.

Good vid. And I like the look of the all in one "fridge" install! Have not liked the look of the "pipes all over the place" heat pump installs which just look like a water leak going to happen at some pint in the future..This looks clean and modern. Will look forward to the updates. I did a quote on an install for our house about 3 years ago and it was shockingly expensive. All the rads would need replacing etc and upgraded pipework. But will be looking to get rid of our gas boiler at some point so a heat pump should been on our horizon.

Interesting, but of absolutely no use to me. Why? My house is pre-war, with no wall cavity, so therefore no insulation - and - I don't have a garage to put that enormous rack of whatsits in! Factor in my age, and I'd probably die before I broke even on the installation costs - if I could afford them!

Not getting a EV until end Sept, but Octopus switched me to Go last December without questioning if I had a EV, not sure if they have tightened it up since then, I switched from agile. I had Tripple glazing installed earlyer this year (about £5k labour and parts for a terraced house) and did not cost much more than double, in some cases if the frames are good quality you can just have the glass inserts replaced

Looking forward to more videos to see how you will get on over the winter with the new heat pump.

I have a very similar system with the mitsubishi ecodan system. Not sure if you can do the same with yours, but I changed out the immersion heater with one I could control the temp on. This in turn is connected to a solar i boost which uses excess electricity once my batteries are full to heat my water tank. For most of the year I get free hot water this way. When there is not enough sunshine the i boost has a boost function and can also be programmed for my/your time of use tariff. The installers were not aware that solar power could be used to heat the water this way, but the engineer who does the annual service is a Mitsubishi engineer and told me how to do it. Worth checking to save a few bob lol.

When I hear “triple-glazed” I imagine a cake with three layers of icing, LOL, and I have to remind myself that you’re talking about insulated windows. (I’m on the West Coast of Canada, and we typically refer to it as “triple-pane” glass/windows here.)

Thanks, very interesting, sadly our 300 year old property would need gutting to install this, so yes for those with the right property it is a good idea.Ground source even better COP, but you need the ground.

Thank you for this. It's good to get an honest take on ASHP from someone of similar mindset to myself. Our house is 18 years old. The oil boiler is the same age. The upside is I can maintain it myself. Mains gas has only become available in our area last year but I have honestly never been a fan and definitely not a fan of combi boilers. I prefer hot water storage, particularly since we have recently invested in solar and an Eddi hot water diverter. We have been fully EV for a few years now with a 2016 Leaf 30 and 2021 M3LR so ASHP is definitely on the cards. I might just need to tease another couple of years out of the oil boiler first as the solar install was obviously a significant investment.

We live in a 1920s bungalow, and have been told, by several installers how we would need to install underfoor insulation, as well as many plumbing changes, that would work out at nearly £50k. Recently, we had an old-school plumbing company come in who took one look at our system and said all we had been told before was rubbish, all we needed to do was swap the boiler for a heat pump - the reason being we have a thermal store system (as we have it linked to our wood burner back boiler as well the gas boiler), and that is well suited to a heat pump. After having been put-off we are now actively investigating the possibility.

I will wait for the winter figures to come in THAT will be the true make or brake for me, looking forward to that!

Very interesting video and look forward to the data over the winter months.

I’m am at the stage of researching for possibly solar panels, heat pump, water tank storage, & batteries. My bungalow with a large flat area on one roof is 2 yrs old with underfloor heating, plus the latest in insulation. It’s got a gas Worcester boiler at present. Your videos are very helpful & thank goodness the heat pumps are now quiet. I’ll look into First 4 Solar, it is difficult to know which company to trust but I know your recommendations are good and much thought given! Thanks again.

In Canada put in a ground source heat pump, went from $3000 propane to $300 electricity. With grants payback was 8 years. Preheats the hot water to 45degC in a storage tank, then an electric hot water tank. Put a timer on the hot water tank to only heat at the lowest electricity rates. Summer air conditioning is almost free since I'm dumping the heat into the cold ground which is around 5degC

I bought solar this year. I want to get rid of gas too and want to go through a winter and more info before looking at taking the plunge. Thanks for the video, looking forward to seeing your updates

Yes of course heat pumps work! But their economic success is almost entirely based upon the ‘spark gap’ (difference between cost per kWh of gas verses electricity). And air source heat pump efficiency is of course at the mercy of ambient air temperature. I have been designing heat pump installations for commercial properties for a while. So I know a little bit about HP economics. It will be interesting to establish your annual seasonal COP which takes into account winter external temperature and additional energy you will incur on defrosting your evaporator. I think you have done the right thing though and it is useful to see the domestic consumer experience on show.

Nice to have an honest appraisal and opinion. Thank you.

Did you get the extra resistor installed on the outdoor unit to enable the cooling function (reverse flow)?

Looks great, but we just don't have the interior space for a water tank that's the size of a very big fridge freezer, even if we laid it flat in the loft. I've requested an octopus ashp survey so hopefully they'll be able to suggest something for our situation. Thanks for another great vid.

I needed a new boiler recently and got quotes for both a boiler and a heat pump. I really wanted to get a heat pump but my local installers were really negative about it and it was far more expensive. Hopefully next time I need a new boiler I’ll go for a heat pump, hopefully the local installers will be more clued up in them and fingers crossed about a drop in price. Really looking forward to how things go with yours

Great stuff! I have solar, battery, heatpump and MVHR and octopus GO. Do you also have an energy diverter on the immersion heater?

I 'm a pensioner living in a 1970s detached house with 12 large windows, solid uninsulated floor and cavity walls. For myself and probably most of the house owning population (UK) it's all about cost/benefit. To insulate my house up to Scandinavian standard (triple glazing etc), replace the whole pipe system (microbore) new radiators and underfloor insulation would be not be cost effective...Quite frankly I could not afford to use my savings for something that isn't a benefit. Like electric cars they are a great idea but only for people who can afford them-Good Luck

Thanks for sharing your experience 🙂. I had also installed a heat pump in my 50 year old house (12 years ago). And it was the best decision I could have made. It was expensive as it is a geothermal heat pump, but it's very economical. To add to your experience, here's a few points I noticed or learned: - a heat pump also saves money in maintenance, as it doesn't need that (contrary to gaz heaters) - best would be to use a heat pump at low temperatures (like floor heating) as the higher the temperature, the lower the efficiency - in any case, a heat pump will always be much better than traditional resistive heaters In my case, in ten years, I have saved more money in my electricity bills than the cost of the heat pump itself. So yes, it can be expensive, but it remains a good investment 😉

Heat pumps are neither good nor bad. It always comes down to "does the design work for the building and will you get a return on investment". Be interesting to see how you get on in winter.

I live in western Canada . Our house is 1400 sq feet above ground with a 700 sq foot basement all heated by forced air and one small fan coil running off a storage style gas hot water heater . In a city of over one million people I could only find one reputable firm who installed heat pumps . Our weather goes from +35C to -40C so I was prepared for some high quotations , the contractor said $31500 CDN which included a backup gas furnace as they had no system that could handle our climate even though I know some exist nobody here sells and installs them 😮 I found one manufacturer in Winnipeg called Arctic Air they make an air to liquid heat pump but even it had to have auxiliary imbedded electric immersion heat rods to work in my climate . They quoted me $65000 USD plus they had no local installer who could help me. I gave up at that point installed a high efficiency forced air gas furnace for $8600 CDN . I’m 64 so there’s no way I’ll live long enough to make this practical. I have 1500 watt solar grid tie system on my roof and it’s generated 15 Megawatts in total over the last 9 years so I guess I’m just going to leave my house as is for now. Canada does not seem to be ready for this type of heating at least not in extremely cold temperature zones like I live in. Hello from Calgary Alberta Canada thanks for the informative videos 😊

Thank you for this video. I find it really very difficult to research heat pumps. You explained how much energy it took to heat up the water tank and how big it was. I can’t find this on Sunamp site, e.g. how many Kw will it pull, how many Kw to charge the heat battery? Does the solar version adapt consumption for available sun? No info. And in my terraced house I think I would need to have an exhaust air heat pump but Joule say these are suitable for a new build house or an apartment and I think what is different about those buildings compared to my 1970 house. It isn’t explained, and all I see are Nibe horror stories, where Nibe say installed wrong... So I will be very interested to learn your experience over the winter, because I’m in a similar experience with a 2006/7 gas combi and I want to do fabric first upgrades as I redecorate before changing it.

A very refreshing video. It’s great to see more in life experiences with these. I’ve been trying to provide a balanced response to the naysayers for years. It would be interesting to see the specs for the outdoor unit. Also, yes 50 degrees setpoint is more than ample 👌🏻. I’ve commissioned a hell of a lot of York Amichi’s over the past four years and you really do not need to push past 50 degrees on a water system.

Welcome to the gang. I mean the heat pump gang. Yours has been an incredible journey, starting with the missing insulation of the house and the garage to now leaving gas behind. I have to roughly calculate how much energy you heed to heat up 190 l of water from 15 degC(tab temp) to 50 degC. I expect to be something like 10 - 15 kWh, but we’ll see.

Thank you for sharing your information - very interesting. Do you have your total heat loss figure for your house?

So from an usuage point of view do you have it set heat the rads at particular times i.e. morning before you get up or are they on constantly?

Seems to be a lot of negative comments. What I'd like to know is how much was the install and how much does it cost to run a month? I'm fairly certain they work if installed properly but at what cost?. (Please don't include solar and battery as most don't have that yet and would be purchased before a heat pump).

Like any venture in life, the better you plan the better the outcome will be. Do your research, pick the right installer, take the upfrom hit (albeit not everyone can afford to) and it will pay dividends in the medium to term. Hopefully Andy you will make use of the whiteboard of truth once winter hits and you have a better idea of running costs/payback time.

Great that you’re doing this!

Very interesting, thank you. We are considering getting a heat pump at some point, hopefully not too far away. Very useful information.

Will you be upgrading your storage battery capacity to handle the electrical demands of the heat pump?

But where in most houses with combi boilers and therefore no cylinder cupboard would you be able to accommodate that huge tower?

Great video. Which company did you use to install your Air Source Heat Pump?

Hope EVM you'll have some videos up about the controls, apps etc. It would be excellent if after you battery is charged excess electricity can be diverted to the heat pump to warm up the hot water.

"don't trust anyone that tells you heat pumps don't work"..... Didn't you tell us heat pumps don't work a while ago?

My concern is the complexity of a heat pump system. How many years do they continue to support their systems with spare parts? How quickly will they ship a spare part? Do they keep all spares for all their systems in stock? Any Corgi certified engineer can fix any gas boiler but what choice do I have about who will service and fix this heat pump?

Interesting video, thanks! I have solar panels but no batteries. Would it then be better to get an electric boiler with integrated battery instead of a heat-pump?

really interested in the winter usage data!

What was the cost for you please?

I have to admit, I'm a heat pump sceptic. This system does look a lot better than most of the others I've seen so far though and I can see them catching on if the market moves towards self contained units like this. You said you're going to wait for the usage data before you can comment about how well the system works but it seems you're already pretty sold on how great they are. For a sceptic like myself I'd be more likely to believe your figures once you have them if you hadn't made so many claims about how they will work in any property, any climate, etc when you don't yet actually have any experience to back up those claims. I can watch heat pump expert videos to get their opinions about how good the tech is in broad terms, as an end user it's probably best to stick to your own experience once we get in to winter.

I had a fridge in the kitchen that had the door that would swing either way - brilliant concept - was very sad when it died only after 3 years

Hi, what is wattage used by both on Basis of KWH?

That "channel" has only a very sketchy understanding of physics/engineering. The engineers that develop these systems have to know what they are doing and wouldn't be allowed to get away with wasting their employers development resources on something that doesn't work. That said heat pumps are a still a hard sell for me at current electricity to gas price ratios, the pay back time is very long. A lot of people will get better return from improving heat retention - our 90's house is well insulated but still can be improved particularly the glazing. For most people the size of the internal unit is also a big issue unless you have an integral garage, and in our case all the floors would have to come up and all the downstairs walls ripped open to change the piping. If gas prices go even higher and electricity comes down with higher renewable content then that calculation can change.

Norway has dry cold. UK is damp. Norway constructs houses with much higher standards of insulation.

Sorry if I missed this, but who did you use to spec your system?

Can it be programmed to heat the tank if you have extra solar and the batteries are already full .

You have a lot more equipment now to maintain, it will be interesting to see the service cost in the future.

All very interesting and useful info but as the technology gets more widespread the off peak rate will increase - as it will no longer be off peak! My neighbours heat pumps are older and very noisy being audible at 2am in my house 20m away. I look forward to your report in January. Before installing anything like this I would like to know how long it's likely to last. Was being lectured at Uni about heat pumps in buildings 40 years ago by a professor who's real world preference was for heat recovery systems.

to reduce running cots set the flow temperature a slow as possible to increase the efficiency- the difference between the flow temperature and the outdoor temperature will determin this.

Hi, I'm from Australia, that tower as you call it is all but unknown to us over hear, we have very little hydronic heating over here (there is some, it's just not very common). Central heating is usually via air ducts etc. Heat pump hotwater systems are starting to take off, with a government funded scheme to rid us of electric hot water systems (as in with a heating element) and replacing them with heat pumps. Hopefully they will extend that one day to include gas fired hot water. Although at the moment the biggest problem over here is the price of electricity to run a heat pump. Our power has shot up 30%, with another 50% foreshadowed, so I'm kind of glad I have both a heat pump (as in reverse cycle air con) and a gas heater to choose from, depending on how the supply charges go. Unfortunately, in a way there is an advantage to gas. If the gas plant shuts down for whatever reason, it take a few weeks for the gas distribution pipes to empty, so if the plant it down for a few days, almost nobody is affected. On the other hand if the power network has a similar issue, the loss is immediate, no grace period at all... I suppose the answer to this lot is of course a big battery that can run grid independent, however for most people over here they are too expensive at this time. Hopefully that will change.

I had my Midea ASHP installed in the last 2 weeks of February and it was running during the cold spell at the end of February into March with average temperatures being between 3 and 5 degrees C. For the 12 cold days, that were very much like our winter days, I used 249kWh, so average of 20.75kWh per day. For comparison, the next week was an average of 9C and for those 7 days I averaged 9.28kWH. Hot water during the summer has been heated to 50C by the ASHP and used either 1 or 2kWh per day. So far from 24/2 to 24/8 my ASHP has used 802kWh and the heating slowed by mid April to 1 or 2 kWh a day. We have a 1973 detatched 5 bedroom house and have 270mm of insulation in the roof space alongside a loft conversion that was completed in 2011. Due to our radiators being 50 years old, we decided to replace them all to get the efficiency and heat transfer. The house was lovely and warm during March and I have set my thermostats up to drop temperature by a few degrees overnight. We moved from an LPG heating system so have also now freed a much larger space in the garden, where the tank once stood. Compared to growing cost of LPG ( I was paying £700 before price rises) I am definately saving money.

I subscribe to you and Skill Builder, enjoying excellent content from you both. But it is a mistake to discredit what he has said about heat pumps! He does not say they don't work period, but instead he has stated, often they are not economic or even effective! I've bought an electric car, have solar panels and am switching to the Octopus Go Tarriff like you, but we are not typical of most households. You do say as much later in the video, which slightly contradicts the start of the video. We have a My Energy Eddi Solar Diverter which is set to heat our hot water to 60 degrees only from solar power using an emersion heater. I too get 3 showers on a full tank and the Eddi uses 5 to 6kwh of solar power to achieve this, depends on how drained of heat the tank is. By my rough calulations, on a normal tariff, gas is four times cheaper than electricity costing 30p per kWh, using gas it would cost the same 7.5p per kWh to heat the tank as we would pay on the Octopus Go night time Tarriff for electricity. For households on a standard electricity tariff without Solar it would cost four times as much to heat the water compared to gas. I'm obviously missing something here, as heating my water with an emersion heater appears to use roughly the same amount of energy as yours, and I don't have a heat pump! Hope you have a water softener, I've just changed the emersion heater after 11 years, and the old one looked like new. Hard water would prove to be very costly with your system. I'll look forward to your Winter heating costs with great interest! Thank you for contributing to the debate. It appears with Heat pumps there is no clear cut answer. With our hotter summers I would favour a system that would cool as well as heat, popular in other countries but discouraged in the UK.

saw your vid made about a year ago when you were on holiday about heat pumps not being for you, but now your getting one. i'm in a similar situation what made you change your mind?

Thanks for another great video watching your update videos with interests as been looking at ashp for 3 years

Looking forward to the whiteboard of truth break down in the future. First 4 Solar should be installing a home storage battery in September. If that goes well then maybe a HP will be next as boiler is getting on a bit!

Looks like your original plumber run out of 15mm pipe and just bodged it with 10 mm to finish the job of on time

The minute you mentioned Scandinavia I almost switched off. This is a false comparison. Yes it’s colder there. (There’s actually energy to be harvested until you hit absolute zero -223’ or thereabouts) Why the comparison isn’t relevant isn’t temperature, it’s moisture. The U.K. & Ireland derive our temperate climate from the Gulf Stream. We are actually on the same latitude as Moscow where it’s routinely 30’ in summer & they have a metre of snow all winter. Why is any of this relevant? In the winter when the ambient temperature drops to around 4’ or less the moisture in the air that’s all around the heat exchanger in a heat pump begins to freeze. At this stage forget a coefficient of 3-1. The thing needs to thaw itself out. Depending on the model it will either go into reverse cycle (it extracts heat from your house to thaw itself) or it will have a ‘boost’ mode (that’s usually a 6kw immersion shoved up its bum). If you think 3-4’ is rare, in many places it’s not. It hung around 4’ in my area for a fortnight last winter & it was actually a mild winter. I used to work in renewables. The business was owned by a very bright engineer (who also had very high personal ethics). One day he said “guys we’re not selling any more air source heat pumps”. “I can’t, in good conscience sell a customer something I wouldn’t put in my own house”. He had done all his homework & came to that conclusion. Yes, if you’re in the midlands or the Home Counties & have a reasonably energy efficient house, then you might just get away with it. Though I’d never recommend fitting one without a thermal store & I’d advise fitting low temperature radiators. Final quote from a guy who’s fitted heat pumps for 30yrs. “ most ASHPs on sale are just glorified air conditioners” Grant’s hybrid is worth looking at as it uses a conventional boiler as a backup when the heat pump is struggling. At least they acknowledge there’s an issue.

Are you able to charge your car at the same time as heating the hot water tank on the off peak tariff?

Since you cannot rely on the 4hrs @ 7.5p cheap night rate for central heating the house in winter, you are fundamentally stuck with the fact that with typical UK tariffs, 1 kWh from electricity costs about 4x that of 1 kWh from gas. So even if this setup does manage to achieve a 400% COP (and you will not on a cold winters day) you might just claw your way back to running cost parity with your old gas boiler! This is the fundamental problem with heat pumps. The 4x cop is cancelled by the 4x tariff difference. The only answer is to drive it with “free” electricity from solar pv which is difficult on a dark January day in the UK.

Any idea on payback times? You truly are a strange bloke to think that a panel with magic hinges is interesting and the more surprising thing is I just found out that I must be a truly strange bloke too.

Can you still get the reduced time-of-use rate on an electricity-only usage? I'm sure my supplier only gives discounts for dual-fuel use

Great video and definitely something I’m thinking about. Just wondering if you are intending to continue with the Tado rad values on the new setup?

Interesting episode - thanks. We moved into a new build house with an ASHP and solar PV last November, and I had the opportunity to monitor the energy usage through last winter when our solar PV was giving very little. Being a new house it used relatively little energy, but as the ASHP is an electrical heater this was still quite expensive. Even considering the CoP of the heat pump, with the price of electricity being so much more than the price of gas the financial benefits seem marginal, which also seemed to be your conclusion in your video on heat pumps last November when you said "I just can't do it". So my question is - what has changed for you? In my case, I have no regrets at all, especially since I realised that our house was probably using more heat than usual as it is a traditional 'brick and block' construction and was drying out for some of last winter. Also, since last year we have a 9.6kWh battery so I'm interested to see what difference this makes. Like you, we are on Octopus Go since we have an EV and I also use the Go cheap rate to charge our battery in winter when the PV gives little energy. I calculated the additional cost of solar PV and our ASHP to be 4% on the price of the house, which we have easily made back in house price inflation since last November. Why don't all new home buyers insist on PV and heat pumps? Why don't politicians legislate to force builders to add them?

Really interesting. In the village I grew up in there is no gas and never will be, so I have been thinking about ASHPs. I like the idea of the Unitower, at least until I saw the size of it. The UK has 10,000s of standard 2 up 2 down terraced houses mostly built from 1880s to about 1940/50s. Fitting the Unitower in one of those will be almost impossible without seriously compromising something else. Is there a smaller alternative?

Very interesting and useful. One thing I’d like to ask is what power it is using during running - you mention it can take up to 2,5 kW - I guess that is at its max - but what is it using while running during the day for example?

Cool video, but when is your break even point? Do you have a spreadsheet we can see?

Great video. Did you consider air-air for a/c in bedrooms etc.? I am considering splitting air-water for downstairs heating and hot water, and a air-air for heating and cooling of upstairs. Likely UK summers are going to be hotter for longer so I'm betting more and more people are going to look for cooling too.

Interesting that you’re shilling first4solar, whereas this very week Ian @ Speedy Feet has revealed he has had a mare with first4solar and after months of them messing him around, is now looking for a new company to take on his install.

Well done. Been installing them for nearly 15 years, yes they do work.!!!!!!

Have a 80l temporary electric hot water cylinder in my house, 1.8kw element. Takes 3.5kwh to heat on GO, I found this will last all day for a single person having a bath or shower at the end of the day. Pure immersion.