Air to Water Heat Pump with Radiators
We’re thinking of getting mini splits installed to replace our heating system and add cooling, but our first estimate was higher than I expected.
Does anyone have any experience with air to water heat pumps with radiators or an electric boiler? We’d like to get off gas, but I want to make sure we get something long lasting for this investment and I’m worried mini splits aren’t it. I’m wondering if we can just keep using our radiators for heat and get a small cooling solution for upstairs.
Thanks
gururoofing
in General Discussion 2 years and 2 months ago
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justinromeu26 | 2 years and 2 months ago
This comes from the Viessmann website. Viessmann is a UK manufacturer of air to water heat pumps:
“If the outdoor temperature drops too low for your heat pump to produce any heat, a backup may be required. This is unlikely to occur in the UK, however, heat pumps in countries such as Canada may need to rely on a backup. This can become expensive, so if you live in an extremely cold climate, a heat pump may not be the most efficient way to heat your home.”
The efficiency of these systems declines until they get to a point that they do not work. that point appears to be about 15 degrees Fahrenheit (according to the Viessmann website). “back up” on these is probably an electric coil.
they seem to be higher tech versions of the heat pumps i experienced in North Carolina in the 1980’s. Those stopped working at about freezing and an electric coil came on. I just checked, an on-line source said some of ours can work down to 25 degrees F.
justinromeu26 | 2 years and 2 months ago
i spent some time on the phone with the guy from Europe. a lot of people there are still putting in gas heating. this guy i spoke to put in a new gas “boiler” three years ago (and this guy is a big “green” sort of guy; i asked him about the gas and he said “well it is cleaner than oil”; sounds just like some of us here). Some people are still putting in oil.
These gas boilers are smaller than ours. he said the unit he has measures 3′ tall by 18″ wide and hangs on the back of the house (outside). that would freeze here if it failed on the wrong day.
He told me about the heat pumps and said they have been marketing them for 5 years or so. He told me that ALL new construction has to have them. The big manufacturer of them for the EU is Grant.
What he did tell me was they are getting grants to install new “zoned” systems. Now his house always had two pipe radiators with manual valves that can be closed to isolate a room, but he means zoned heating that switches areas of the house off from the source (the heating unit manifold or something) (my father has two zone hot water with two valves and circulators on a manifold and has two thermostats; not really new technology).
The person i spoke to could not answer questions about using this in a cold climate like sweden BUT i looked on line and they have been installing a lot of these heat pumps in Sweden, not sure if they are going in new construction but it sounds that way.
Master Plvmber | 2 years and 2 months ago
I just came from a seminar from the distributors of a high tech air to water heat pump company and they stressed: “Do not take a boiler out of a house and expect this unit to heat a home in (our) climate. This technology is intended for highly engineered homes that have minimal heat loss and next-to-zero infiltration.”
justinromeu26 | 2 years and 2 months ago
Prob all eu.
JohnHancock | 2 years and 2 months ago
Everyone in the Netherlands is going to switch over to heat pumps for new construction or when replacing your current boiler by 2026. I’m assuming Germany and nearby countries have similar timelines.
justinromeu26 | 2 years and 2 months ago
Its new to us johnh and for some of us who want to make the change to something better, the reality is we might not want to make that change twice, so we might wait to see where we go as a country with this stuff. Many people won’t see putting european technology in our homes if we don’t have the support here for it or it is seen as something for a luxury market. And older people might delay with the junk they have now or might plan to do it once
I put a call into someone in europe. He just put a new heating system in and he mentioned heat pumps. I am going to kick this around with him in a few days.
JohnHancock | 2 years and 2 months ago
All these boilers, on demand water heaters , whatever you call them are usually on the top floor or nearby and directly vented outside. Provides heat and hot water. Central heating is hot water with a 2 pipe system, so you can control each radiator individually.
This is standard EVERYWHERE and has been standard since the early 70’s. Can’t stop laughing why ppl even try to debate this….I mean it’s just old news….
carlinepierre27 | 2 years and 2 months ago
I have been looking into the same question for a house I own upstate. My understanding is that there are a few companies that sell air to water heat pumps in Canada and Europe but nothing is widely available in the US. I am hesitant to replace my hot water radiators with mini-splits and I am hopeful that greener options for hot water systems are on the horizon.
justinromeu26 | 2 years and 2 months ago
i can tell you that when i travel to Europe and they have these newer heating systems (and i am not yet sure what they are or how they are fired), they have these very light and slim radiators. so i suspect that whatever direction we take, even if it includes modern gas equipment, these old radiators will be obsolete.
gururoofing | 2 years and 2 months ago
The consensus here is that there is no practical way to reuse old cast iron radiators without gas right now in New York. Is that right?
justinromeu26 | 2 years and 2 months ago
Jeremy, my in-laws still had coal fire places in their house until they passed away in the past decade. As they got older, one of the sons got them gas fired inserts. Their father complained that they did not heat as well as the coal and had them removed.. i think he missed walking out to the coal bin.
I see space in old european row houses as being an installation problem as many do not have basements. But this stuff must be so compact it fits in a closet or under the sink.
Colonial, we went through something i am attempting to convey here in this house wth the refrigerator. We bought a new refrigerator. It is not garbage. It has all sorts of technology that puts it light years ahead of the old amercan one. I consider the old american stuff to be “junk” because it was big, heavy and simplistic. But, i questioned what i was doing having something (from the 1980’s) removed from my house that would have lasted perhaps twenty more years for something that might last 15 years.
The mindset will shift on this stuff with a younger generation that i s accustomed to things that don’t last 40 years and as we see the life cycle of products change we are sure to see advsnces in technoloy
Guest User | 2 years and 2 months ago
Pre-war housing may have aesthetic charm but it often lacks with modern energy efficiencies required for modern heating technologies
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/03/14/heat-pumps-wont-work-old-homes-warns-bosch/
justinromeu26 | 2 years and 2 months ago
If that is in response to what i said: I did not call anything of theirs garbage (the british leyland cars, yes). Their stuff tends to be “light weight” . The cars for instance. Just because it does not last long does not mean it is garbage and does not do what it is supposed to do but it does it more efficiently – because it is lighter. But because it is lighter it fails sooner. We do see that here with modern a/c units and heat pumps, they fail at 15-20 years. We had an old Chrysler water cooled ac unit in a building i worked in in the late 1990’s and that had been installed in 1955. Heavy, old inefficient but it runs – or ran for a long time.
I think i called our stuff junk because it is old and heavy and inefficient.
I suspect one reason it is easier to make advacements in technology is because of the faster life cycle. If you count on things failing and consumers replacing, it is easier to invest in improvements and sell them to consumers.
In so far as interest in mechanical things and systems, i just don’t see the interest there in gen eral. Here every kid grew up working on a car and every garage has at least a tool box in it. Over there, i see far fewer tools and far less conversation about fixing things. I was even talking to the owner of an hvac installation firm from dublin last fall and i asked if they did a lot of service and he said no because they cannot find people with the skillset. Its not just that the people lack the skillset; they lack the interest. This stuff starts when you are young, usually as you watch dad. If dad’s not doing it, the children won’t.
You feel it in their towns. Hardware stores are fewer and farther between, i never see auto parts stores around, and they don’t have home centers. Never see an electric supply. Go to a pub and the men don’t talk about fixing things. No one gripes about the problems they are having with something mechanical. And you don’t see handyman magazine lying on the coffee table or fine home building. Different culture.
On the other hand, i understand what you mean. I lived down south here and we had heat pumps which had probably been around for a while at that point and no one talked about them like we talk about our steam heating systems here. All they wanted to do was set the thermostat and let it do its job. The most exciting thing about the heat pump where i lived was the sound of the chameleons getting chopped up by the fan blades.
colonialrevival | 2 years and 2 months ago
A major reason that Europeans lack the perceived enthusiasm toward home systems is not because their stuff is actually garbage.
Many “exciting” things that are nascent and novel here in the United States, like mini split heat pumps, are ubiquitous in continental Europe and have been for some time. Why would someone be particularly excited about the extremely energy efficient climate cooling system that their entire neighborhood has?
gururoofing | 2 years and 2 months ago
That’s a good point. In California, cars get a smog check and you need to prove it’s been done. I never thought of residential heating equipment the same way.
Master Plvmber | 2 years and 2 months ago
It should also be said that many municipalities in Europe homes and boilers are subjected to an annual boiler inspection by a city inspector. If the boiler has a drop in efficiency or shows it’s producing more carbon monoxide than typical, the boiler is tagged and the owners are given a very short window to have it fixed. If when the inspector returns, there isn’t a new boiler in place or the condition isn’t rectified with the old boiler, the gas is locked off. We have an odd way of not dealing with this in this country and we make even odder statements like “My boiler’s 50 years old but it works great.” as if we’d even know or have a standard by which to judge such things.
gururoofing | 2 years and 2 months ago
Thanks for the information everyone.
justinromeu26 | 2 years and 2 months ago
so as i waited 15 minutes for my crappy 120 volt american designed kettle to heat a pot of water (only some people will get this) i had plenty of time to think.
My comparison was really between 50 year old american boilers and 50 year old british cars. i meant those made by the now defunct British Leyland. There is a reason why British Leyland is defunct and why you don’t see people using those cars the way some older american gas guzzlers are still on the road. it was not about whether the technology is better. you know this, if you talk to older Europeans, they used to think american products were the best. there was a time when they lasted longer and that was when we made big, old inefficient things. we were not thinking about the true cost.
European technology may be better for luxury products (and some things heavily regulated like the size of car engines and heating systems). i use German festool products. They are the best – they last long and the technology is light years ahead (i tell people they are a game changer). But not everyone is usi ng luxury products – here or in Europe. Go in their houses over there and they use Dewalt just like we do. Some of the appliances i have seen look cheaply made. i first traveled to the UK in 1989, i used to think that everyone drove a jaguar and back then, jaguar had a lot of problems.
I have never really talked to people in Europe about their heating systems. Most of the people i know there are not into talking about this stuff the same way some of my friends would or people on this board might (my neighbor installed his own mini split system and told me all about it and over a six pack one day; i do not run into this kind of interest in this stuff in europe). so i am at a disadvantage when trying to make a comparison. I do trust you that the technology is better (i know it is, i am reading this stuff eman and others post because we all have to make a change here).
Part of the problem for us may be that our old cast iron heating systems do last longer. They become environmental anchors around our necks. my neighbors have a boiler in their house made in the 1940’s. My boiler dates to 1989. Europeans now have an advantage because some of them might not have thought of installing central heat until the advent of this newer, smaller equipment that can be tucked in the closet under the stairs of an older, smaller home. we have our crappy old stuff in our basement, it runs and it is paid for so why not keep using it? i know that mindset is bad from an environmental standpoint but for some, like my 80 year old neighbor, it is an economic reality; she is timing the demise of her boiler to something else. perhaps if this old stuff only lasted 15 years we would all be running out buying the newest and best and the manufacturers would respond by improving the technology.
cate | 2 years and 2 months ago
FamilyHouse, many people in NYC who already have a working radiator system install mini-splits for cooling and continue to use their radiators for heat.