Has anyone had an air heat pump fitted in past 2 years?

[FreakA]

Has anyone had an air heat pump fitted in past 2 years?
I know people complain they're not hot enough but they're very popular in colder countries and the technology and fitting knowledge has increased a lot in two years. Plus the installation of new gas boilers may be banned as early as 2030 so it must be more reliable than people say.
So is it hot enough for our climate? (South East if it matters). Did you install underfloor heating everywhere including first floor bedrooms?

We don’t have one but I live in south Germany where it is really cold in winter and know many friends who have them in their new houses. It’s also common here to have underfloor heating through the entire house. It’s amazing - a really pleasant even temperature throughout with none of the drafts and hot spots you get with radiators.

Oh that's sounds amazing @chloechloe

Do they all have newly built houses or have any renovated their existing properties and added it?

They work best in new builds with houses that are well insulated and preferably with underfloor heating, Also better if you have solar panels to help run it .

We’ve just moved into a new rental property (a big, renovated barn) which has air source heat pump. Even with the big spaces and high ceilings it’s as warm as toast. We were talking to a builder friend the other day and he said the problem is retrofitting them to houses that are not sufficiently insulated or not fitting them properly. When they aren’t up to the job/ house isn’t sufficiently insulated they end up running as electric immersion heaters which is why they can sometimes turn out to be so expensive to run.

There are two types of systems. We opted for the cheaper colder temp one. The house was warm enough but I missed the heat emanating from the radiators while I tried to wrap myself around them as much as possible. If I did it again I'd spend a bit more on a high temperature system.

This is great feedback.

It's interesting that there are two types of systems @LazyFace - do you happen to remember the name so I can Google?

@Daisydoesnt and @Chumleymouse the entire house will be renovated with new insulation (new roof, new underfloor heating downstairs). However it will need to be radiators upstairs I presume given the various constraints in having underfloor heating on the 1st floor.

I think we had a system from Daiken but there are cheaper suppliers out there. We also had ufh in the new part of the house and kept radiators upstairs/old part downstairs.

My experience is only via underfloor heating which of course doesn’t ever get to such a high heat; as you’ll know it works at lower temperatures. I can’t say how successful it will be with rads.

If you do, make sure you have a couple of local engineers who are able to service and fix the systems. There are so few of these that you might have to wait a long time for a slot and pay a high price that includes the engineer's time and travel from quite a distance.

They are also great for aircon in summer. NZ based here but would have the heat pumps above radiators any day. Our house is well insulated, double glazed and we have two large heat pumps and a wood burning stove with wetback ( free hot water in winter). Heat pumps are also programmable. Paying for the colder temperature pumps is well worth the investment.

Why do you need to have radiators upstairs?

It is possible to UFH upstairs. Look at something like Wundatherm which has product designed to sit between the joists.

I have a one month old Panasonic system. It seems pretty good. I have a EPC b rated house. It is pretty inefficient the coefficient of performance drops below 2 in the very cold and freezing fog. But on a day in the low teens temperature wise I can run my heating keeping house at 20 degrees for less than 70p of electricity.

We've had one in our new build for 8 years. Brilliant for low bills. House is very warm and we run the heating most of the time on 21ish degrees. The only notable things I found are - the pump makes a low humming sound (not a problem really) and the house takes a while to heat up from cold (if heating is switched off for few days).

Great feedback, thanks all! I think we'll be going for this now.

Also interested in this. How obtrusive is the noise? Enough to stop you sitting near it in a garden?

@Yesbutisittouching - the noise is a low hum which is most noticeable at night - mainly because it's quiet and also it's working hardest at that time. If you are out in the garden that means the weather is ok, the pump is likely to be off or on low mode so not noticeable. To be honest I only ever noticed at night when the house would be quiet and everyone asleep. We had it on 1st floor level so next to the kids bedroom hence perhaps I heard it when putting the kids to bed and after they were asleep. If you have it at ground level (which I'd recommend for maintenance) then it should be low enough to be inaudible in the day and you won't be near it at night either. Also the noise is only on the outside, not inside the house.

Thanks @TeenTitan007. No vibration issues either?

They run at between 40-60 decibels, some YouTube videos of them running ( different models )