Heat pump installation costs

Running a heat pump and charging an EV is going to require more than a new radial circuit!
Repipe highly likely.
Oh and for you to get the grant there's the MCS costs to the installer to.
And gov has been fining manufacturers of heat pumps for every unit they don't sell, so those costs have now been passed on to customers buying gas boilers.
 
Out of curiosity, have checked if you need to have other work done before you qualify for a heat pump grant. When we enquired, we needed to upgrade our insulation & fit solar to qualify. But this was a few year back.
 
It is concerning when trades cannot explain in simple terms the key tasks in a job.
Fit heat pump/pipework with base
Fit new HW cylinder/pipework
Fit new radiators and larger pipework
Fit electrical circuit to heat pump and cylinder with new controls
Remove old system
Test and commission
Supply MCS certification

Takes about 5 days, give or take.
 
Best one i heard with a heat pump was standard size 3 bed home with a combi already fitted
Heat pump cylinder/ pipe / rad upgrade 17k
took in total 30 days no one noticed it had 10 inch concrete floors and ceilings and they were trying to drill through it with battery drills .
Dont know how many walked off the job but it involved several teams with the them trying to up the price to 21k
Ended up with ombudsman and council building control getting involved despite being a private house
new cylinder had to ripped out and all change due to being inadequate along with other bits .
.
She was told by me and at least 2 others to just change the combi but she wanted to be green , she certainly was at that price and standard of work .
One of the funnier bits was guy saying im just going to put you a loft hatch in so i can insulate your loft as he attempted to get through a 10 inch at least concrete ceiling :LOL::LOL:
She was so proud of her green choice she was giving us a running commentary with pictures on facebook till she nearly had a breakdown
 
You have poor reading skills.

It is concerning when trades cannot explain in simple terms the key tasks in a job.

Why don't you check out the heat geek website? There's tonnes of info and videos on there, starring Adam, the founder of heat geek.
Loads on YouTube as well.
Go for a Heat Geek Assured installer then you get the backing of heat geek themselves.
 
Fit heat pump/pipework with base
Fit new HW cylinder/pipework
Fit new radiators and larger pipework
Fit electrical circuit to heat pump and cylinder with new controls
Remove old system
Test and commission
Supply MCS certification

Takes about 5 days, give or take.
Thank you. You’ve provided some useful information in recent posts.

I hope I don’t need new pipes to and from radiators, that would be very disruptive. Obviously a survey would assess the changes required.
 
If the pipework sizes concern you then consider the changes in heat output from each of your existing radiators when you go from an average (mean) temperature of 60C (70C in and 50C out) that a typical condensing boiler runs at to a mean temperature of 42C (45C in and 39C out) with a heat pump.
The heat output may be only 30% of the radiator's quoted output, so you'll need much larger rads. With larger rads you'll need higher water flowrates to get the required 6C temperature drop through the rad. It's almost certain that the distribution pipework will need to be 22mm or larger, with minimum 15mm legs to each rad.

IMO a heat pump will only work satisfactorily in a well insulated house.

Having taken two heat pump installer courses to date I am still not convinced they are the solution to heating Britain...sure, they'll work down to minus 15C in the dry winter climates of north America and Scandinavia, but place the -20C cooling coil of a heat pump in the damp air stream of +5C Blighty and you'll very quickly form insulating ice on it, requiring energy that has no benefit to your house heating to defrost it....and regularly too!
In winter the HP will probably be running 24 hours per day, at 3kW input for a 10kW output unit, the electricity cables that supply your street may only have been sized for an average of 1kW per house. Add to this load the 3 to 7kW extra load to charge up an EV overnight and we'll soon be in the situation where overheated cables fail regularly in the street, requiring expensive and long lasting roads disruption while the whole network is upgraded....and the inconvenience of a cold house and un-charged car until the power cut is fixed.

The only effective driver to increasing HP numbers is when the price of gas rises beyond half that of electricity.

Then we come to maintenance of the outdoor unit (the heat pump itself). Just as air-con tends to fail in summer, so will a HP fail in winter, however it will take FGAS qualified fitters to replace parts on the refrigerant side, and they will have to have the extra skills to correctly diagnose else many (very expensive) parts will be erroneously exchanged before a repair is concluded, and excessive waiting times until the numbers of these experienced tradesmen increase; until then the desperate householder will be exposed to the repair chancers that litter fledgling industries.

Anyone who witnessed the solar install quotes of old would see that the prices reflected the govt. grants; as FIT payments reduced so did the install prices, and I suggest that's how it will be with HP quotes. At the moment all HP related parts are at premium prices, and that's with the majority coming out of Chinese factories....it's that £7500 grant that's keeping the prices high artificially.

You may have guessed that I am not an advocate of heat pumps at the moment, even though I could earn well installing them; customer satisfaction is more satisfying. I am definitely an advocate of increased insulation, but until that happens I believe a better low carbon future lies in hydrogen technologies.

A final note to the OP: every contributor on here does so in their own time and for no financial reward. You may not be getting the answers you want as quickly as you want, but keep in mind that each is trying to help in their own way.

MM
 
Oh, and as for your dodgy EPC survey, I have numerous examples of crazy 'assumptions', one even failing to notice the 150 litre bright white unvented cylinder when he popped his head into the loft, so your E to C miracle does not surprise me; and the EPC system itself is poised to change to favour renewables and low carbon systems....I can see landlords rushing to install heat pumps into rented properties as we approach 2030, leaving the tenants to cope with the shortcomings and higher bills.

And there will no doubt be no shortage of 'installers' with dodgy MCS accreditation ready to sling them in.
 
There’s more than enough installed to prove that they can and do work, when properly installed of course. Regarding solar installation costs, are you referring to the installation labour costs excluding the panel cost, or the total cost? The price of panels has plummeted, so it is no surprise that the total cost has dropped markedly. I would not be surprised also if labour costs dropped, with lower profit margins. As I said earlier, I’m not convinced subsidies were a good idea, tax money from us all went to wealthy middle and upper class people, and the market would have taken off anyway when panels became cheap. Some of my financially well off neighbours receive huge FIT payments each year.

I’ve been getting more quotes, only Heat Geek want payment for a survey, namely £250. The others are free. There is a range in prices, from £500 to £6,155 with heat pump power ranging from 4 kW to 8 kW. Of course these are price estimates, a survey is needed to provide a firm price and specification. The cheapest is Adlår who operate in Holland, Sweden and elsewhere in Europe and install their own brand of heat pump. I am more inclined to a known brand such as Worcester Bosch and Vaillant. They claim that the 15 mm radiator piping will be fine. I have never had to turn my system right up, and keep many radiators on a low flow rate. -5 C is the lowest thus far in 15 years. I still don’t know enough e.g. does heat pump power matter beyond a minimum necessary.

Almost none of these companies have stellar Trust Pilot reviews, one in ten very unhappy customers is not great. That said, they don’t seem to be because systems don’t work, but because they’re not explaining the system operation, or not fixing installation issues quickly.

I have a woodburner stove, installed to allow for my gas boiler going down in winter. 15 years later and not one down period.
 
Have you considered underfloor heating to go with a new heat pump ? This works better with low flow temperatures.
 
I am more inclined to a known brand such as Worcester Bosch and Vaillant.
Nothing wrong with cheaper brands like midea etc (in fact the bosch is or certainly was just a rebranded midea). You will pay a hefty premium for Vaillant, as in several thousand, and I'm not convinced it is worth it.
 
Have you considered underfloor heating to go with a new heat pump ? This works better with low flow temperatures.
Expensive, invasive and very messy.
Nothing wrong with cheaper brands like midea etc (in fact the bosch is or certainly was just a rebranded midea). You will pay a hefty premium for Vaillant, as in several thousand, and I'm not convinced it is worth it.
Without meaning to be rude, what background do you have that informs your opinion?
 

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