Compressor central heating - breaking every week or so

[endecotp]

Consider contacting LG.

Heat pumps do have their issues, but what you're describing is abnormally bad and I imagine it may be due to incompetent installation. LG's reputation depends on having competent installers; they may be interested to know about this, especially if these installers are "approved" by them in any way.

What sort of heating did they have before?

 

[just pumps]

Agree regarding being approved and incompetent. Go straight to LG with a time line of date it was signed off, and dates of breakdowns and response times.

 

[NotebookNewport]

Consider contacting LG.

Heat pumps do have their issues, but what you're describing is abnormally bad and I imagine it may be due to incompetent installation. LG's reputation depends on having competent installers; they may be interested to know about this, especially if these installers are "approved" by them in any way.

What sort of heating did they have before?

A normal gas boiler

 

[bernardgreen]

In cold weather the evaporator of an air sourced heat pump may ice up and shut down. The cure is supplimentary heating to de-ice the evaporator ( the outside unit ). Has supplimentary heating been installed and if so (1) is it enabled and (2) is it adequate for the cold weather in recent weeks.

 

[NotebookNewport]

In cold weather the evaporator of an air sourced heat pump may ice up and shut down. The cure is supplimentary heating to de-ice the evaporator ( the outside unit ). Has supplimentary heating been installed and if so (1) is it enabled and (2) is it adequate for the cold weather in recent weeks.

Will check later today by speaking to him

 

[endecotp]

(Previous heating was) A normal gas boiler

Right. If you'd said that it was previously electric heaters and there was no mains gas supply, or something like that, then an air source heat pump (ASHP) would probably have been a sensible choice - provided that, for example, there was a suitable site outside where its noise will not cause disturbance, and that the house is well insulated.

Removing a mains gas boiler to install an ASHP is - well, it's the sort of thing that a "green geek" like some of my friends (or the folk on the "green building forum") would do. For a "normal" person to do it sounds like perhaps some hard-selling was involved.

Do you know whether the radiators were replaced? ASHPs run efficiently at a lower temperature than gas CH, so often the rads need to be larger.

 

[NotebookNewport]

Right. If you'd said that it was previously electric heaters and there was no mains gas supply, or something like that, then an air source heat pump (ASHP) would probably have been a sensible choice - provided that, for example, there was a suitable site outside where its noise will not cause disturbance, and that the house is well insulated.

Removing a mains gas boiler to install an ASHP is - well, it's the sort of thing that a "green geek" like some of my friends (or the folk on the "green building forum") would do. For a "normal" person to do it sounds like perhaps some hard-selling was involved.

Do you know whether the radiators were replaced? ASHPs run efficiently at a lower temperature than gas CH, so often the rads need to be larger.

They had new radiators too. They are in their 80s. Gas was the old one.

 

[Doggit]

In cold weather the evaporator of an air sourced heat pump may ice up and shut down. The cure is supplimentary heating to de-ice the evaporator ( the outside unit ). Has supplimentary heating been installed and if so (1) is it enabled and (2) is it adequate for the cold weather in recent weeks.

Have you got this the right way round Bernard. Surely it's the compressor in the outside unit of an air source heat pump; the evaporator would be the external unit of an Air con unit. And having an external heat source to stop it icing up, would reduce it's efficiency, and imply it's not fit for purpose. The main purpose of an ASHP, is to extract heat from a cold environment.

 

[endecotp]

Surely it's the compressor in the outside unit of an air source heat pump

No, the compressor is inside. The compressor gets hot, so you want that heat inside the house.
See e.g. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_source_heat_pumps#/media/File:Refrigerator-cycle.svg

having an external heat source to stop it icing up, would reduce it's efficiency,

Correct. So you hope it's not needed very often. I think mainly the problem is when it is cold & humid outside and you get condensation which turns to ice. While the fans are running the air temp can be well below zero but it doesn't ice up because it's moving. It can ice up while it's off and then need to defrost itself when it next starts.
The quoted efficiency numbers are supposed to allow for this.[/QUOTE]

 

[Doggit]

Thanks for that Endecopt. I now remember a friends house in Denmark, it had a great big compressor inside, but the external unit outside was in a wooden enclosure to help protect it form the elements.

 

[bernardgreen]

Compressimg a gas into a liquid produces heat by compression. The condensor coil inside the house cools this hot liquid by dissipating heat into the house. The cooled liquid then passes out to the coil out side the house where it passes through a pressure reducer before passing through the outside coil where the liquid evaporates cooling the air passing over the coil.

Confusion in the names arises because water vapour in the outside air condenses onto the evaporator coil.

 

[Doggit]

Your finger aren't working yet Bernard, but I got the gist of it, so my apologies for getting it wrong.

 

[bernardgreen]

Your finger aren't working yet Bernard

I blame the heating, the fingers are shivering......

 

[NotebookNewport]

Do you need planning permission for these?
Going there sometime this week. Engineers were to turn up again on Saturday but haven’t turned up..
We are in South Wales and last engineer came from Scunthorpe

 

[endecotp]

Do you need planning permission for these?

They are covered by planning law. Google will tell you the rules for England; I'm in Scotland and you're in Wales so......