by Paul Thorney
•
2 February 2025
An initial site visit had been arranged to meet with our Client to evaluate the practicalities of having an air source heat pump installed within the property. One of the important factors is that our Client could not have the unit close to the House as there was no practical location for the heat pump to be installed. One location was too close to the neighbouring farm land fence and the other location did not offer the correct clearances and the heat pump would face directly into potential strong winds so neither option was suitable. The garden to the rear of the property had a slight upward gradient and looked as though it had the potential but the type of air source heat pump would be the crucial factor in this scenario as the suggested location would be approximately 8 meters away from the House. A hydraulically split air source heat pump would have needed a trench in which pre-insulated 35mm equivalent pipes would need to be laid in. Upon reaching the House, the 35mm pipes would need to convert to copper pipe and then be surface mounted to where it would route up the external wall, through into the loft space and then down into the airing cupboard. On this project that approach had no appeal due to cost, a more simplistic approach was required to make this project seamless. The refrigerant split Panasonic Aquarea K Series offered the best solution as it would mean we could come up with a solution that would have the unit sited in a location 8m away from the House, a trench with a ducting could house and protect the pre-insulted 1/4" and 1/2" refrigerant copper pipes and power cable, as the pipes reach the House we could use surface mounted trunking to neatly house the pre-insulated refrigerant pipes, the trunking would route the pipes into the large loft space where the Panasonic Bi Bloc would be mounted on the gable, from the Bi Bloc the Secondary Space Heating Flow and Return copper pipes would pass down into the airing cupboard to supply the 3 Port Valve and the DHW Cylinder. Although this was the most suitable solution we knew that some groundwork preparation would be needed and we knew some form of a wind barrier would certainly be a necessity to ensure the heat pump performance wasn't affected by any strong winds.