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You don't see them much these days, I guess a standard immersion heater with an excess solar controller is the modern day equivalent ?We're on a 'feed in tariff' (FIT) with the solar panels, so we get paid approx. 56p for each kWh generated (regardless of whether we use it ourselves or export it), plus another 4p (roughly) per kWh exported back to the grid. The FIT scheme was closed for new applications a few years back, but our contract runs till 2036. We import around 100 kWh a month (evening/overnight usage ... we don't have battery storage), but receive about 3 times the cost of that from the FIT payments.
The Kingspan water heating system is much older ... mid '90s I believe. There are two heat exchangers on the roof (one each side) with electric circulation pumps and the control box (shown in my picture) in the airing cupboard. It's a pressurised system, filled with glycol (antifreeze) to avoid problems in winter. The system is no longer made but Kingspan still have a network of engineers who will service/maintain them. We have the gas water heating turned off completely all summer ... even in the winter we just run it for an hour first thing in the morning and another hour late afternoon.
We can't take the credit for any of this stuff - it was all installed when we bought the house.
You don't see them much these days, I guess a standard immersion heater with an excess solar controller is the modern day equivalent ?
I did it in a previous house.You don't see them much these days, I guess a standard immersion heater with an excess solar controller is the modern day equivalent ?
I only have a combi though and next to no mains pressure due to being up a hill and and a having a narrow lead mains pipe full of holes - I have to run a boost pump straight off the mains feed....
Not sure if a pressurised system can be added to a combi system ?
I think that replacing the pipe will be the first thing to do.We also upgraded the water main into the house from 15mm copper feed to 32mm alkathene as we were at the top of a hill with 30+ houses off the main in our street.
We went from a hot flow rate from the boiler of 8 - 9 litres a minute (took 20 - 25 minutes to fill a small bath) to full mains pressure at all outlets.
Although I was at the top of a hill, the pressure in the road was OK. It was my 15mm copper supply pipe that was the problem. The copper was fairly thick wall compared to modern copper so the pipe was less than 13mm internal diameter. It's easy to check flow rate by timing how long it takes to fill a 2 litre jug from your kitchen sink cold tap,I think that replacing the pipe will be the first thing to do.
Similar to yourself, I am the last on the hill, with less than 10 l/m flow.
I can probably get the neighbors in on it too, one ditch, 3 or 4 pipes.....
The water company don't want to know, don't want to help in any way so it's a case of saving up or putting up..
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