Mooney + ZEROBreeze AC, think it'll work

[Pinecone]

On 4/30/2021 at 3:50 PM, A64Pilot said:

Not enough water flow, the amount of heat removed is substantial, plus as the water gets more than warm, efficiency tanks, so you need only cool or cold water.

‘GE used to build a heat pump water heater, but I think it didn’t sell due to cost, people don’t want to save energy anymore as evidenced by the number of SUV’s and pickups on the road.

Ground source heat pumps used to be the rage back in the 70’s after the energy crisis, they had either a whole lot of buried pipe and recirculated the water or two wells, pump out of one and discharge into the other. I had two wells at the old house and considered it.

But air heat exchangers due to size and materials and construction techniques pretty much wiped out the efficiency gap and the ground source pumps had maintenance issues, wouldn’t think so, but apparently they did.

‘A heat pump as it’s not creating heat, but moving it, achieves greater than 100% efficiency.

You can depending on where you live bury a lot of pipe and pull air though it, SW Ga for instance the average year round temp is 68F. I used to do a lot of cave diving, the water was always 68f regardless of the time of year.

Actually both devices are in full swing and available.

A number of companies make heat pump water heaters, and with the right installation, they are very energy efficient.  https://www.homedepot.com/b/Plumbing-Water-Heaters-Hybrid-Water-Heaters/N-5yc1vZckra

And ground water heat pumps for the house HVAC are alive and well.  They don't use city water as there is a significant cost for that.  They drill two wells, one to take water and the other to return the "used" water.   Having a heat/cool source at a pretty constant 59F is great for both heating and cooling.  Especially heating in very cold weather locations and cooling in hot climates.  If I have to replace my AC, I will seriously consider a ground water heat pump system.  I currently use oil for heating.

[A64Pilot]

When I replaced the three HVAC units on my last house in 04 I think it was I researched ground source pretty heavily as I already had three wells on the property but found out that they are apparently troublesome as in frequently needing repair, and that coupled with the rather large increase in efficiency of air source heat pumps at least in South Ga they just don’t pay. I had three phase available as well at the barn and that further increases efficiency.

But due to initial expense and maintenance issues I didn’t go with ground source nor three phase even though both would have been an efficiency increase. Turned out to be the correct call because while at the time I thought it would be the house I died in, 12 years later I sold it.

It’s sort of like Solar, without government subsidies you would never break even with it, not yet anyway.

Usually though wells aren't used, it’s more common for a rather long loop of pipes to be buried as the ground heat source and that circulated, ground water temp in Albany Ga is 68f year round, very good for both heat and cooling.

‘I installed at the time the most efficient Trane system, each unit had two compressors, normally only the small one ran which of course was more efficient, but if set point was  2 degrees from actual temp the big one kicked on and ran until set point was reached.

I’m in Fl now, on a well and you never see ground source heat pumps here where you would think there would be. I have again contemplated one as when I’m cooling the house it could be used to heat the pool, but instead I have a 125,000 BTU heat pump to heat the pool, which I’m thinking about putting in the hangar, because that over 10 ton heat pump blows out a LOT of cold air, ought to really cool the hangar. 

[Pinecone]

04 is not 23.

And yes, in the past the loops were used, but now it seems the wells are preferred.

[Fly Boomer]

2 minutes ago, Pinecone said:

04 is not 23.

And yes, in the past the loops were used, but now it seems the wells are preferred.

I always thought the loops seemed kind of shallow.  The wells make more sense.

[A64Pilot]

You’re not allowed to put wells in many places and they aren’t cheap. I had the original well that was usable, but old, a newer well but the water had high iron content so when city water became available we abandoned it, and a 6” irrigation well. The two smaller wells were within 100’ of the house and would have been the ones I would have used, they were at least 100’ apart too.

I had the ideal set up but couldn’t find anyone local who stocked, serviced and installed them and I wasn’t bringing in someone from out of town due to expense and service issues.

But you just don’t see ground source heat pumps very often at all, and down South is where they are most viable as the ground water temp is close to what your trying to keep the house at. 68F in Albany Ga where I used to live and 72F in Central Fl where I live now.

They have been around forever, house I grew up in the early 60’s had a ground source heat pump, the hose just ran onto the ground in a shallow pond, I use to play with the warm water as a kid. They have been around pretty much since the beginning of airconditioning. First real use of AC was movie theaters in the 1920’s and ground source has been around since the 40’s. But how many do you see? I’ve seen two, the one as a kid and one other. It was neat as there was nothing outside of the house whole thing was in the garage.

My neighborhood we are all on wells and septic tanks and the houses aren’t necessarily cheap and many have energy saving features, super insulated windows, my house and several others are ICF or (insulated concrete form) which costs 20% more on average to build than a concrete block house, but is very energy efficient. As we are all on wells and this is Fl sand ground source heat pumps would be easy and much less expensive than normal, yet there isn’t a single one in the approx 90 houses. I could install one by plumbing it into the house water supply and dumping it into the septic system, it wouldn’t overload the drain field as this is pure sand and not much perks better than sand.

They are more efficient, but cost much more and as they are actually very rare good luck finding an installer and maintainer.

Its not that they don’t work they do, but I believe the upfront costs mean they just aren’t done except rarely, and that drives up costs and as I said good luck finding a service technician, even in reality they are pretty much identical to a regular air source heat pump.

I guess it’s just inertia, they aren’t real viable in many instances so sellers and installers only want to fool with systems that are viable in every situation like Condos, apartments, houses in the city etc where ground source isn’t viable.

For ground source you need wells, a pond or at least a big enough yard to put in a big loop of buried pipe.

I’ve honestly thought about the pool, 75% of the year I run the AC which removes heat from the house and dumps it into the outside air, and I heat the pool which takes heat out of the air and dumps it into the pool. So why not instead take the heat out of the house and dump it into the pool?

So right now I run 3 tons cooling the house and 10 tons heating the pool, pool heat pump dumps a huge amount of cold air and the house heat pump quite a bit of hot air, both are wasted but could be used.

I’ve seriously considered moving the pool heat pump into the hangar, with 10 tons of airconditioning I believe I could make the hangar very pleasant and as I’m heating the pool anyway it’s free cooling

And as I’m cooling the house anyway the pool could be heated for free.

 

Edited July 18, 2023 by A64Pilot

[201Steve]

On 4/28/2021 at 7:59 PM, EricJ said:

r.   I stuff a bunch of freeze packs in it and then put as much ice around them as will fit,

Is that the gel type?

[EricJ]

2 minutes ago, 201Steve said:

Is that the gel type?

The ones I use are similar to these:

https://www.amazon.com/AmazonBasics-Reusable-Hard-Sided-Rectangular/dp/B07YX8FBXV

 

[tgardnerh]

I’ve seriously considered moving the pool heat pump into the hangar, with 10 tons of airconditioning I believe I could make the hangar very pleasant and as I’m heating the pool anyway it’s free cooling

I've seen products that sort of jury rig a heat exchanger between the condenser and the pool plumbing, but your idea seems great. There's nothing "special" about it, so any qualified tech will understand your system in 30 seconds, and there's no weird failure modes that you'll get to find.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Fly Boomer]

12 hours ago, A64Pilot said:

And as I’m cooling the house anyway the pool could be heated for free.

Except for the 10 tons vs 3 tons differential.

[A64Pilot]

7 minutes ago, Fly Boomer said:

Except for the 10 tons vs 3 tons differential.

No,

Currently the house is cooled and the heat wasted to the atmosphere, if I had a ground source heat pump then the heat would be pumped into the pool when the house was cooled, free pool heat, and increased house AC efficiency. Just have to buy a Geo Thermal heat pump. But it would pay for itself much faster than one that dumped the heat into the ground.

Down side could be argued that in the two moths or winter when I heat the house I would be cooling the pool, but if that’s bad, just run the heat strips? Still I think come out cheaper excepting of course buying the new heat pump.

125,000 BTU pool heat pump currently heats the pool and blows 125,000 BTU of cooling into the atmosphere.

Literally move the thing into the hangar, then it would be “wasting” 125,000 BTU of cooling into the hangar, actually removing 125,000 BTU of heat and putting it into the pool and dehumidifying the hangar. I believe I could really cool down the hangar with 125,000 BTU of airconditioning. I only run it starting at noon and it only runs on average a couple of hours a day and with a Geo Thermal heat for the house maybe it wouldn’t need to run at all? So maybe leave the pool heat pump outside if it doesn’t need to run if the house geo thermal keeps the pool warm.

If lightning hits the heat pump I think I’ll do it.

All speculation, but I don’t see why it won’t work.

Dumping heat into the air with one system and removing heat with another seem wasteful.

[Pinecone]

12 hours ago, A64Pilot said:

I’ve honestly thought about the pool, 75% of the year I run the AC which removes heat from the house and dumps it into the outside air, and I heat the pool which takes heat out of the air and dumps it into the pool. So why not instead take the heat out of the house and dump it into the pool?

So right now I run 3 tons cooling the house and 10 tons heating the pool, pool heat pump dumps a huge amount of cold air and the house heat pump quite a bit of hot air, both are wasted but could be used.

I’ve seriously considered moving the pool heat pump into the hangar, with 10 tons of airconditioning I believe I could make the hangar very pleasant and as I’m heating the pool anyway it’s free cooling

And as I’m cooling the house anyway the pool could be heated for free.

 

Cooling is not as much as an issue as heating with a heat pump.  So I can see not many companies in FL doing ground water heat pumps.  But up north, getting enough heat out of an air cooled heat pump is not easy.  And when you go to the resistance heat, the electric use skyrockets.

[A64Pilot]

Yeah somewhere roughly around freezing the COP (coefficient of performance) for a heat pump in heating mode reaches 1.   1 is the same efficiency of electric resistance heating, which by the way is 100 % efficient, but a heat pump normally is way more than 100% efficient. My pool heat pump in 80F air is 660% efficient. Heat pumps can be way more than 100% because they don’t create heat, they just move it.

In cold temps heat pumps normally shut down and the strips come on

For example my pool heat pump in 80 degree air and water has a COP of 6.6 which is the most efficient I could find.

https://www.hydroroyal.com/model-125.html

But drop the air temp down to 50 and COP drops to 4, which is a big drop. In the over 90 degree weather that I run it at it’s over 7. The higher the temp that your robbing heat from, the easier to rob that heat of course. The electric current draw remains the same but the BTU changes significantly.

On a different note the fact that a heat pump just doesn’t work in real cold weather has Tesla doing some interesting things with their cars heat pump to heat the car in real winter, they make it work, but the COP is 1.

If your into Engineering “stuff” look up operating modes of the Tesla heat pump, I find it fascinating.

There are home furnaces that approach 100% efficiency, I’ve heard of 98%, but I can see up North that a Geo Thermal heat pump would be the “bomb”

But many complain that they just don’t blow HOT air like a furnace does, my Mother in law wouldn’t have one for that reason, and this was South Ga.

Edited July 18, 2023 by A64Pilot

[Will.iam]

Wow never thought I’d get such great info on heat pumps from mooneyspace. Thanks for the details analysis. 

[A64Pilot]

Years ago when the Longbow Apache came out I got my HVAC license in theory so I could legally purchase refrigerant if needed when we were away from home, but mostly just to get it, you never know.

Things that operate at high efficiency interest me, the Prius for example from an Engineering standpoint the thing is brilliant, I spent hours understanding as much as I could.

For example many electric vehicles have an AC of course but heat the interior with electric resistance, it works but it is terribly inefficient. Tesla could make different frequencies from the inverter so that the drive motor would heat up and the car could harvest that heat to heat the cabin, along with a heat pump of course.

But then they really got to thinking and do things like if the car is parked in the sun the heat pump can harvest solar heat in the cabin and store it in the mass of the battery, then rob the heat from the battery to heat the interior when your driving.

They came up with three different cooling modes, and twelve different heating modes and if you delve into this thing it’s an Engineering marvel of complex operation but simple mechanicals.

Model Y was first but I believe ALL Teslas use the system, I know our 2021 Model 3 does, but if this kind of thing interests you, read this article and there are Videos with animations that explain it well too.

This was done because the more and more efficient the Tesla’s became the greater the power required to heat the car dropped the range and efficiency of course, normally waste heat is used in an internal combustion car so you can stay as toasty warm as you would like with no efficiency penalty, but an EV can easily lose a third of its range heating the cabin

The Prius ran into the problem as well because it’s engine is off so much that in city driving in real cold weather it never really gets fully up to temp, the early Prius upon shutdown would pump all the engine coolant into a thermos bottle to retain the heat and the later ones circulated coolant around the catalytic convertor because those things get really hot. In cold Wx the Prius will run the engine just as a source of cabin heat and of course when it’s doing that mileage tanks.

https://insideevs.com/news/452464/tesla-model-y-heat-pump-system-details/

If you find this stuff interesting watch the videos, I think there was more Engineering time spent on this than is spent designing most engines.

Edited July 24, 2023 by A64Pilot