France in Focus

when the 'team' arrive to fit air-air PAC's in our lounge & attic.
I've got the two electric supplies from tableau dejuncteurs to the wall where the external units will be fitted. Built a plinth for the lounge consul unit. removed plasterboard on the attic stud wall to conceal pipework etc & boarded out beween studs to give sturdy fixings for the consul unit. Measured drawn up & marked all the relevant walls showing heights they could/should diamond drill the stone walls & altered a rainwater downpipe where the two outside units will go.
It ain't cheap but I've used this company before & am assured they're sending their crack team to my job.
What could possibly go wrong?

bad weather, wrong drill, wrong drill bits, inadequate electric supply, a long lunch . . .

Good luck - if the summer is warm then I am sure you will enjoy.

J

niemeyjt wrote: ↑Wed Jan 17, 2024 7:01 pm bad weather, wrong drill, wrong drill bits, inadequate electric supply, a long lunch . . .

Good luck - if the summer is warm then I am sure you will enjoy.

J

So far so good.
Man & assistant arrived about 10 ish after loading up & driving here.
Got stuck in right away & refused offer of coffee.
Went through my sketches which they got straight away.
By lunchtime all messy hole drilling & making good finished so off for 1 hour break.
By close of play at 1700 hrs they'd mounted all units except one outside unit found to be damaged after unboxing, fitted pipe ducts everywhere, piped up lounge unit & cleaned up.
Back tomorrow at 0900hrs with replacement unit & hoping to complete.
Excellent caring & clean workers.
Biggish outfit with 3 branches in Finistere who installed my first PAC a few years ago but no more expensive that the local company who didn't seem to know JS & would have installed an unworkable system if I didn't know better.
So far I'm very happy

A nice midterm review.

Maybe of interest to PAC doomsayers.
My kitchen is lovely & warm with Mitsubishi air-air unit performing well & 'chucking out' very hot air despite it being -6 outside.
I certainly wouldn't be shelling out 7k€ for two more if I wasn't convinced of their efficacy

What is PAC?? Passive Air Conditioning??

@demi Pompe à chaleur (heat pump)
I've always been curious to know how much they cost to run, particularly with electricity prices going up and up. Like all electric heating, are they better suited to modern, well insulated houses ? How would they perform in an old stone house with no foundations ?
We intend sticking with our oil CH as long as we can - it works extremely well and our utility bills seem to be a fraction of what some people seem to pay.

Some friends have just had a quote for their new home (not new, but new to them), as a transition from gas central heating. It's relatively modern and possibly about 150m2 ish of open plan, single storey for half, a couple of upstairs bedrooms over the other half. 28k€, and they could get a grant of 9k€ towards that.

So that won't be happening! They reckon it would take at least 10 years to be level with the equivalent cost of gas, and they wonder what's the shelf life of these heat pumps?

Blaze wrote: ↑Fri Jan 19, 2024 9:51 am I've always been curious to know how much they cost to run, particularly with electricity prices going up and up. Like all electric heating, are they better suited to modern, well insulated houses ? How would they perform in an old stone house with no foundations ?

My old stone house,bought as a wreck, has no foundations .
There is no towns gas available & I didn't want the hassle of installing oil fired central heating so I fitted a cheapo Brico Depot PAC (pump a chaleur) in the kitchen along with a woodie plus electric radiators & a woodie in the lounge. Bedrooms & ensuits have electric rads/towel rails which are rarely switched on.
It's worked fine for years with the cheapo PAC being replaced by a modern inverter ( auto speed control) model.
The 40m2 single story kitchen's PAC usualy runs for about 8 hrs a day which cost about 1€ in 'leccy (about 30€ per month) before the latest tarif increase. ( about 1,20€ now) Our 'leccy' bill for the last few years has been around 1k€ including hot water.
The lounge woodie is 'fired up' about 3 oclock in the afternoon & costs practically nothing to run as we have our own wood supply.
Anno Domini being what it is, wood burning is getting more of a chore hence the new PAC.
The attic rooms, which were built for family summer holidays, were never heated but will now be heated by the new PAC.
We will now have the principal rooms in the house fitted with PACs which will save me some effort & should be a selling point if we choose to move to a smaller house with not so much land.

End of day two. All finished except commissioning of attic unit which is left on Vaccuum test over weekend.
Only problem is a damaged case on an outside unit which will be replaced.
Great team.