snipped-for-privacy@aol.com wrote: ...
That's occurring anyway and certainly not by "sinking".
Which, if you will read my first response is precisely what I recommended...
Given the level of cost he claims for last winter, it would seem either the house is very small, the setpoint is extremely low, or the house is pretty well insulated. Then again, maybe it's global warming and the winter was mild last year...
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the best).
Sorry it still will not work. The efficiency will drop to almost nothing. You don't have enough exchange area.
Personally I think it will work ,as a HVAC Contractor with 35 years experience and just as many working/installing Heat Pump systems, here's my opinion, First they make a air source heat pump using a 12000 btu air source heat pump to heat hot water, Rheem is one brand, shows it can be installed in basement.So if you have a small unit say a 18000 or 24000 BTU and it clearly works for the Rheem domestic hot water heater why would it not work for a slightly larger unit. Also if you did install the outdoor unit in the basement and have the duct work in the basement ,put in couple a three supply registers to dump warm air into the basement with a small return in the return duct in the basement, if it still does not work try rejecting the discharged air (using duct ) to a casement window sending the air outside.
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why do people suddenly respond to thread over 3 years old?
Mark
Look at how a heat pump or AC works (heat pump is AC in reverse). One coil gets hot and the other gets cold. If you want a 20 degree rise in temp upstairs you will get a 20 degree drop in the basement. That is assuming
100% efficiency. Eventually the basement will have to get as cold as the outside or colder in order to get a sufficient heat rise in your living space. At about 35 degrees or so a heat pump does not work very efficiently and needs extra heat.
Because I'm new to the thread
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And as well that's assuming the same volume of heated space as compared to the basement (which may be reasonably close for a ranch style w/ a full unfinished basement, but for anything w/ partially finished basement or larger heated area in comparison, the ratio would be
to
He comes from the hellish place called the home owners shrub.
It will work great if you want the entire basement to be a walk in freezer/cooler.
You got here the Dilbert way. Study up "usenet", f*ck the homeclonershub and come join us the "real" way. Using the homeownersclub has a habit of making smart people look stupid. Not your fault, just a mistake. Use usenet.
So, with 35 years of HVAC experience, one of your solutions is to put
3 supply registers in the basement along with the heat pump? One of the stupidist things posted here in a long time. Why not put a windmill on the roof of your car to generate electric to power the car. We could all drive for free.The heat pump in basement idea is interesting, but would not work unless you had some way to increase the surface area for heat transfer. For example, if you had buried a network of pipes in the floor before pouring the cement, you could circulate water through there, and then have it go through a radiator. Behind the radiator you could have a squirrel cage/centrifugal blower. Your only cost to maintain the air temp in the basement would be for an efficient water pump and efficient squirrel cage blower. This could make a heat pump very efficient.
Of course, if you have that setup, it would be much better to simply use a heat pump designed to directly work with the water or whatever fluid is in the pipes. That would be a geothermal system.
It's an interesting idea to use the basement as a heat source. But as you point out, the real question is how much the basement temperature will drop. Dropping that temperature is going to take some heat away from the house through colder floors, more heat loss through basement ducts, etc.
And another big issue I see is summer. Almost all heat pumps also serves as AC. So, in the summer, you're raising the basement temperature and again, how much is the key question. That would obviously depend on the size of the basement. Large, open, full basement would be the best case. Even then, I think it's highly questionable.
responding to
No good.
I'm not a heating specialist, but I can figure out that there's not enough of a heat sink in the basement air to accomplish anything.
Heat pumps are done with long lengths of tubing underground because of the huge thermal mass of the ground.
There are other types of heat pumps, such as water cooled and air cooled. But a basement would not have enough heat to warm a house before it was cooled below the heat pumps ability to extract heat.
Sure an air conditioner is a type of heat pump.
But we agree that a basement isn't going to cut it.
responding to
I'll say it this way: Heat pumps can only move heat (BTUs) around. Located outside, your heat pump can exchange an infinite number of BTUs from the air since it just grabs "new" air with a new supply of BTUs with its fan as needed. So, it will work whether the outside air is warm or cold pushing the BTUs in or out of the outside air (and your house). If you put the heat pump in your basement, the BTUs the heat pump can grab are limited by what the walls, floor and other materials contain or can transfer in/out. Since the BTUs can't easily flow in or out of the basement volume of air, walls and concrete, the heat transfer is not limited by the pump but by its source of BTUs.
On a hot or cold day when your heat pump is trying to cool or heat your house, it will run out of BTUs that can be pulled or pushed into your basement. It then loses efficiency and will just run without doing any heating or cooling. Meanwhile, your basement will either be way too hot or way too cold. You may not care what the temperature of the basement is, but your pipes could freeze on a cold day outdoors as the heat pump sucks heat from the basement to put into the house. On a warm day outside, the heat build up in the basement could be dangerous and damage wiring or the house structure. Or, the heat could simply make the heat pump so inefficient, it wouldn't cool the house; it would just waste electricity.
If you could fill your basement with water which has a much higher BTU capacity per unit volume than air and concrete and use that water for your heat pump, you might make your idea work; but there's also a good chance that you would have a block of ice in the basement for much of the winter and a pool of steaming water for much of the summer.
A neighbor of mine installed a ground water heat pump to heat and cool his house. For a house of about 2500 square feet and well insulated, it takes the water from 5 wells to supply enough BTUs winter and summer to keep the house comfortable. It's very energy efficient because the high volume of well water, either coming or going is always about 50 degrees F +/- 10 degrees., so it can either give or take plenty of BTUs, but drilling the wells was expensive.
Tomsic
Thank you Tomsic, you have made the problem clear for me.
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