The Homemade Heat Pump Manifesto

[BeerGrylls]

Promised pics of my boat ASHP ghetto install. Takes about 8kw/day with outside temps ranging from 0-7deg C. There is plenty of room in the engine compartment to keep all the guts of the WSHP conversion in there, and I look forward to having my cockpit back...

[nokiasixteth]

Originally Posted by BeerGrylls

Promised pics of my boat ASHP ghetto install. Takes about 8kw/day with outside temps ranging from 0-7deg C. There is plenty of room in the engine compartment to keep all the guts of the WSHP conversion in there, and I look forward to having my cockpit back...

What temps are you keepin the inside with only usin 8kws a day ? And how many sq ft ?

[AC_Hacker]

Originally Posted by BeerGrylls

Promised pics of my boat ASHP ghetto install. Takes about 8kw/day with outside temps ranging from 0-7deg C. There is plenty of room in the engine compartment to keep all the guts of the WSHP conversion in there, and I look forward to having my cockpit back...

OK, thanks for the photos. Now I see what is going on.

Looks to me like you have a fairly modern heat pump that has a variable speed compressor. They are really efficient machines.

You haven't said very much about your background. For instance what kind of work do you do? Do you enjoy being involved with technical activities. Are you an electrical engineer, for instance? Do you have experience with analog and digital circuitry? Do you have an O-scope? Do you have experience with a logic analyzer?

The reason I'm asking is that the kind of unit you have is pretty sophisticated and if you make appreciable changes to it (if you want to hack it), you'll probably need to employ the technical skills, that I mentioned above.

Being able to hack a variable speed heat pump holds out the promise of being able to create an unusually efficient new machine.

So far, on the EcoRenovator forum, some talented people have worked on doing that very thing, but if they have reported back on their success, I have not heard of it, and I watch the forum pretty closely.

Acuario has tried to do this and has gotten farther than any one I know of. His work starts RIGHT HERE.

BradC also did some very innovative work, but I don't recall if he ever attempted to hack a variable speed compressor.

In my own work I have tried to stick with simpler machines because there are significant efficiency gains to be made there.

But I have held out the hope that someone will solve the riddle and that hacking variable speed compressor machines will become more common.

Maybe that person is you?

Best,

-AC