I was impressed and inspired with your work. On the strength of your YT portable heat pump system videos, I purchased a used Friedrich PH14B unit which is a dual hose unit with the built in heating function. It cost me $100 (~£80) plus another ~$50 to duct and rig a semi-permanent installation. Currently, I’ve only had it running for a few days. It’s the Fall season northern USA (outside air temp (°F) mid 50°s to mid 30°s), it heats the entire house. Many thanks.
This is the most Heath Robinson thing I've seen in a while - and I love it. The previous owner of our house was a HVAC engineer and he left a portable AC unit that he'd ducted in a similar way to warm/dehumidify the ensuite. I don't think it actually runs in heat mode, so there's some trickery going on including mixing the warm exhaust air with the cold supply air. It works well enough but I think I'm going to replace it with a MVHR unit. Amazing stuff, thanks for documenting it
Very interesting and innovative solution. Thank you. I have a portable air con unit similar to yours that I only use for a few weeks a year so repurposing it for heating is an idea to think about and you are the first person I saw who has done this
Great job. Thank You 🙂I did it the same with one exception - my source of outer air is ground heat exchanger. This exchanger made me the air with 9-11C all winter :-). I use fral 19sc with R290. My cop after changes is about 5 to 6. I connected it to existed ventilation system with recuperation. Greeting from Poland.
I am very impressed with this. I have now tried it on a simple circuit. Ours is only a 1.4Kw air conditioner but it’s useful to be able to reverse it for winter vs summer. Only uses 300Wh and maintains temp so far. Thank you for the idea
Great effort on this. I too have the Airflex15 V2. I've planned a similar set up with a few little tweaks. Interesting that it runs better to split the duct. I'm surprised you haven't adapted it to be used for summer and utilising the cold air. Have you considered installing PV panels? I'm contemplating a 7KW battery PV system which I've estimated should cover it. Just need a little excess power to heat water, which would get me off the oil boiler. Hopefully once I've completed the setup and can compare.
The puddle underneath will be from the compressor mountings which will be transferring cold to the casing. Insulate underneath with some foam strip which will reduce this issue.
What happened to your other unit? I see this is now a proper reverse cycle portable unit that does heating and cooling without you having to trick the sensors.
I've bought a portable ac to try something similar on my narrowboat. What I've found is it has two drain ports. One at the bottom like you use and one halfway up, just below the evaporator. I mistakenly put my drain hose in the top one and it seems to catch the water before it drops to the bottom. Being higher it is easier to put a bucket under it. I might open it up to see exactly where the water travels internally. A heat pump would have been my choice but I'm on solar only, so a 500btu ac unit is a cheap experiment. PS I suspect the water impeller turns off in dehumidifier mode but haven't checked mine.
I was impressed and inspired with your work. On the strength of your YT portable heat pump system videos, I purchased a used Friedrich PH14B unit which is a dual hose unit with the built in heating function. It cost me $100 (~£80) plus another ~$50 to duct and rig a semi-permanent installation. Currently, I’ve only had it running for a few days. It’s the Fall season northern USA (outside air temp (°F) mid 50°s to mid 30°s), it heats the entire house. Many thanks.
The windshield washer pump as a condensate pump= genius.
This is the most Heath Robinson thing I've seen in a while - and I love it. The previous owner of our house was a HVAC engineer and he left a portable AC unit that he'd ducted in a similar way to warm/dehumidify the ensuite. I don't think it actually runs in heat mode, so there's some trickery going on including mixing the warm exhaust air with the cold supply air. It works well enough but I think I'm going to replace it with a MVHR unit.
Amazing stuff, thanks for documenting it
Very interesting and innovative solution. Thank you. I have a portable air con unit similar to yours that I only use for a few weeks a year so repurposing it for heating is an idea to think about and you are the first person I saw who has done this
Great job. Thank You 🙂I did it the same with one exception - my source of outer air is ground heat exchanger. This exchanger made me the air with 9-11C all winter :-). I use fral 19sc with R290. My cop after changes is about 5 to 6. I connected it to existed ventilation system with recuperation. Greeting from Poland.
I am very impressed with this. I have now tried it on a simple circuit. Ours is only a 1.4Kw air conditioner but it’s useful to be able to reverse it for winter vs summer. Only uses 300Wh and maintains temp so far. Thank you for the idea
I purchased this exact model Todo more or less the same thing. Duct to 2 rooms. however it's not getting cold now lasted 2 weeks give or take a day
Good for you, keep on rocking in the free world!
Great effort on this. I too have the Airflex15 V2. I've planned a similar set up with a few little tweaks. Interesting that it runs better to split the duct. I'm surprised you haven't adapted it to be used for summer and utilising the cold air. Have you considered installing PV panels? I'm contemplating a 7KW battery PV system which I've estimated should cover it. Just need a little excess power to heat water, which would get me off the oil boiler.
Hopefully once I've completed the setup and can compare.
The puddle underneath will be from the compressor mountings which will be transferring cold to the casing. Insulate underneath with some foam strip which will reduce this issue.
What happened to your other unit? I see this is now a proper reverse cycle portable unit that does heating and cooling without you having to trick the sensors.
I've bought a portable ac to try something similar on my narrowboat. What I've found is it has two drain ports. One at the bottom like you use and one halfway up, just below the evaporator. I mistakenly put my drain hose in the top one and it seems to catch the water before it drops to the bottom. Being higher it is easier to put a bucket under it.
I might open it up to see exactly where the water travels internally.
A heat pump would have been my choice but I'm on solar only, so a 500btu ac unit is a cheap experiment.
PS I suspect the water impeller turns off in dehumidifier mode but haven't checked mine.
I just thought, a heating mode would swap condenser and evaporator functions so it might not have a second drain.
Amazing project! Thanks for the detailed and interesting insight! Have you thought about using a level sensor for your condensate pump?