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Samsung Gen6/Joule ASHP - Remove Zoning

  • 18-11-2024 05:31PM
    #1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6


    Hi,

    I have a Samsung Gen6/Joule ASHP. I'd like to move to a single zone (or possibly 2?) controlled by the ground floor thermostat ("Thermostat 1") and use the radiator trvs to control room temps. The purpose of this is to 

    a) Increase the water flow to try increase efficiency (based on my understanding from heat geek videos), and 

    b) allow the bathroom towel rads in the upper floors be heated even if the upper floor is 'warm enough' according to the floor thermostat.

    Currently each zone is wired to a a separate thermostat and I can see where these are connected in (2 wires from each thermostat). What i cant see from the samsung literature is how to switch control of these zones to the ground floor unit. Could i just disconnect Thermostat 2 and 3 and use jumper cables from Thermostat 1 to get things working as intended or is there a way to 'programme' this from the Samsung Controller? 

    Any assistance is appreciated in advance, I am struggling to make sense of the samsung/joule set up information to achieve this. 

    Post edited by delly on


Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,821 ✭✭✭✭the_amazing_raisin


    There should be servo valves for each zone, you could probably wire the valves for all 3 to zone 1 so they work together

    Another option without any modification would be to set the temp in the upstairs zones to a very high temperature. Then set the times on all 3 zones to run together

    The thermostat will be "always on" and the TRVs will regulate the temperature in each room, in theory

    You'll probably need to add a TRV to the radiator that has the zone thermostat, I think they leave them off by default

    The controller might also be unhappy since as far as it's concerned the room will never reach temperature. You'll want to watch it to be sure it doesn't try using the backup heater

    "The internet never fails to misremember" - Sebastian Ruiz, aka Frost



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6 RandomName1234


    thanks for the response, i think i could easily add jumper cables from the thermostat 1 input to the control so it acts as the input in place of the zone 2 and 3 thermostats.

    I was hoping there was a way to programme the ASHP controller to just read the thermostat 1 for the other zones but i cant see how to do this on the Gen6.

    Post edited by delly on


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,717 ✭✭✭ECO_Mental


    I have a Joule Samsung A2W heat pump but have underfloor heating, and my understanding of it is that the thermostats call for heat and open the valves in the manifold. All the Samsung HP knows is to supply heat, and it's the thermostats that distribute where the heat is needed; they send a signal to open or close valves in the minifold.

    I am like you in that I am re-evaluating how I use my HP. For the last three years, I just let it work away. If a room needed heat, the HP came on (I did turn off the stats from April to October) even if it was just one room. You have three zones; I have twelve!! So a bigger problem🤔. Every room and corridor has its temp stat.

    Since I now have changed to a smart tariff, I am turning on the heating through a timed schedule to heat up to 21-22 degrees in most of my rooms and spaces at 3:30 am for 1.5 hours. I am lucky, though; I have a very well-insulated house and have a Kore insulated foundation with 400 to 500 mm of insulation over the whole house, so what I am doing is using the thermal mass to heat the house for the rest of the day.

    The next few days will see how this works with the very cold weather, but my thoughts have now changed in that if the HP is on, use it to heat all the rooms, not just one it will use the same energy. I have looked at that heat geek guy as well, and he makes sense.

    The only way I can get rid of all my zones easily is as the_amazing_rasin said is to artificially set the temps stats in rooms to a higher-than-required temp so that the controller opens up all the valves, thus by default, one zone. I might have to do this for an hour or two every evening as it gets colder, but for the last few weeks, just heating in the very low EV rate I have with Bord Gais 6.33 cents is costing me very little (40 cents for 1.5 hours of heating).

    I know it's been exceptionally mild, and as a result, it's only two weeks ago I put on the heating at night, but comparing 2023 to 2024, there is a drastic difference (see graph below). I put this down to the mild weather mostly, but I will continue to monitor it to see how it's working out. I also have changed my DHW heating stratagey to come on not on demand but at set periods and use as much as possible the EV rate as well.

    image.png

    6.1kWp south facing, South of Cork City



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6 RandomName1234


    Thats a great response. I'm going to have to read over it a few times but youre energy consumption chart is very telling. I'm going to have a think about how I want things to work a bit more.

    For any future reader, I did call Samsung to ask about the multiple zone operation and settings in the Samsung gen6 controller. The way the joule module works is that whatever 2091 setting is at applies to all zone thermostats. E.g. thermostats can be used as simple on/off switch (as you describe above) or can be set to high temp limit switches with the heat pump operating on weather compensation. But whatever is set for 1 thermostat will apply to all. (To confirm this, the b24 wire in the Samsung module is related to zone 2 on their controller, so if there is no b24 wire then only zone 1 is considered active).

    I wonder how much energy is wasted with heat pump installations where the homeowner is (rightly) not interested in the nitty gritty details of optimisation.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 21,080 ✭✭✭✭Cyrus


    I am interested in this (mine is gen 5) i have UFH and rads upstairs,

    Upstairs is generally set to 19.5 degrees so heating doesnt come on very much, but because of that the towel rails are cold, so whats the idea here that would have them warm, im not fully following.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6 RandomName1234


    Basically the theory with ashp is it's better to have 1 zone for the whole house and try getting the heat pump water flow temperature working so that the heat pump is just ticking over for as long as possible rather than kicking in and out (like keeping your car at idle for longer period Vs repeated accelerating and braking).

    I am trialing the heating on weather compensation which in theory if dialed in correctly should keep the house at a steady temp by just interpreting the outside temp. But to avoid the house overheating I am using my thermostats as upper limits. So rather than the thermostats giving the low temp to kick in they are set at a high temp to cut out.

    I have my thermostats programmed at night to basically turn off the heating. The temp only drops a couple of degrees. Then in the morning the heating should start about 6am and very slowly start heating the house back up to temp (including the towel rads). If needs be I'll tweak the radiator trvs to dial back the temps in individual rooms but I'm a bit off that yet I reckon.

    If that doesn't get me the results I want I might look to link the whole house to just operate off weather compensation and the ground floor thermostat and use smart trvs to control the upper floor bedroom temps. That will get me flow through the towel rads whenever the heating is on.

    Tbh I'm not a massive fan of the whole ashp set up. Maybe others enjoy the endless tweaking that seems to be needed to get it working how you want but I would prefer the simplicity of a combi boiler (had no choice tho in a new build).

    Caveat, my current approach to tweaking things is driving my other half mad, factor that in whatever you end up doing!

    Post edited by delly on


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