I'm in Heaven

Hi Guys

Could anyone recommend AC suppliers. There seems to be a hugh difference in price etc. Does it work out cheaper as we do not need the outside box? Would really appreicate any feedback

Thanks

Marie

Hi Marie

I'd take a side-step and wait before you install aircon. 

a) it's expensive to run and I'm not sure about what you mean about not needing the outside box - if you've got that, then all you need is the wall-mounted internal bit which I think costs start around 250 euros for the cheap and cheerful.
b) how much time are you going to spend in the apartment? If it's a holiday home it will take years to recoup the cost.
c) will free-standing fans do the trick?

We were seriously considering it when our friends gave us the above advice. We were in Spain last week with the Saraha weather and got by with free-standing fans. We've been there at varying times and really don't think it will be worth installing.

What we are seriously considering is some sort of heating, but again the aircon is expensive and I am told that there are some plug in heaters (econoheaters) that are much cheaper to run are a very flat panel that hooks on the wall and plugs into a socket.

I expect you'll get all sorts of other advice, but, hey, we're all entitled to an opinion.

Regards
Irene

Hi Irene

Thanks so much for the advice. I think that I will wait for awhile and just observe the various times of the year.
We are on the corner at the top so we do get a good breeze flowing through the apt plus there are so many outgoings
when you first purchase. Maybe a portable AC unit will do the trick.

Hope you had a good time while you were there!

 

KInd REgards

 

Marie

Hi Irene/Marie

I don't think that you will find that  modern aircon is particularly expensive to run as it works on a heat pump system,which is very efficient. The heat generated is cheaper than other electrical heat units.

That said, whether you NEED it depends on many other factors. Obviously the lengh of time you are there during the hot months and even which way your apartment faces. Our apartment faces east(same as yours Irene) which means we don't have the very hot late afternoon sun. Anybody on the west side of the building may well consider it a necessity.

What I do consider a necessity is HEAT in the winter months. We spend February and March in Spain this year and I don't think that I would have survived without my electric blanket and fan heaters EVERWHERE. I don't think that it was particularly cold outside, in fact most days in March were in the 20's but it was much colder in the apartment. I can honestly say that I wore more clothes inside than out!

We did actually buy 2 aircon units from an electrical shop in Delores at the end of February. They had an offer of free fitting so we paid about 1100euros for inside and outside units. I'm not sure how that compares to other places for price but O.H was very particular about the units he wanted and they were the most expensive in the shop!

Have yet to use the cooling as our summer break had to be cancelled due to my ill health but the heating was really quiet and efficient.

I hope this helps!

Gloria (and Mike)

Hi Gloria

Going by Katie & Tony, they said their bills were extortionate when running the aircon. They had theirs installed by the builders though, so it's possible that they're not as efficient as the ones you refer to.

I'd be interested to know what your electricity bill was for the couple of months you were running them.

I know what you mean about being colder inside than out - we found this in March and Christmas!

Irene

Hi Irene,

Will look up our electriity bill but think it was about 80 euros. Most of that (february) was from before we had the units installed. We did keep the apartment very warm as I suffer from arthritis and can't stand being cold! We were rather worried that the bill would be very high as Katie had told us about hers. When it came in we were relieved that it wasn't as high as we had imagined.

We found that the aircon units only ran for a short time before cutting off whereas our fan heaters were on most of the time, particularly in the evenings. But of course March was much warmer than when we first arrived in early February.

We will check into our bill tomorrow and let you know.

Gloria

Hi Irene,

Gloria asked me to look up our Iberdrola bills for this year.  They are:

13/01   37.27 e
05/03   108.40 e
12/05   81.58 e
08/07   32.07 e

Since we were in residence from early February, you can see the effect electric fires had on our bill of early March, in contrast to the bill for June which included for our stay in March.  Only the last 3 weeks did we have the heat pumps fitted.  As you can see the standing charge and the fridge (we leave it running when we are not there) account for about 35e every 2 months (say 17.5 e per month), therefore for cooking, lighting and heating we paid about 73 e in February and about 46 e in March and the only real difference was the type of heating.  Although the weather was a little better in March, I don't think that made much difference as we always used heating in the evenings and because the heat pumps have remote controllers, we ran them for longer as they could be switched off without getting out of bed!!

In the trade the name given to these domestic heat pump units is a "split" referring to the fact that you have an inside and outside unit.  As I am in this business in the UK, I always insist on top quality equipment as the performance is better and you get a meaningful warranty.  Mitsubishi, Daikin, Fujitsu, Panasonic, Hitachi are just some of the good quality manufacturers.  I have seen some real rubbish in Spain, much of which is not even legal in the EU.

Without getting too technical, normal electric radiant fires are about 95% efficient (the odd 5% is used up in light) "black" heaters are of course 100% efficient because all the electricity is converted into heat.  We first used "black" heaters because they were cheap, readily available and you just plug them in to go.  However, I knew they were going to be expensive to run.  Heat pumps however, work on a technical principal called the "refrigeration cycle" and without going into a long explanation they should be around 400% efficient.  This is called the Coefficient of Performance (COP) and my units operate at around 4.2 to 4.6 COP.  I did not go for inverter driven because the small improvement in performance would have taken many years to pay back as we don't intend to use them much in the cooling mode since we don't expect to be there in the summer. 

The reason why people say heat pumps are expensive to run is of course they use them all the year round for heating AND cooling, whereas electric fires only get used in winter.  We can now get heat pump boilers in the UK and I am seriously thinking of chucking out my Gas boiler as the efficiency of a heat pump means that it's cheaper to run than than gas.  If you can get by on fans or natural ventilation in summer that's great, but most people yield to temptation and switch on the AC.

I will stop there, however, if I can be of any further help (confusion?) let me know and if reqired I will bore the pants off everyone with a full technical breakdown!

Mike

Wow Mike !!!

You have impressed me with your knowledge !!!  Its great to gather as much information as possible.
Thank you for your imput.

Marie

who is the best supplier in the area for air conditioning?

Hi Carol

I'm not really sure. We went with a small shop in Delores, mainly because they offered a unit Mike was happy with and they also offered free fitting! The fitting takes a surprisingly long time but was very well done and very neat. The poor chap was working on his own so that may have been why it took all day. I think that it really needs 2 people to fit the outside units as we had ours fitted up high. Mike did offer to help but the young man wouldn't let him.

I have seen quite a lot of people advertising in the Costa Blanca News and Coastrider etc. all for much the same price that we paid. Although you can certainly buy cheaper units.

In case you are wondering, I can't remember the name of the shop-the bill is back in Spain!! If anyone is interested we may be able to find it on a credit card bill or can get it after our trip out in Sept/Oct. I'm afraid that they didn't really speak any English(why should they) when we first called in but we were asked to call in later when a lady would be there who did speak a little. It all worked out very well and the units were delivered and fitted in a couple of days.

Gloria

Just to say that I have found our credit card bill from the shop that we bought our aircon units from. It says 'Electrodomestico Gil Redo, Delores'. The cost was £801.40 or 1046 euros. The units were Fujistu.

It's quite a lot of money I know, particularly at a time when all you seem to be doing is paying out. It's really up to individuals to decide whether  the outlay is worth it. I think that for people who live there it certainly is but for others, who knows.

Gloria

Hi Gloria and Mike

Once again thank you ! You have been most helpfull

Regards

Marie

Hi guys

Can anyone recommend a heating solution for a 2 bed apartment? Apartment is occupied perhaps 3/4 months of the year. I dont really need an AC unit during the summer so heating only would be fine. Running costs would be my main concern.

Many thanks

Michael

Hi Michael

I'm surprised if you've posted in this thread, that you're asking the question as previous posts discuss this issue.

anyway... if you are only going to be there for a short while each year, then it will take a long time to recoup the cost of air-con. It depends whether the time you spend out there will be broken up or one long chunk, and if it's the former, and your stay is in the cooler months, you might need heating more than cooling. I have been reliably informed that air-con costs a fortune to run, whether it's heating or cooling!

We were out there for the first two weeks in August and it was VERY hot. We managed with just a couple of fans. 

We've been out there at all different times. It's chilly in the winter and we bought oil-filled rads and moved them around. We're going to look at investing in econo heaters when we (eventually) move there.

Hope this helps.
Irene

Irene,

Thanks for the info.

Much of the the thread so far has discussed the pros/cons of aircon which I have ruled out as I do not believe it to be cost effective in my particular circumstances.

It was solely heating options that I was looking for information on. I know there are a number of options such as oil filled radiators, fan heaters etc and was looking for opinions and recommendations on options such as these. 

Does anyone have any opinions on 'econo heaters'? I have not heard of these.

Michael

http://www.econo-heat.com/main.html

Read all about it!

Irene

Thanks Irene,

Also found a spanish distributer: http://www.econoheat-spain.com/eng/index.html

They seem reasonably priced, and who could pass on the offer of a free backpack?!

Michael

Wow, a free backpack... is that with each radiator? You could end up with one for every day of the week!

However, if they live up to their blurb, they seem quite good options. We're going to try one and see how it goes. If and when you get yours, let me know what you think.

By the way, I'm pretty sure I've seen them or an equivalent in Carrefour, so it might be worth having a look.

Cheers
Irene

I did warn you that I could bore for England on this subject.

I don't want to be a damp squib ( or a cold shower)  whichever is appropriate and if electric heating suits your needs and your pocket, go for it, as we did for the first few weeks.  You can find Econo-Heat type radiators in most of the big  stores (I have seen them in Carrefor and Ardy's), but unless someone has invented perpetual motion without letting the rest of us know, 1 unit (kilowatt hour) of electricity will still only dissipate 1kW of heat into the air.  The Econo-Heat might benefit from a close control thermostat to accurately control the air temperature and therefore for any given temperature setting use a little less energy, but if the heat loss of the room is 1.5kW you will need a heater that uses / puts out 1.5kW, simple physics really.  If your heater glows, then it is a little less efficient, but otherwise the transfer is 100% and you can't do better than that!

However, a Heat Pump uses a system known as the refrigeration cycle and the electricity is used to run 2 fans (one inside the room and one in the outside unit) and a little compressor (pump).  The compressor takes heat from the outside air (yes, even in winter down to about -5 degrees C) compresses it and transfers it to inside.  For each kilowatt of heat produced this way the fans and compressor use only about 250 watts (1/4 kilowatt) to do this.  There is no breach of the perpetual motion barrier, because you are not producing any heat, only transferring it from one place to another (like in your 'fridge, a heat pump simply 'pumps' heat from one place to another).

However we all make our own decisions, and I agree that the 1,000 euro + cost of a couple of heat pumps will buy quite a lot of electricity, so if you are not there much it may be the best solution.  The same goes for the summer, if fans do the job for you, then why not? Fans use a process called Adiabiatic (evaporative) cooling, but I simply refuse to bore everyone with that, so I will make this my last comment on the subject before you all tell me to stop being an anorak.

Regards

Mike

Now Michael, can you please explain that in basic English because I'm completely baffled - impressed, but still baffled!!!

Irene