For many years I've been impressed with and wanted to install a minisplit into my 1963 built 1700 SF home in the PNW. I'm up in the hills so we get single digit temperatures with wind and recently weeks in the upper 90s. Not terribly humid though. I live in an agricultural area so no trees for shade.
This old house was heated with electric baseboard heat and then wall heaters but since I bought the place in 2006 I have been a 100% wood heater. No ducts and 8' ceilings. I did add insulation to the attic and crawlspace along with double pane windows since we moved in.
The wife hates how these minisplit indoor units look. So we chose to put it on an exterior wall in a less than ideal location in a laundry room off of the main hallway. It's not a room with a door but kind of a connecting hallway. The inside unit "blows" into the main hallway. Now that I've been using it, I'm really glad it's not right in the living room. These things are noisy and blow all the time unless they're totally shut off. The conditioned air, at least in summer, makes it throughout the entire single story home with only about a 2 degree differential from that hallway to the farthest corners. Big relief here. I was very worried that I would get a conditioned hallway and the rest of the home would not be conditioned.
Knowing that I only need to burn about 60# of firewood in my 80% efficient stove during the coldest weather I was able to consult the performance chart and find that at 5 degrees outside, the 24k btu unit makes the equivalent amount of heat as that 60# of wood. In other words I used my wood consumption to size this heat pump for 100% of winter heat. This means it is oversized for cooling duties which was evident as it loafed along at idle or stopped pumping refrigerant at times when it was 97 outside.
I picked the DIY unit not because I was afraid of making flares but because I could install it myself and keep the full warranty. These chinese minisplits are all made in the same factory so for me it was about warranty and tech support if needed since it is geared to the DIY crowd. The DIY unit is not an ultra low ambient temperature heater like some of the hyper heat models. Still, consult the performance chart and it is rated to do what it needs to.
I mounted it outside on a concrete slab. I installed a yard drain for condensate routed to my downspout disposal system that takes it far away.
Install was easy except for fighting the thick copper lineset. You're not allowed to cut it since these lines are prevacuumed and precharged. The O-ring connectors were very simple. The lineset is 25' long and you are required to coil the extra horizontally flat with the ground. That sucks. ALmost all videos of installation, even by the MR cool company, show storing this coil vertically which would be much easier. I took pains to make sure it was horizontally coiled and contstantly sloped down to the compressor.
Simple 10 gauge dedicated 240volt 25 amp circuit with disconnect and convenience outlet within 25 feet.
So far we're really happy with the noise level and distribution from the laundry room. Purchase price was 1900$ and my utility is supposed to give me an 800$ rebate. It looks pretty good back there too with the other mechanical type stuff. The outside unit is really quiet with the biggest sound being the fan blowing when it's ramped up.
This old house was heated with electric baseboard heat and then wall heaters but since I bought the place in 2006 I have been a 100% wood heater. No ducts and 8' ceilings. I did add insulation to the attic and crawlspace along with double pane windows since we moved in.
The wife hates how these minisplit indoor units look. So we chose to put it on an exterior wall in a less than ideal location in a laundry room off of the main hallway. It's not a room with a door but kind of a connecting hallway. The inside unit "blows" into the main hallway. Now that I've been using it, I'm really glad it's not right in the living room. These things are noisy and blow all the time unless they're totally shut off. The conditioned air, at least in summer, makes it throughout the entire single story home with only about a 2 degree differential from that hallway to the farthest corners. Big relief here. I was very worried that I would get a conditioned hallway and the rest of the home would not be conditioned.
Knowing that I only need to burn about 60# of firewood in my 80% efficient stove during the coldest weather I was able to consult the performance chart and find that at 5 degrees outside, the 24k btu unit makes the equivalent amount of heat as that 60# of wood. In other words I used my wood consumption to size this heat pump for 100% of winter heat. This means it is oversized for cooling duties which was evident as it loafed along at idle or stopped pumping refrigerant at times when it was 97 outside.
I picked the DIY unit not because I was afraid of making flares but because I could install it myself and keep the full warranty. These chinese minisplits are all made in the same factory so for me it was about warranty and tech support if needed since it is geared to the DIY crowd. The DIY unit is not an ultra low ambient temperature heater like some of the hyper heat models. Still, consult the performance chart and it is rated to do what it needs to.
I mounted it outside on a concrete slab. I installed a yard drain for condensate routed to my downspout disposal system that takes it far away.
Install was easy except for fighting the thick copper lineset. You're not allowed to cut it since these lines are prevacuumed and precharged. The O-ring connectors were very simple. The lineset is 25' long and you are required to coil the extra horizontally flat with the ground. That sucks. ALmost all videos of installation, even by the MR cool company, show storing this coil vertically which would be much easier. I took pains to make sure it was horizontally coiled and contstantly sloped down to the compressor.
Simple 10 gauge dedicated 240volt 25 amp circuit with disconnect and convenience outlet within 25 feet.
So far we're really happy with the noise level and distribution from the laundry room. Purchase price was 1900$ and my utility is supposed to give me an 800$ rebate. It looks pretty good back there too with the other mechanical type stuff. The outside unit is really quiet with the biggest sound being the fan blowing when it's ramped up.
