Panasonic vs Mitsubishi ducted heat pump and ventilation solutions

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#3322060 18-Dec-2024 17:28

What is the temperature of the air at the supply diffuser in each room when it is on air conditioning? I can't measure mine for you, it's not working well, waiting on the technician to come next week. You could compare with a high wall output temperature, ducted won't be quite as low.

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#3323979 24-Dec-2024 00:16

Sorry about the late reply.

So last Friday the installer came over and found the bypass damper isn't working properly (won't fully close). So he's gonna get that replaced. It wasn't setup correctly in airtouch as well, as the airtouch controller now shows a bypass damper symbol. He also relebanced the rooms. He did mention he may need to increase the static pressure.

I still need to try it again tomorrow during the day. It's better. A bit louder at the return.

Now my other issue I have with it is that it doesn't seem to power down when rooms are at or below target temp (in cooling). It just keeps going. I'm now worried (after some reading) that they haven't configured the Mitsubishi system to read its temperature from remote sensors (airtouch) and thus it never stops running. Just seems like it'll kill my power bill.

Hoping their competent enough to figure this out. Seems like installing airtouch incorrectly is very common.

timmmay

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#3324041 24-Dec-2024 07:46

Sounds like an improvement, generally.

In cooling mode my Daikin keeps the airflow going, but turns off the outdoor unit so it's not actively cooling once all the rooms are at the target temperature. Have you checked the outdoor unit?

You could try economy mode, if the Airtouch 5 is similar to the Airtouch 4. It's way deep in the settings - installer settings (password is probably "polyaire"), AC Setup, detail, change the control sensor to "Economy". Here's what I said about it in my big info thread.

I was also guided by the manufacturer support to change a setting in here to help reduce overheating, by telling the Airtouch to completely ignore the Daikin temperature sensors and to use its own only (economy mode). Previously it would only shut the outdoor unit off in heating mode once the Daikin sensors said the house was up to heat, which isn't what you want when you have individual room controls.

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#3324069 24-Dec-2024 08:51

timmmay:
Sounds like an improvement, generally.

In cooling mode my Daikin keeps the airflow going, but turns off the outdoor unit so it's not actively cooling once all the rooms are at the target temperature. Have you checked the outdoor unit?

You could try economy mode, if the Airtouch 5 is similar to the Airtouch 4. It's way deep in the settings - installer settings (password is probably "polyaire"), AC Setup, detail, change the control sensor to "Economy". Here's what I said about it in my big info thread.

I was also guided by the manufacturer support to change a setting in here to help reduce overheating, by telling the Airtouch to completely ignore the Daikin temperature sensors and to use its own only (economy mode). Previously it would only shut the outdoor unit off in heating mode once the Daikin sensors said the house was up to heat, which isn't what you want when you have individual room controls.

Thanks for this. I did manage to login with "Polyaire".

So it was set to auto. I can confirm, even if actual temp is below target temp for cooling, outdoor unit turns on.
Changing to economy mode, outdoor unit never turns on, no matter what I do with the target temp.

Based on some reading, this makes me suspect that they haven't configured the Mitsubishi ducted unit to offload its sensor handling to remote sensors. Ugh.

Hopefully they acknowledge this and get it sorted. Will have a talk to them when they come over next. Sounds like they need the original controller to get this configured.

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#3324101 24-Dec-2024 09:15

Try leaving it on economy mode for a few hours when you need cooling. Mine's been on that setting for years and it works better generally, telling Airtouch to use its internal sensors rather than the heat pump sensors. Obviously if the outdoor unit never turns on it's not helpful, but give it a chance - sometimes these things respond slowly.

I don't know if you can configure a ducted unit to use external sensors, and I don't think Airtouch does that - I could be wrong here. What I've observed is the Airtouch sets the Mitsi / Daikin target temperature to the lowest of the room temps when in cooling mode, or the highest in heating mode. What the economy setting does is somehow tells the heat pump the temperature is up to heat when all the rooms are at the target temp, rather than letting the thermostat in the return decide when to turn the outdoor unit off.

In general I suggest you describe the problem to the installer and let them work out the solution, rather than tell them what you think is wrong. Installers regularly call their supplies like Daikin / Mitsubishi / Airtouch for help, let the experts work it out. I would only suggest solutions if they exhaust all their ideas.

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#3324440 25-Dec-2024 18:19

Ok so it does spin up in economy mode, but the result is the same. Unit never spins down when the rooms are at temp.

Yea I will describe the problem to them instead of trying to be a "mr know it all".
It's unfortunately still underperforming. During the day I just can't get rooms under 24degrees. Regardless if door is open or closed. But it might be because they still need to replace that bypass damper. Idk. I'm really hoping it's a simple fix.

I also just realised today that the intake for the fresh air might be right next to the exhaust for one of the bathroom vents...I need to confirm that. I assume that's a bad idea.

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#3324492 25-Dec-2024 19:54

AlDrag:

Unit never spins down when the rooms are at temp.

does the room then get colder than the set point?

just to clarify, your talking about the outdoor fan not stopping? ie the compressor is still running?

AlDrag

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#3324494 25-Dec-2024 19:59

tweake:
does the room then get colder than the set point?

just to clarify, your talking about the outdoor fan not stopping? ie the compressor is still running?

Correct. At night it still takes a while for the room to get to the set point, but it does get there. Where during the day it seems to never go down.

When it reaches the set point at night, it stays there for a while, then I wake up, I find some rooms to be at about 18 degrees instead of 21!

The outdoor compressor fan never stops. It does if it put it on fan mode, but if on cooling, it always runs regardless of the room temp relative to the set point.

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#3324495 25-Dec-2024 20:12

Something is really wrong there, possibly multiple things. The installer really needs to diagnose and fix the problem. Do they have any experience with these systems?

If they can't fix it you may need to get a third party involved, and if you haven't paid them fully, don't until it's working properly.

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#3324496 25-Dec-2024 20:18

timmmay: Something is really wrong there, possibly multiple things. The installer really needs to diagnose and fix the problem. Do they have any experience with these systems?

If they can't fix it you may need to get a third party involved, and if you haven't paid them fully, don't until it's working properly.

Yea....I'll measure the vent again. What temp do you think the vent should be if I'm trying to target a 21c room temp?

Supposedly the installer is experienced in installing a lot of these systems. Maybe the bypass damper not working properly really is the culprit.

Edit: I've just paid $500 so far. They are really nice and seem receptive of helping. Just hoping they can actually get it performant.

tweake

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#3324497 25-Dec-2024 20:19

AlDrag:

Correct. At night it still takes a while for the room to get to the set point, but it does get there. Where during the day it seems to never go down.

When it reaches the set point at night, it stays there for a while, then I wake up, I find some rooms to be at about 18 degrees instead of 21!

The outdoor compressor fan never stops. It does if it put it on fan mode, but if on cooling, it always runs regardless of the room temp relative to the set point.

i wonder if its sucking in a lot of attic air. do they have the erv hooked up yet?

also once the air temp get to set point, does the indoor fan speed drop?

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#3324499 25-Dec-2024 20:25

tweake:
i wonder if its sucking in a lot of attic air. do they have the erv hooked up yet?

also once the air temp get to set point, does the indoor fan speed drop?

I did wonder that. The ERV is setup. On the the day of install, I thought I could smell the attic quite strongly, suspecting the vents were leaking or something. But I don't think it smells like that anymore. Probably just because the attic ladder was open all day (the attic ladder is in our bedroom wardrobe).

I don't think the fan speed drops when it reaches set point. But I'd have to actually check. On auto mode, it seems to run the fan speed at the same speed always. Setting high fan speed does increase the fan speed though.

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#3324500 25-Dec-2024 20:34

AlDrag:

I did wonder that. The ERV is setup. On the the day of install, I thought I could smell the attic quite strongly, suspecting the vents were leaking or something. But I don't think it smells like that anymore. Probably just because the attic ladder was open all day (the attic ladder is in our bedroom wardrobe).

I don't think the fan speed drops when it reaches set point. But I'd have to actually check. On auto mode, it seems to run the fan speed at the same speed always. Setting high fan speed does increase the fan speed though.

i don't know that exact model, but the fan speed should drop down to low speed when you hit set point rather than turn off like most do because of the erv. i just hope they didn't do the dirty trick of not wiring it up and set the heat pump to continuous air speed. on continuous (mid, high) air speed you most likely will get lowering of temps as the attic cools down and cools the heat pump. i get the same thing with my split heat pump.

if your up to a bit of crawling in the ceiling, take some pics of the setup and wiring connections. pics of the erv ports and where it goes. make sure thats hooked up right and its not just bypassing and the heatpump is sucking in hot outdoor air all the time.

timmmay

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#3324505 25-Dec-2024 21:03

AlDrag:

Yea....I'll measure the vent again. What temp do you think the vent should be if I'm trying to target a 21c room temp?

Supposedly the installer is experienced in installing a lot of these systems. Maybe the bypass damper not working properly really is the culprit.

Edit: I've just paid $500 so far. They are really nice and seem receptive of helping. Just hoping they can actually get it performant.

I've never measured the temperature at the supply diffuser, I don't think I'll need it tomorrow as the weather is looking to pack it in. I could check in a few days, I'll try to remember to do that.

I asked Perplexity AI, it says the air temperature at the diffuser in the room should be between about 12 degrees and 16 degrees C.

It really sounds like something is hooked up incorrectly to me. Even with a 6 or so kw heat pump it should be capable of cooling the house on an early summers day with no problems, and it should cut off when it's meant to. Try turning it on before it gets hot, to keep it cool, rather than trying to cool from high temperatures. Either method works for us, but if the house was say 25 degrees it would take a few hours to get it all the way down to 20 degrees on low fan - maybe 1-2 hours on medium fan. I prefer low fan for cooling, but either way the house feels like an igloo when it's turned on, possibly because our heat pump is a bit oversized.

AlDrag

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#3324508 25-Dec-2024 21:31

I will try do a crawl in the attic tomorrow. Never done so before, but I assume I just need to walk on the beams.

When using just "fan" mode. The outdoor unit fan doesn't spin, but air is still coming through due to the ERV I assume.

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