Water Heating & Pumping

Good day all. I’m not sure if this is posted in the correct heading, and Mods, if wrong please correct. I live in Pretoria East. I have a retrofit EV tube hot water solar system. It has 24 tubes and use is made of the existing 150L geyser. The water gets hot during the day up to 65° C. The geyser size is 150L. However, the water cools right down at night. If I do not set the Geyserwise to turn on the grid electricity, the water in the morning is in the low 30’s. With the cold snap we are having it has got even lower. This I found out last night and the power being off and this morning it was 21°C. For this reason, I do rely on morning hot water f…

I'm looking at installing a Geyserwise onto an old Kwikot geyser to give better temperature visiblity and control, as this is running from an Inverter with Solar panels and battery. Do I need to drain the Geyser to install the new thermostate, or can this be done while the geyser is full of water (with power off of course)?

Hey guys, I read that the geyserwise system works on the premise that the solar geyser pump will turn on when the collector temperature is 7deg higher than the geyser temp, it then stays on for x duration and turns off again, then repeats the cycle. My question. Should the solar geyser pump be running continuously throughout the day (provided the collector output temp is higher than the input collector temp)? OR, should the pump toggle on and off throughout the day pushing bursts of hot water into the geyser?

I have had a 2700L JoJo installed as a municipal backup that runs through a three stage whole house filter and driven by a 0.75 Kw JoJo VSD pump and I experience very low water pressure since installation.

Hi Please advise on what to do. My geyser is on a timer in the morning and evening. It works independently from our solar power. It refuses to come on or allow us to turn on the geyser.

My 13 year old Kwikot ran as usual yesterday. It did not run at all today. The display is dead. I don’t want to peuter, but I do want hot water fairly pronto. I have established that the unit does get power (even I can use a multimeter) I can get Kwikot in. They’ve already told me that there is no fixing this model. So that will be a new installation, effectively from scratch. I could go for another brand, but I suspect that other than ITS they are all the same. And again it will be an installation. Third option, and maybe the quickest to implement, is to reconnect the element that is still in the geyser. Put that on a timer so it doesn’t draw from the…

Hi all, We have two geysers. One is warmed by a heat pump and we include that in the backed up circuits. This runs well with no problems. The guest geyser is on the sub DB, thus on the non-backed up sides. Some time ago I had the element in this changed from 3KW to 1KW. It took longer to warm up, sure, but I could use spare PV in the afternoon to heat it, and this was close but I got away with it. This geyser is controlled by a timer switch. When the timer was installed, the 3kw element would draw more than the current for which the timer is rated, so the setup is that the timer controls a solenoid which can handle the 3kw. Though I now have a 1kw element.…

Hi folks, I have recently had a solar system installed and have my solar geyser which is controlled by a geyserwise connected on the non essential side. I have set my geyser element to come on at midday and have set the temp to 65 degrees (maximum allowable on geyserwise), however it only heats up to 55 degrees and then the element switches off. Any ideas on why this would be happening ?

I am looking for recommendations for a wifi geyser timer 4 kW element Preferably something that could possibly connect to Home Assistant in the future

Hi, I have strange issue, well for me anyway, my gas geyser tries to ignite but, no flames. I then have to disconnect the orange gas pipe from the gas bottle, you can hear the gas in the pipe escape, poof, and if I then connect it again open the tap we have flames and hot water. why? it is like there is a gas block in the pipe which does not allow the gas from the bottle to push through, any thoughts on the issue? Thanks

I’m looking at different options to reduce my current water heating bill. I have a 200l geyser with a 4kW element (set to 55deg) which runs off a timer as follows: 05h15-06h45 and 15h30-19h30 My current daily power usage is approx 18-20kWh. I am investigating the option of a 5.4kW ITS heat pump which I am told will provide equivalent volume and rate of hot water (up to 60deg) but at a fraction of the power usage as my current geyser and element. 1) BRAND AND RELIABILITY: are ITS heat pumps reputable and reliable? Any other recommendations? 2) EFFICIENCY: is the claimed 1,2kW per hour power usage and the claimed 1.5-2hr time to heat water from 20…

So my old flat panel solar geyser which I have had for 16 years finally gave in.The insurance company replaced it with a Kwikot 16 tube solar geyser. I was all excited thinking I am going to get nice hot water in winter compared to my old solar geyser. This geyser does not have the element connected as I have a Heat Pump as well. The last few days I would estimate the water temp from the solar geyser to about approx 35deg.I was told by the installers this is normal for winter. Anyone out there with Kwikot solar geysers? Is this normal?

Hi Hope someone can help with more info. I bought a house about 2 years ago with a heatpump already installed. The problem is when taking a shower water will get cold very quickly and the next person need to wait about 45min before its hot again. We have getting used to it for the past 2 years, but I came across a post somewhere saying when installing a diverter valve will keep water warmer for longer. My question is can just add the diverter/loading valve to current plumbing or is there something to watch out for? Also do I need to add a non return valve to the cold water pipe? Advice will be appreciated.

Hi Members I need some help. Some back ground. We need to install a borehole pump with a solar supply. Head = 145m with 20,000l/hour. The AC requirement on the pump is 11-15kW. From the main DB to the pump = 110m With a 70mm2 cable over that distance (3+N) there is approx 30-40V drop. My first choice will be a grid-tied inverter option, as we need to irrigate after sunset. Are there any grid-tied inverter options that can function without a battery when the grid is down? 2nd option would be an island installation with a controller, VSD and DC pump Does anyone here have some experience in this regard? Thanks

Hi, has anyone had any experience with this? how do I achieve trickle heating my geyser during the day? So that it doesn’t use a bunch of batteries (morning) and also during the day when the wife is using the washing machine, pool, sprinklers etc….

Sharing the info below to save anyone in the market for a heat pump from a lot of hassle if you are looking at ITS for a solution. This is a factual and honest review of my experience with ITS Heat Pumps and their installer. In early May 2023, I contacted ITS through their website, inquiring about the installation of a heat pump. I was promptly contacted and informed that ITS would refer me to one of their installation agents. Subsequently, Carl from Urban Blue Maintenance reached out to me and provided a quotation for the installation. Post-installation, the first issue I encountered was excessive noise emanating from the heat pump. Urban Blue addressed this b…

Good day Does anyone have any experience with these kwikot integrated heat pumps. I cannot find any reviews on them. I would like to find anyone has installed them and what is the opinion on them .

I'm posting because I could not find anything on Google or this forum. If I have missed it, please link it here. I have had a 15 tube evacuated 150L solar geyser setup installed that feeds my current geyser/heat pump set up. The idea is to save on heating cost and have enough water to supply the house. I've seen that my electricity bill never went down since the installation and I wanted to know what should I expect in terms of temperature gains from my solar geyser (with no electric heating element). My current daily gain is around 15⁰C, with about 8⁰C losses and 1 person showering another 7-10⁰C. This does not seem correct t…

Hi Guys A friend of mine wants to install a Magneto Heat pump in order to help his batteries last longer (through the night). He normally turns his geyser on for an hour and this would take roughly 3Kwh from his batteries. Now as I understand it (correct me if I am wrong) the Magneto heat pump heats a cylinder of water to 60 degrees and maintains that heat for the heat exchanger to work. It only uses 750W to keep that water at 60 degrees, BUT… If that pump runs for 4 hours in a 24h time period, he is still using 3Kwh. My opinion is that he will be putting less strain on this inverter but the same amount of power will come from his batteries. For …

I have just installed a geyser wise thermostat and panel and notice that it using the element to heat the water to 58 degrees and after an hour or and hour and a half the temperature in the geyser dropped to 45 degrees. Any guidance please

Any recommendation for suppliers of solar geysers. Not sure yet if it will be a split system kit or complete high pressure solar geyser, still deciding on options in johannesburg area. It will be a diy install so I just need to purchase from a reliable supplier.

Hi We're building a house near Kruger and it's hot and sunny year round. What type of heating system would you do geysers? We're a family of 5. Would you go electric and power via solar panels? (we get tons of sun) Or would you go gas? It's a new house build so I'd prefer to plan it properly. Any advice and insight is appreciated!

We installed a sunsync 5KVA system a week ago and since then my geyser electricity consumption has shot through the roof. I have a CBI timer on my geyser and before the installation we were consuming approximately 25-30KWH on a 150litre geyser with it switched on all day. Since the installation this has sky rocketed to 80KWH a day and I have had to switch it and off to try spare electricity at intervals during the day. Apparently they installed a grid tie setup which is supposed to assist with the water heating through the day. Our usage of water has stayed the same. With it only running at intervals throughout the day (approximately 9 hours in total) we are no…

Hey! We currently have our geyser at home set on a timer for 2 hours in the evening and sometimes an hour during the day. Usage is at 5 - 8kw/h per day even with the timer on. the max draw ive seen is 3.3 kw/h so i assume is a 3kw element, i wont be suprised if its the oldest most outdated element possible - we baught the house about a year ago and the previous owners were narrowsighted and extreme cheapskates. I cant find much info on heat pumps and would love any imput and someone that can talk to long term use, maintanace etc etc vs just geyser. It seems these are the best: https://itssolar.co.za/product/4-5kw-super-its-residential-heat-pump/ I want to be co…

Hi It's me again! Sorry for all the posts, just handling different sections and would love some expert opinions, to check installers ideas against! A Few Notes Bed 1 is 6m x 6m Lounge is 12m x 6m Bed 3,4,5 are 4x4m Blue = internal units Yellow = Condenser and suggested piping route We've placed the condensers on concrete roofs, the rest of the roofing is thatch. North is towards the bottom right. House is thatch with a higher internal height. There are lots of windows and glass sliding doors. A Few Quick Questions Where would you place aircons? What sizing would you go for in each room?…