The flash sparkling new BMW 320 pulled into my drive... this might be an expensive visit.... but...WOW I was lucky... the first person in the area to take up Smart Energy's special offer.... but I had to take it there and then or someone else would take it. Even to this day, Im not sure what the special offer was...
So that was how the high pressured salesman continued his pitch. I was shown some wonderful photos of their head office, pictures of the sun and other pretty pictures. The sales pitch was screaming THIS IS GOING TO BE EXPENSIVE FOR WHAT IT IS.... But, as I am in the heating industry, and wanted to use my house as an experiment as to if this solar is worth getting into I managed to get past the sales man high pressure selling and agreed to get a DIY kit.
For the £5000 + that the kit was costing me, I had hoped that it would be high quality, afraid its not, but its not rubbish either. The pipe that takes the "special liquid" from the collector to the cylinder in my opinion, looks DIY, but then it is made for ease of installation, not to look pretty. (although they kept telling me just how wonderful the stuff is!) the joints chunky giving it a rather armature look. It would have been more professional looking if they hads offered copper tube.
Anyway, the engineer came to "commission" the DIY instulation, but that was just pumping this "special fluid" into the pips and then left with out telling how to set the electronics. So after reading the book, throwing it away I worked out how it should be set against the rest of the central heating.
So now its been running for 4 months and what do I think... well on a cloudy day, it does give your some impressive heat, on a sunny day, it will heat your tank up... but it would seem that the solar collectors are so efficent, that as soon as we get a summers day that reaches 21deg, the "Special liquid" gets so hot that it turns into a gas and the pump is turned off, so the hot water will not heat up... AMAZING on a hot summers day, there is no hot water! Another problem is that you can hear the electronics switching the pump on, off...on ... off... on off as it is trying to decide what to do. (so that isnt goint to last too long!)
SO are we going to be advising our customers to have solar heating... well, this free energy is expensive, very expensive. Assuming you dont have to call smart energy back, it will take around 20 years to get your money back, but each time Smart Energy has to make a visit, add another 3 years. Oh and the industry says that a solar heating instulation only lasts 20 years. (well I dount it will be that long with the pump clikcing on for a second then off for a second, then back on)
SO COME ON SOLAR BOYS.... Drop the price and help save the planet
How helpful would this review be to a person making a buying decision? Rating guidelines
5 Grand+ sounds very expensive, at least a Grand more than I would expect to pay.
majeedkazi 30.05.2008 16:09
Hi welcome to Ciao, very good first review
martinwi 30.05.2008 15:49
A great first review. Although a shortish review this packed lots of info in it with the good points (point perhaps) and all the negatives. This reminded me of Double glazing sales people. Martin.
Advantages: Good early savings from SMART Energy Master. Professional People. Quality Panels. Flexible Disadvantages: It is complex, expensive and you must use the system properly to gain savings
May 30th, 2008
very helpful by (100%):
