Oct 15, 2009 06:39 PM
73191 Views
(Updated Oct 15, 2009 06:41 PM)
I had recently installed a 100ltr V gard solar water heater at my house in Trivandrum and would like to share with others my experience. The product is good and gives hot water all the time. However, I failed to find enough coverage on the actual costs involved or the output given by the product on the web or elsewhere. As is to be expected the company representatives hype the ability of their product before purchase. Let me first break down the costs I incurred in installing this system and at the same time detail the requirements to install it.
The heater itself including cost, transportation and assembly at location cost Rs.18200. The heater requires water to be supplied from a water tank sited at a height of 1.5 mtrs above the floor level. My house is a single storied terraced house and the heater has been sited for maximum sunlight. We have two existing tanks, but as they were installed when the house was constructed twenty years ago, the difficulties involved in raising them and giving pipe connection to the heater caused me to buy another tank and this required a steel construction of 1.5 mtrs height and together with the fittings they cost Rs.6300.
Now for hot water to be transported to the two bathrooms and kitchen required hot water piping for about 36mtrs, together with fittings they cost Rs.10700. Of course this includes two hot water taps one for the kitchen and one for one of the bathrooms costing Rs.1750. Thus I incurred total cost of Rs.35200 for the solar heater. (Approximately double the price as advertised by the manufacturers).
Prior to installation the company guys were boasting of temperatures upto 95 deg Celsius. By my experience the highest temperature on a sunny day at 3 pm is around 85 deg Celsius and in the morning at 6 we get around 60-70 deg Celsius for two people to have bath. Performance in rainy or cloudy days is yet to be seen however. All in all I would say the idea is good, with hot water available all the time. The idea of connecting the hot water to the kitchen was suggested by the company guys and it is quite good, as without it we will not be making maximum use of the water heater.
The question that remains however is whether it is worth its price. As I mentioned I had absolutely no idea about the costs after purchase and if I had known beforehand the requirements other than the cost price, I wonder if I would have taken the trouble of installing it.
A couple more facts as I have been told -
1) The tank and the tubes may get scale depending on the water in use. If so, in 6 months to a year it will have to be cleaned out and the company people charge around Rs.350 for one time. There is apparently no other maintenance. However, there are 15 glass tubes in a 100 ltr heater, and though the chances of a tube breaking by itself is less, it may happen especially if there is no water in the tube for some reason on a hot day. The cost of each tube is Rs.480. If the vents get clogged or some mishap happens rupturing the hot water tank that will cost around Rs.7000 or 8000.
2) The water in the tubes keep evaporating, and I have no way of verifying this, but the representative claimed that 500 ltrs of water may evaporate in 2-3 days. If this were the case, we may be saving electricity, but are we not wasting water?
Anyway let me wind up this, the solar water heater indeed gives hot water through the day in warm days and in tropical climate like Kerala, we are utilising the energy from the sun. However, I feel the costs involved are indeed exorbitant, and utility wise, the heater's cost may be realized as energy saving may be in 8-10 years, i.e. if the heater happens to survive that long without major repairs. And the big question in trying to gain something are we losing something - WATER? I hope this is of some use for those who are going to invest in a solar heater for home use.
