EcoSolar Energy Conscious Design Limited
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controller turns on the pump to circulate water from the cylinder to the collector to raise the
collector temperature.
The Solar Controller also has the capability to data log the heat being recovered from the collector,
this requires the optional flow meter to be installed.
The Solar Controller has four buttons of quadrant appearance located to the left of the LCD display.
Pressing the left and right buttons allows the user to scroll through the different temperatures being
monitored, the fault diagnosis screen and the two programming screens. The up and down buttons
are only used during system programming and should not be used by the occupier. T1 is the
temperature in the top of the solar collector, T2 is the temperature in the bottom of the hot water
cylinder and T3 is the temperature in the top of the hot water cylinder.
Backup Water Heating
The backup water heating system needs to be managed to maximise the use of the solar heating
system, minimise the energy consumed heating water, and minimise the risk of Legionella. The
backup heating system is normally electric elements although gas, diesel and heat pump systems are
also common. Cylinders with electric elements, larger than 200 litres capacity, will generally have two
elements, one at low level the second at high level. Under normal circumstances the backup heating
source is turned off and is only turned on when additional hot water is required or to minimise the
risk of Legionella.
The user should monitor the weather and water temperature in the top of the cylinder ( T3 ), over a
short period of time they will determine the temperature below which additional hot water is
required, this temperature will vary from household to household and depend upon hot water
consumption. If the water does need to be heated the user should press the boost button on the
EcoSolar “One Shot” controller. This controller will heat the water and automatically turn off the
heating once the water is up to temperature, the user will not need to turn it off. The over-ride switch
on the “One Shot” controller turns on and keeps on the electric elements. Under normal use the
boost operation should suffice, however, if there is significant hot water usage the user may want to
consider using the over-ride button.
In cylinders with multiple elements, with the “One Shot” connected to the top element, using the
boost feature will heat only the top portion of the cylinder, which may be sufficient for normal usage.
Using the over-ride feature will maintain the water in the top of the cylinder at the set point
temperature, however this will consume significant energy and savings will be reduced.
Legionella Control
Unless the hot water cylinder is being heated regularly to greater than 60
O
C, there is a risk of
Legionella establishing itself in the hot water cylinder. In order to minimize this risk the water should
be heated to 60
O
C for 6 hours once a week. This function can be manually managed or EcoSolar are
able to supply controllers or timers that take care of this function for you. If you are managing this
yourself we recommend that the water is heated at the same time each week this way the
management will hopefully become habitual. If the cylinder has two immersion heaters the lower one
should be initiated to maximise the amount of water heated.
