Your MVHR system
Enjoy benefits to your health and your home from your Mechanical Ventilation Heat Recovery System (MVHRS).
Your MVHRS:
• Improves indoor air quality
• Reduces the risk of condensation, damp and mould
• Can help to reduce heating bills
What is a Mechanical Ventilation with Heat Recovery System (MVHRS)?
An MVHRS is a whole house ventilation system that runs nonstop throughout the day. It’s perfect for today’s modern home where comfort, energy efficiency and health and wellbeing are important. The system might be mounted in a cupboard, in a utility space or sometimes in the loft. Hidden pipes run from the system to each room in the property and only the air valves are visible on the ceiling.
How does the system work?
The system extracts air from the bathroom, kitchen and any utility rooms, moving the stale, moist and odour-laden air outside. As this air is extracted, it passes through a heat exchanger that recovers up to 95% of the heat in the air. At the same time, replacement fresh air is brought in from outside.
This ‘new’ air passes through a filter and the heat exchanger where it picks up and re-uses the heat. This warm clean air is then supplied to living rooms and bedrooms.
This cycle creates a balanced and continuous level of ventilation into the home, which is vital for preventing condensation, damp and mould.
When outside air temperature rises, the heat recovery mode is automatically switched off and the unit goes into a ‘summer mode’. This ensures the home continues to be ventilated, but prevents additional heat being passed into the home.
Save on heating and fuel bills
It costs around £35-£75 per year in electricity to run an MVHR system constantly. At the same time, the system will help lower heating bills by at least the same amount, by recovering up to 95% of the heat in the air being extracted. In most homes, your heating bills will be lower than the cost of running the MVHR. This is why it’s really important that you don’t switch the MVHR system off.
Your system may have a boost mode; if it does, using this when cooking or showering will reduce the moisture level in the air, reducing the energy needed to heat the air. To activate the boost mode hit use the switch (usually located on a wall switch in the kitchen/bathroom or via a remote sensor) when cooking, showering, or drying clothes indoors, and leave it on for about 20 minutes afterwards.
Troubleshooting
My MVHR is noisy, what do I do?
If your MVHRS unit becomes noisy or there’s a noticeable change in the pressure of the air coming into your home, it may mean that the filters need cleaning. Try taking the filters out, vacuuming them and putting them back in. It’s also a good idea to clean off the air outlets/extractors surfaces.
You can also watch our MHVR video guide.
If this doesn’t solve the issue, call us on 0300 777 2600 or use the MyGolding portal to raise a repair. If your home is less than a year old, please contact our New Build Aftercare team in the usual way.