wokisawi,

Both the HVAC guy and I came up with independently with the same idea of using a Venmar Eko HRV, so he is familiar with the units. The HVAC guy is out of Colorado Sprtings and seems like a nice fellow. I don't know if he does work in Boulder, but it was 2 hours for him to come to Salida, and he was fine with that. Contact info is:

Darrell Allen (wife Lisa runs the office)
Atlantic Heating and Air Conditioning and DOWN to EARTH Home Energy Assessments
1425 Valley St # A
Colorado Springs, CO 80915-2848
(719) 264-8222
www.atlantic-heating.com

I would see if he is willing to come to your place, which I bet he will. If so, I would get a quote from him. If not, ask him for a recommendation for somebody in your area.

Lee

THANK YOU!!  This is exactly what I needed.  Wish Venmar could provide this info!

Oh well - it was a good try.  They don't come to Boulder, and they said there are no installers or even distributors for Venmar in our area.  Seems strange?

Did you happen to also deal with a distributor, not just an installer?

Venmar only gave me a contact for someone in Minnesota --  doesn't help

woksawi,

If the Venmar is the solution to your needs I wouldn't let the lack of a local supplier stop me. I imagine the shipping of a unit from any supplier would not be prohibitive and any local, competent HVAC person should be able to do the install. I am also looking at a similar setup and would feel comfortable doing the install myself.

woksawi-

For my house, which was a production house and not a custom house, my builder was already using the HVAC guy in Colorado Springs whose contact info I provided previously. The houses in my neighborhood do not include HRV's as a standard feature but rather use continuously operating exhaust fans to vent the crawl space, but I wanted to use an HRV instead. The HVAC guy contacted his consultant that handles energy efficiency stuff to get a recommendation, and I searched the internet to see what I could find. We both came up with the Venmar Eko HRV. Guess I just got lucky that the HVAC guy was willing, for an extra cost, to install the HRV and tie it into the natural-gas fired, high efficiency furnace that he was also installing in my house at the same time.

I am sorry that you could not get Darrell to come up to Boulder, and that he could not provide any help in providing a contact for that area. An option would be to check with installers there and see if any of them handle HRV's, and what brands they work with. Then you could check that brand out on the internet and see how well it performs. I think that the fellow that Darrell contacted about an HRV recommendation was Justin Wilson at Building Performance Solutions, in the Springs, http://www.buildwithbps.com/contact.html. I think that he mostly consults with builders, but he might be willing and able to help you out.

Lee

Thanks - will give that a try.  Our situation is slightly different re buying/hooking up ourselves.  We need separate ducting and because of how it has to go (e.g. the builder didn't plan the route accordingly before concrete floor was poured on second floor) I'm still unsure if, because of duct turns/length, etc that might be needed, we couldn't use the Venmar Eko so I'm afraid to just buy it and have someone install.

A few companies here have recommended other units simply because that's what they rep (e.g. Broan, Lifebreath) but they don't seem as efficient as the Venmar Eko.  We'll see!

looking over HRV bids now and it seems ridiculous what some of these guys are proposing. Intake and exhaust in same exact area? Tons of supplies and returns? And they want $5k to install (minimum) which seems very high. This seems odd that we can't find a company that knows how to install HRV. How best to find an experienced company in Boulder?

Another question - there is a discrepancy on our bids -- some suggest supply/return in every room. Others say supply and return on each floor. Is there a good article about best recs for installing HRV?

We used to use a lot of ducted HRV but stopped using it because it never performed as promised. We now use FiWi HRV all the time and find it simpler, cheaper and way more efficient and there are no ducts that require regular cleaning. You don't need to chase humidity all around your house with ductwork, the humidity will come to the HRV unit quickly through the air by just dropping the RH% in one room.

For the FiWi HRV system on the Viking website, it looks not really all that different than simply putting an HRV system in a few places around the house in order to avoid running lots of ducting. It seems like this could in principle be done with more conventional HRV systems as well, as opposed to being a property of the particular fine wire heat exchanger. Is there some kind of implied price differential between FiWi and conventional HRV units which makes this more economical than single unit plus ducts?
Also, it seems like with the Viking system, one is relying on passive venting between rooms in a given area to provide air exchange. By contrast, a ducted HRV approach usually seems to include air intake/exhaust per room.
What am I missing?

Because there is 20km of fine wire in each heat exchanger, its the most efficient heat exchanger in the world, this allows it to be compact in size allowing it to fit into a wall. Ducts mean fungus and mould growth so the less ductwork the better.

Not sure what type of obstructions your build presents as far as duct routing but if your are being sold more than 4 supplies and returns then that is overkill. I would think 4 would be max for any using this model. If you haven't already, take a look at the installation manual for this and use the non-air handler hook-up example. Since the duct sizes you are dealing with (6" max.) it shouldn't be a big deal to run within walls (may need to go to oval duct) and joist spaces.

For my plans I am looking at a supply in the master bed, great room, and a split arrangement for the 2 bedrooms upstairs. Return in master bath, upstairs bath, great room, and upstairs loft. Don't give up, just get more informed.

Thanks - not giving up yet, although with all the other construction issues, I am about to lose my mind :)

Re obstructions - the contractor "forgot" that we were doing an HRV and would need ducting (or electrical for that matter) and when the second floor concrete (2 inches) was poured - WITH the RADIANT TUBES in it - he forgot to have them leave areas where the ducts could come through (and some of the electric, like kitchen island, etc) so it would mean drilling through concrete that has radiant tubes in it (risky) or doing a circuitous route. 

He also had the plumbing installed BEFORE the HRV ducting and it is now in the way of the most obvious HRV route.  Might have to move plumbing.  I know, great contractor.  That's not even the whole story.

Anyway, this is helpful re the 4 supplies and returns and that they do NOT need to be in the same room - that is what I read.  I am getting more educated but learn more from this board then from subs because every single sub says something different, and says it like they are right.

The guy who is supposed to run the system now also put the intake and exhaust (to outside) in the same area only a few feet away from each other.  Common sense tells me that bad/exhausted air is then being pulled right back into the house!  It's a little complicated because that area of the house (close to where HRV will go) is mostly underground, but still, doesn't make sense to have them next to each other. 

I again called Venmar today to try to talk to someone in tech.  Again to no avail. 

woksawi - I assume because you mention chemical sensitivities, you would be running this unit more than code requirement? If you run it full time (or just minimum) how does it make up the heat loss of a cold Colorado day? With a forced air system the furnace further tempers the air but now at best you would need an electric heat element in the HRV to temper the incoming air. If say the temp. is minus 20, I believe the unit will be recirc'ing about 20% of the time to defrost. So all in all an HRV may not be as economical to run as the manufacturers suggest. Also for sensitivities you need to make sure you are exhausting from all areas (radiant heat provides no air mixing.) I wonder if you would not be better with straight exhaust and makeup air entering through a fan coil since you already have hot water. On mine (Calgary Alberta) I am using a high velocity unit with a heat coil to temper the incoming air. As the H.V.U. uses 2" ducts for the the branches it does not take as much room as standard pressure ducting however I do feel they are somewhat over priced.

I'm not familiar with an HVU - do you have a link to brand/more info?