On Friday, April 7, 2017 at 8:55:23 AM UTC-4, TimR wrote:
On Wednesday, April 5, 2017 at 5:11:07 PM UTC-4, wrote:
I just ran a basic whole house manual J on my 2 story house with
finished basement in Waterloo. I was conservative - going for the low


Ding ding ding! We have a winner. Without a manual J you are just guessing. Install companies always estimate too high, and deliver oversized equipment, which is the worst thing in a humid climate.

If you've done a manual J, and you have a number for what your load is supposed to be, theoretically you could test it.

You could keep track of the run time of your equipment and the degree days, and see if you got it right.

I have never seen this done, in either residential or commercial. That is strange in commercial where you have DDC control and can track actual flows and heat transfer - maybe design engineers don't want to know.