A popular Gloucester holiday destination is benefiting from the arrival of Rinnai Infinity energy efficient condensing continuous flow water heaters.
Croft Farm Leisure and Waterpark is a camping and caravanning center with its own lake for windsurfing and other watersports, perfect for an activity-based family holiday or simply a great day out.
Croft Farm offers 80 tent and touring pitches, split between the two sides of the central lake. All the pitches have electric hook up points. Two and four person chalets are also available and in the Pod Village each Pod can sleep four people. Nearby toilet and shower blocks service the touring pitches and the static facilities. Other facilities include a laundry and dish washing sinks.
Rinnai hot water appliances first made their appearance at Croft Farm nine years ago when they were installed in the fully equipped fitness center housing a gym, sauna, and sunbed facilities and in a separate shower block. The leisure park has now upgraded another shower and toilet block replacing an old, dated and inefficient electric system with two Rinnai Infinity HDC 1500 externally mounted water heaters. By using the robust external units designed to stand up to all weather conditions including frost, there is no need to dedicate internal space for them as they happily sit on an external wall, which also means there is no fluing to worry about, thereby keeping installation costs down.
“The season was already under way (the park is open between March and October). The electric heaters were still running while the Rinnai units went in and we shut down for just eight hours to activate the changeover so the whole process was painless.”
Alan Newell
The Rinnai heavy duty condensing range uses two heat exchangers to capture residual heat from flue gases to pre-heat incoming fresh water, with the HDC1500i turning in an impressive 105% nett efficiency*. These figures add up to considerable ongoing energy savings when compared with non-condensing continuous flow water heaters.
Owner Alan Newell takes up the story: “The electric instantaneous water heaters had reached the end of their life span so we wanted to switch to the Rinnai heaters we have elsewhere in the park. Energy saving considerations definitely formed part of that decision as well as being impressed by the performance of the Rinnai units in the other shower block and gym which have never suffered a breakdown.
“We first approached Rinnai nine years ago after seeing ads in the trade press so I called them and they were very helpful. Plus, our plumber Bob Place was very keen to use them”.
In this latest refurbishment of a shower block with four showers eight hand basins and three outside sinks for dishwashing and veg prep the two Rinnai units are performing well. “In fact, prior to the refurbishment campers were complaining that there was never enough hot water for them to wash up satisfactorily. Now they are commenting on how hot the water is and say it is brilliant. We are happy because we know the hot water will never run out whatever the demand. As for the installation itself, it went without a hitch, according to Newell, who says: “The season was already under way (the park is open between March and October). The electric heaters were still running while the Rinnai units went in and we shut down for just eight hours to activate the changeover so the whole process was painless.
According to Chris Goggin of Rinnai UK: “Continuous flow systems are far more energy efficient than storage systems, and the preferred method of heating water where gas and water services allow. Leisure and caravan parks like Croft Farm are a prime example of this, as they require high volumes of safe temperature controlled hot water at intermittent times of the day. With the Rinnai continuous flow system there is no chance of running out of hot water.”
