Manual For Residential 4

HVAC-Calc Residential 4.
0 1
HVAC-Calc Residential 4.0
INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................4
WELCOME ..........................................................................................................................................4
WHAT IS HVAC-CALC FOR?..............................................................................................................4

WHO IS THE PROGRAM FOR? .............................................................................................................4
WHAT ABOUT SUPPORT? ....................................................................................................................4
SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS ....................................................................................................................4
PRICING - LICENSING ..........................................................................................................................4
HOMEOWNER OR PERSONAL USE............................................................................................................4
BUSINESS ...............................................................................................................................................5
REVIEWING THE HEAT LOSS – HEAT GAIN BASICS ...........................................................5
DESIGN CONDITIONS ...........................................................................................................................5

WHAT IS THE HEAT LOSS OF A HOUSE? ............................................................................................6
WHAT IS HEAT GAIN ...........................................................................................................................6
SIZING WITH A RULE OF THUMB .......................................................................................................7
SIZING FURNACES................................................................................................................................7
SIZING AIR CONDITIONERS.................................................................................................................8
SIZING HEAT PUMPS ...........................................................................................................................9
THE HVAC-CALC TUTORIAL ......................................................................................................9
INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................................................................9
START THE PROGRAM .........................................................................................................................9
THE OPENING SCREEN ........................................................................................................................9
THE FINISHED SAMPLE HOUSE ........................................................................................................10
STARTING A NEW JOB .......................................................................................................................12
ADDING THE HOUSE ..........................................................................................................................12
WE’VE STARTED! ..............................................................................................................................13
HOW TO NAVIGATE ...........................................................................................................................14
ADDING DESIGN CONDITIONS...........................................................................................................14
ADDING INFILTRATION .....................................................................................................................15
ADDING A ZONE COMPONENT ..........................................................................................................16
THE DUCT COMPONENT....................................................................................................................17
RULE NUMBER 1 ................................................................................................................................17
ADDING THE LIVING ROOM ..............................................................................................................17
ADDING A FLOOR ...............................................................................................................................18
THE DOUBLE CLICK FEATURE ............................................................................................................19
THE CHANGE ALL BUTTON .................................................................................................................19
HVAC-Calc Residential 4.0 2
THE DELETE BUTTON..........................................................................................................................20

ADDING A WALL ................................................................................................................................20
RULE NUMBER 2 ................................................................................................................................20
ADDING A WINDOW ...........................................................................................................................21
ADDING A CEILING ............................................................................................................................22
MORE NAVIGATION ...........................................................................................................................23
CHANGING INFORMATION ................................................................................................................23
ADDING PEOPLE ................................................................................................................................23
ADDING THE DINING ROOM ..............................................................................................................24
THE RESULTS .....................................................................................................................................26
ADDING A FIREPLACE .......................................................................................................................26
ADDING A KITCHEN ...........................................................................................................................27
DOING A WHOLE HOUSE CALCULATION .........................................................................................29
ADDING ANOTHER ZONE ..................................................................................................................29
ADDING ALL ROOMS .........................................................................................................................29
THE BASEMENT FLOOR.....................................................................................................................29
BASEMENT WALLS ............................................................................................................................29
FINISHED ............................................................................................................................................32
LOADING IN A JOB .............................................................................................................................32
VIEWING AND PRINTING REPORTS...................................................................................................33
REPORTS IN PDF FORMAT ...............................................................................................................34
SIZING THE FURNACE ........................................................................................................................35
SIZING THE AIR CONDITIONER.........................................................................................................35
END OF TUTORIAL .............................................................................................................................35
HOW DO I …....................................................................................................................................35
HOW DO I REGISTER THE PROGRAM ..............................................................................................35

HOW DO I ADD MY HEADING ..........................................................................................................36
HOW DO I SAVE MY SLOGAN ...........................................................................................................36
HOW DO I DO MOBILE HOMES ........................................................................................................36
HOW DO I DO INSULATED CONCRETE FORMS................................................................................36
HOW DO I CHANGE THE ORDER OF ROOMS AND ZONES ...............................................................36
HOW DO I DO A CFM REPORT ........................................................................................................36
HOW DO I SIZE THE DUCTS ..............................................................................................................37
CHANGE CFM .....................................................................................................................................38
SPLIT ...................................................................................................................................................38
DELETE................................................................................................................................................38
SELECT ALL CHILDREN .......................................................................................................................38
CLEAR ALL CHILDREN ........................................................................................................................38
ENTER CFM DIRECTLY.......................................................................................................................38
THE DUCT REPORT..............................................................................................................................38
VIEW FULL REPORT ............................................................................................................................38
HOW DO I DO A HOT WATER BASEBOARD REPORT ......................................................................38
HOW DO I MAKE A COPY OF A JOB .................................................................................................39
HOW DO I CHANGE WHERE MY JOBS ARE STORED ......................................................................39
HOW DO I TURN OFF THE TONNAGE IN REPORTS ..........................................................................39
THE END .............................................................................................................................................39
Introduction
Welcome
My name is Don Sleeth and I thank you for choosing HVAC-Calc Residential 4.0. It was 1981
when I wrote my first Manual J heat loss and heat gain program, over 25 years ago. There
was no such thing as a PC at that time; IBM was still making only main frame computers. It
was written on a wonderful little computer, the Sharp PC 1500, which had all of 10K of
memory and only a one-line screen! The computer I use now has 12,800 times as much
memory. Computers have changed but people have not.
People still need computer programs that are simple to use. They need programs that don’t
require them to use a calculator or look up information in tables. That should be the
computer’s job.
I think you will enjoy using HVAC-Calc. That fact that I like simplicity and the fact that I was
an HVAC contractor for many, many years before writing computer programs shows in the
design of the program.
What is HVAC-Calc For?

HVAC-Calc Residential 4.0 calculates the heat loss and heat gain of a house. The heat loss
is used to size a furnace to heat the home and the heat gain is used to choose the proper size
of air conditioner. HVAC-Calc also has tools that you can use to determine the amount of air
needed in each room and the size of ductwork necessary or the amount of hot-water or
electric baseboards.
Who is the Program For?

The program has been designed for contractors, engineers, architects and homeowners to
use. It requires no special HVAC training or skills. There are no training classes or videos
necessary to use this program, just follow the manual and you will be totally capable in one
evening. We don’t sell training; we sell programs that don’t require training.
What About Support?

You are allowed one support call with your Home Owner License purchase. There is also a
frequently asked questions site which you will receive when you purchase.
System Requirements
The HVAC-Calc programs (both Residential 4.0 and Commercial 4.0) are light, small footprint
programs. They will work on any computer that has Windows 95, 98, NT 4.0, Windows 2000 ,
XP, and now Vista and on Macs with Virtual PC or SoftWindows. They were designed to work
at the lowest screen resolution of 640 X 480 but look much better at 800 X 600 or higher.
Pricing - Licensing
Homeowner or Personal Use

People wanting to do a heat loss, heat gain calculation on their own home can purchase a
special homeowner, “Non-profit Use Only” license for $49. This gives you the right to use the
program on your own house only and the program will expire in 2 months. It does not
include the printed manual or disks. I strongly suggest you print this manual rather than trying
to read it on screen. To order the Homeowner license please go to
http://www.hvaccomputer.com/order. We will send you an e-mail with a magic number to
unlock the free trial.
If you think you will require the program for a longer time, you can purchase a non-expiring
license for $389.
Business
The standard license is $389 for one user. This includes free updates (downloadable) and
support. It also includes the program on CD. Having been a contractor, I try to make things
easy for you, so you are allowed to install the program on up to 3 computers, but only one
user is licensed to use the program. If you have more than one user, you must pay an
additional $89 for each one. If you have multiple sites, you can call for special pricing. As a
further break, I consider family members as just the original user. This means your wife,
husband, son or daughter, even if employed in the business can use it for the single user
license.
To order on-line, please go to http://www.hvaccomputer.com/order or call 1-888-736-1101
We also have special pricing for educational institutions, please call.
Reviewing the Heat Loss – Heat Gain Basics
Design Conditions
As you will learn below, we are going to calculate the heat loss and heat gain of a house. In
order to do that, we have to choose what temperatures we are interested in. For heat loss, for
instance, the colder it is outside then the more heat your house is going to lose. What
outside winter temperature should you use? Should you choose a furnace big enough to
keep you warm when it is 10 F outside? Well, not if you live in Miami, or in Bismarck, ND.
Researchers suggest that you calculate your “Design Heat Loss” at a Design Temperature.
The Design Temperature is chosen to be the temperature that your location will be warmer
than, 97 ½ percent of the heating season. This means that the Design Temperature is not
the coldest it ever gets, just that it doesn’t get colder than that for more than 2 ½% of the time.
The recommended Design Temperatures for hundreds of cities in the USA and Canada are
built in to HVAC-Calc. If you were to choose a furnace that exactly matched your heat loss at
the design temperature, it would be able to heat your house just fine 97½ % of the time in an
average winter. During that other 2 ½ %, it would still heat your house, however maybe not
quite as warm inside as you would like.
But an average winter means that there are winters colder than average and warmer than
average. That is why most contractors would choose a furnace size that is larger than that
needed at design conditions by a safety factor. I use a safety factor of 20% to 25%. More is
said on this in the sections below.
Just like there is a Design Temperature for winter, there is also one for summer as well as a
Design Humidity Content known as Grains of Moisture. All of these design conditions are built
in to HVAC-Calc and available for you to use. You do not need to have a detailed
understanding of them.
What is the Heat Loss of a House?

Heat moves (transfers) from a warmer temperature to a colder temperature. If there is a big
temperature difference it moves faster, if there is a small temperature difference, it moves
slower. If there is only a little resistance (R-Value) it moves faster, if there is a larger R-value
(resistance), it moves slower. If there is a big area separating inside and outside it moves
faster, if there is a small area, it moves slower.
Assuming you want to keep the house at a constant temperature, say 72, as the heat moves
out you must replace it, using the furnace.
Heat is measured in BTU’s (British Thermal Units). As you can see from the paragraphs
above, it is not the fact that heat moves out of your house that is important, it is how fast it
moves out that matters. It is the rate, or speed, of heat loss that matters. If the house loses
50,000 BTU’s each hour then its’ heat loss is 50,000 BTU per hour. This is confusingly
written 50,000 BTUH even though it should be BTU/H.
When people talk about the Heat Loss of a house, they are usually talking about the Design
Heat Loss of the house, the heat loss at the Design Temperature.
There are two sources of heat loss in a house. One source is heat transfer through the
envelope of the building, the outside walls, the windows, the ceiling and the floor if it is not
above a heated space. The other source of heat loss is infiltration. Infiltration is the amount
of cold air that either sneaks into the house through cracks and door openings, or is purposely
brought into the house for ventilation.
Here is a summary of the factors affecting heat loss
Temperature difference
Reducing the inside temperature and moving to a warmer climate are two ways to reduce
heat loss
Area of the building envelope
Smaller houses have lower heat losses than larger ones.
Thermal Resistance
Adding insulation to the walls and ceiling (increasing R-value) reduces heat loss
Tightness
Better window frames, sealing cracks particularly around doors reduces infiltration as
does better fireplaces
What is Heat Gain

Heat Gain of course is very much like heat loss, except here we are talking about the amount
of heat that the house gains in the summer time. In the summer, the temperature difference
goes the other way, it is warmer outside and ideally, cooler inside. Heat is transferred from
the hot outside and it also is brought in with outside air, infiltration.
The four factors discussed above all affect heat gain also, in exactly the same way they affect
heat loss. However there is one additional and very important factor, solar gain through glass.
In addition to heat transferring in through the house envelope and sneaking in through
infiltration it is also radiated in by sunlight, both direct and indirect, through windows, glass
doors and skylights.
There is also an additional unit of measurement that is used to describe the cooling capacity
of air conditioners and that is the “Ton”. One Ton = 12,000 BTU per hour (BTUH). It comes
from the number of BTU’s absorbed by a ton of ice melting in 24 hours. If you have a heat
gain of 30,000 BTUH (at the summer design temperature) then you would need to remove
30,000 BTUH in order to keep the house at the indoor design temperature of say 75.
You could remove the 30,000 BTUs each hour by either setting up some fans to blow the
inside air over a mountain of ice, being sure to completely melt 2 ½ tons each day, or you can
install a 2 ½ ton air conditioner. Due to the difficulty of obtaining ice these days and the
problems associated with drinking two and a half tons of ice water each day, most
homeowners choose the A/C.
Sizing With a Rule of Thumb

Some contractors still feel they can accurately size an air conditioner or furnace with a “Rule
of Thumb” such as 800 sq.ft. per ton. Don’t put too much value on the number 800, I have
heard it all the way from 400 to 1200!. Thumbs can do a lot of things, but they can’t size
HVAC equipment. Here is an example that blows the “rule of thumb” method right out of the
water.
Picture a scenic lake and a lovely custom home on the south shore. The house is 3,200 sq ft
with a view of the lake in almost every room. Of course those windows face the lake to the
North. Mr. North who owns the house calls Bubba Sizebythumb the A/C contractor to install
an air conditioner. Mr. Sizebythumb divides the square footage of 3200 by 800 and installs a
4 Ton air conditioner.
Mr. South admires the house from across the lake where he has a building lot and has the
same house built on his lot, with a lovely view of the lake, to the south of course. He too calls
Bubba Sizebythumb who does the math and installs a 4 ton unit.
Mr. South absolutely cooks in August with the sun streaming in the glass, and must close the
blinds too, thus losing his $100,000 view, to achieve relief from the heat. Mr. North finds he
has to turn his thermostat colder and colder to try to achieve a feeling of comfort. He can
never find the right setting for his AC because an oversized AC does not remove enough
humidity.
Rules of thumb can’t work. That is why you need to do an accurate heat loss/heat gain
calculation. Ta Da!!
Sizing Furnaces
The first and most important step in sizing a furnace is to do the heat loss calculation. This is
what HVAC-Calc does. When you are finished you will have a number that is the Design Heat
Loss of the house. Let’s say that number is 52,234 BTUH. As discussed above, this means
that the house loses 52,234 BTU’s each hour when the outdoor temperature is the Winter
Outdoor Design temperature for your area.
Obviously, you want a furnace with an output of at least 52,234 BTUH. Most contractors,
including myself, would add a safety factor to the requirement. After all, weather data is
averaged to come up with the Winter Design Temperature and you want to be warm even on
colder than average winters. My own personal recommendation is a 20% to 25% safety
factor. I do get some flack from the energy conservation enthusiasts on this
recommendation, you have to judge for yourself.
Please note: There is no safety factor built into the program. The results are as accurate
as possible. Just in case you missed that, there is no safety factor built into the program.
So, 52,234 plus 20% = 62,680 BTUH, this means a furnace with a 60,000 or 70,000 output
would do nicely.
Why not add a big safety factor, like 100% to be really safe? There are a number of reasons
why not.
Operating costs go up. A furnace that runs only for short bursts uses more fuel, much like city
driving compared to highway driving.
Initial costs of the furnace and the larger ductwork go up.
Comfort level may go down due to short bursts of hot air and long off cycles
Furnace life may be shortened due to condensation on the heat exchanger.
Sizing Air Conditioners

Sizing air conditioners is a little more difficult than sizing furnaces. First let’s look at the job of
an air conditioner. An air conditioner actually has two jobs, job one is to lower the inside
temperature (i.e. remove heat) and job two is to lower the inside humidity (i.e. remove
moisture). Both jobs are equally important.
The tricky part comes in because thermostats, which are devices that know nothing about
humidity, control air conditioners. When an air conditioner is running, the warm moist inside
air is blown over a cold air conditioning coil called an evaporator. This cools the air and in so
doing, humidity in the air condenses to water, and is routed to a drain. That is how the
humidity is removed, it condenses and goes down the drain.
When the temperature inside drops to the set point of the thermostat, the air conditioner
stops. However, maybe it didn’t run long enough to remove enough of the humidity in the air.
This is why Mr. North, in our example above, keeps turning down the thermostat. It is not
really the cooling he is looking for, it is the humidity removal. If the air conditioner can cool the
air too quickly, it does not run long enough to remove the humidity.
If a home is cooled by an air conditioner that is too large, the occupants tend to keep turning it
cooler and cooler because they are not comfortable. The house is cool and damp. So the
goal is to match the cooling load of the house (heat gain) quite closely to total cooling capacity
of the air conditioner. No safety factor should be added to the cooling load when choosing the
size of air conditioner.
There is a further consideration in dry climates. When you run HVAC-Calc, (yes, we will be
getting to that part) you will notice that the Total Heat Gain in the reports is broken down into
two components; sensible heat gain and latent heat gain. Likewise air conditioner capacities
are broken down into the same two components, sensible and latent. When you add the two
together, you get the total cooling capacity that is used to rate an air conditioner.
The sensible cooling capacity is the capacity of the air conditioner to remove heat from the air,
i.e. to lower the temperature. The latent cooling capacity is the capacity of the unit to remove
humidity from the air. In a dry climate, the latent cooling capacity is of no interest or value,
there is no moisture to remove. In a dry climate, the heat gain of a house is almost entirely
sensible heat so you must make sure to choose an air conditioner with a sensible capacity
that matches the sensible gain of the house.
For instance, suppose you live in Nevada and your total cooling load is 30,000 BTUH. You
may think, great, I need a 2 ½ ton unit. Wrong, if you look more closely at the HVAC-Calc
printed report, you will notice that the Total Heat Gain = 30,000 and the Sensible Heat Gain =
28,000 and the Latent Heat Gain = 2,000. Now, look at the published capacities of the 2 ½
ton unit. They may be Total Capacity = 30,000, Sensible Capacity = 20,000 and Latent
Capacity = 10,000. The unit is too small; it will not remove enough sensible heat. You will
need to find a larger unit with a higher sensible cooling capacity. If you can not find the
published capacities, a rough guide is that 72% of the total capacity is sensible.
Please note: There is no safety factor built into the program. The results are as accurate
as possible. Just in case you missed that, there is no safety factor built into the program.
Sizing Heat Pumps

Heat pumps, in most climates provide heat from the heat pump itself as well as from an
auxiliary source such as electric heaters. It is standard practice to size the auxiliary heat as if
the heat pump did not exist. One justification for this is that if the heat pump needs repair and
it is the worst weather conditions in the winter, the repairs may not be able to be carried out
until the weather changes.
The heat pump itself should be sized the same as any air conditioner, however it is standard
practice to “round up” with heat pumps. For instance, if the cooling load is over 2 ½ tons but
under 3, you would choose a 3 ton unit with a heat pump to reap the benefit of it’s larger
heating capacity.
The HVAC-Calc Tutorial
Introduction
The easiest and fastest way to learn HVAC-Calc is to do a load, so that is what we’ll do. Well,
actually, we won’t do the whole thing, just enough to show you how to do your own. First
though, we’ll take a look at a completed load so we can see where we are going. HVAC-Calc
ships with a finished load calculation for “Sample House” which we’ll take a look at first. Then
we will do part of a house from scratch, step-by-step.
This is a tutorial, which means you are supposed to follow along and do it also. To make
things perfectly clear, when I mean for you to actually do something on your computer, it will
look like this. Also, I use the word “select” when I mean to highlight an item in a list or in the
tree.
Start the Program

To start the program, first click on the Windows Start button. Then click on the Programs
Folder. You will then see a list of program folders and programs. Somewhere in that list will
be a folder called ‘HVAC-Calc’, find it and click on it. Inside that folder, will be an icon of a
house and the name HVAC-Calc Residential 4.0, click on it to start the program.
If you have the trial version of the program, you will have to watch some comments we have
received about the program from other people just like you. Remember, you can purchase
the program right over the phone and we can unlock it right away – no more delay. When the
button at the bottom of the advertising that says “Start Program” becomes white, click on it.
The Opening Screen

HVAC-Calc is built for ease of use. The opening screen lists all the jobs you have done,
unless they have been deleted or moved to ‘Cold Storage’. As the list gets longer, rather than
delete old jobs, you can just move them to Cold Storage and then if you ever need them
again, you can bring them back again.
You can also sort the list of jobs by clicking on ‘Name’, ‘Street’ or ‘Last Modified’. This will
become useful when you have a longer list of jobs.
For now, there are only two items in the list, ‘New Job’ and ‘Sample House’. ‘New Job’ will
always be at the top and is the selection you make if you want to start a new load calculation.
First, let’s look at a completed job, select ‘Sample House’ and click on the “Load” button on
the top right.
HVAC-Calc also makes it very easy to start a job on your laptop and then move it, using a
floppy disk, to your desktop computer. See the “How Do I” section for instructions.
The Finished Sample House

Here is a picture of the HVAC-Calc screen with the important areas labeled. Please take a
minute to familiarize yourself with the different areas of the screen.
Enabled Disabled
Menu Buttons Buttons
Add, Change &

Delete Buttons Button Bar
Information
Screen
The Tree
Expander
Buttons
Move Buttons
Help Panel
The Tree shows the organization of the house. It is probably the most important part of the
whole screen. In HVAC-Calc every part of the house is owned by some other part of the
house. For instance the First Floor, which is a Zone Component, owns the Living Room and
the other rooms, which are Room Components. The Sample House is a Job Component,
and it owns the First Floor and Basement which are Zone Components.
Do you see the little lines in the Tree that show what is attached to what? You can also see
that Sample House owns Design Conditions and Infiltration as well as the two Zone
Components. Also, The First Floor Zone owns a Duct Component. The ownership
relationship is used throughout the program, so don’t worry if you don’t quite ‘get it’ yet. That
is what the tutorial is for.
Click on the Expander Buttons. Now you can really see how components are all attached to
one another.
Click on and double click on the little yellow triangles in the Tree. Select different
components in the Tree and notice how the Enabled Buttons and Disabled Buttons change
depending on what is selected in the Tree.
Click on the Results Tab. And then click back on the Job Tab.
Okay, enough fooling around; let’s do a load from scratch.

Starting a New Job

When we started the program and were presented with the list of jobs, we could have
selected ‘New Job’ and then clicked on the Load button to start a new job, but instead we
loaded in the Sample House. Now that we have the job loaded we can still start a new job
without quitting the program. On the menu (see the labeled screen picture above to see
where the menu is), click on ‘File’ and then click on ‘Start New Job’.
On the right hand side, you may see a box showing the “Quick Start Teacher”. This is
another way to get the general concepts of how the program works. It is intended for those
that will not read the manual. You, of course, are smarter than that, so close the teacher.
click on ‘Close Teacher’. Later, if you would like to see the teacher again and follow her
instructions, you can turn it back on under the ‘Settings’ menu.
You should now have a blank Tree with the Job Information Screen on the right. When you
are new to the program, you should always keep an eye on the Help Panel at the bottom of
the HVAC-Calc screen. The contents of the Help Panel change with the location of the
mouse cursor.
Adding the House

In the Name field of the Job Information screen, type ‘Don Sleeth’. Notice how the Add
Button turned red as soon as you started to type. This is because HVAC-Calc has detected
that you have entered some information but you have not yet made it stick by adding this
component to the Tree. We will add it shortly. Fill out some more fields as shown below and
then click on the red Add Button to start to build your load.
After clicking on the red Add button….
We’ve Started!
We have lift off! We have started to build our load by adding a Job Component to the Tree.
Several things happened on the screen, I’ll point out some of them but don’t worry if you don’t
quite understand yet, you will understand shortly.
The little box beside the word Job on the tab now has a blue checkmark in it.
This means that the information in the Information Screen is about an existing
component as compared to one we are looking at but have not yet added
More buttons are enabled in the Button Bar.
All the ones that are enabled can be added to a Job Component, the ones that are
disabled cannot be added to the Job Component. For instance, if you were building a
person, you could not connect the leg to the head. In a house, you cannot connect a
Door to the House, you will see later that you can connect a Door to a Wall.
Notice how the word Job in the Button Bar is underlined, indicating that component has been
added.
The Add button is now disabled but the Change and Delete buttons are enabled.
This is because the Information Screen is the same as the selection in the Tree and
you can’t add a Job Component to a Job Component. But you could change it or
delete it.
The Help Panel has new help for you
There are hundreds of different help panels to help you get the job done.
Most importantly, the house itself has been added to the Tree.
How to Navigate
If you want to add a certain component, like, say, Design Conditions, then you need to get the
questions about Design Conditions to appear so that you can answer them, then add the
component. How do you get the right Information Screen to appear? Well, there are two
ways.
One way to get the right Information Screen to appear is to repeatedly click on the owner of
the component in the Tree until you see the Information Screen that you want. To see this
work, click on ‘Don Sleeth’ in the Tree (In the Tree – not in the Information Screen). Do it
again and again noticing the different Information Screens you see. You should see Job,
Design Conditions, Infiltration, Zone and then back to Job again. This also helps you learn
which components the Job Component owns; if it can’t be added, you are not going to see it.
Notice how the Add button becomes enabled when you are viewing a component that can be
added to the component that is selected in the Tree.
The other way to navigate is with the button bar. Right now there are 4 buttons enabled and
clicking on any one of them will bring you to that Information Screen. Try it. The reason you
can see only 4 different Information Screens is that there are only three things that can be
added to a Job Component, namely Design Conditions, Infiltration and Zone Components.
Adding Design Conditions

Click on the Design Conditions button on the Button Bar. In the upper section of the
Information Screen, you can choose your state and then your city. Look at the screen picture
below then choose your state and then your city. Once you select the State and City, click
on the ‘Use this set’ button. This automatically loads in the design conditions for that city.
However, as it would be better if you were using the same Design Conditions as this tutorial,
find Iowa and then Newville and then click on the ‘Use this set’ button to load Newville back
in.
When the screen looks like the one below, click on the red Add button to add the Design
Conditions to the Tree.
Adding Infiltration
We now have the House Component and the Design Conditions Component in the Tree. The
next component to add is the Infiltration Component. With ‘Don Sleeth’ selected in the Tree,
click on the Infiltration button in the Button Bar so you can see the Infiltration Information
Screen.
HVAC-Calc does most of the hard part about load calculations for you. It simply needs some
information from you, and then it will calculate the load. The steps (in the yellow part) on
each Information Screen are numbered; all you have to do is answer them in order. In Step
1., select ‘Avg. (loose construction, poor vapor barrier)’. If the selection is already made for
you, then you don’t have to do anything.
Step 2. Enter any forced ventilation here. This is for fresh air fans. Hold your mouse cursor
over Step 2 and read the Help Panel. It says, “If there is a forced fresh air intake fan that is in
constant operation, not intermittent like bathroom or kitchen fans, enter the CFM value here."
As you can see, there is very specific and useful help available on screen. I don’t want this
manual to be too large so I will not repeat all the help and explanations here. You would be
wise to read them on your screen as we go.
Infiltration is the air that sneaks in through cracks. It is measured in Air Changes per Hour
(ACH). An infiltration rate of 1 ACH means that enough air leaks in to the house (and out,
obviously) to completely change all the air in the house in one hour. The ACH infiltration rate
depends on the size of the house and the tightness and the number of fireplaces. HVAC-Calc
will automatically calculate those values for you (they are different in summer and winter) and
use them to calculate the load, if you leave “Automatically use the recommended ACH values”
selected in Step. 3.
We are finished with the Infiltration so click on the Add button. You should now have a
House Component (Don Sleeth) and it owns two components, namely Design Conditions and
Infiltration.
Adding a Zone Component

Click on the Zone button in the Button Bar to see the Zone Information Screen. It is easier to
do heat loss and heat gain calculations if you break the house up into zones, or areas. It does
not mean that you are using separate units for each Zone, although you can. It is just that
dividing the house up into chunks makes it easier to do the loads. The house in this tutorial is
a bungalow with a basement. The easiest way to do a load for this type of house is to break it
up into 2 Zones, the First Floor and the Basement. A two-story house with a basement would
be 3 Zones.
On the Zone Information Screen there is only one Step and that is to name the Zone. There
is a list of names there to save typing, but you can also type in your own name. This time we
are lucky though as the name I want is First Floor. Make sure yours says ‘First Floor’ and
click on Add.
Here is what my screen looks like after adding the First Floor Zone Component.
The Duct Component

Probably First Floor is already selected (highlighted) in the Tree, if it isn’t then select it. The
only Buttons that are enabled in the Button Bar now are Zone, Duct and Room. This is
because Zones can only own Duct Components and Room Components. You have four
items in the Tree, try selecting each one, one by one, and watch how the buttons in the
Button Bar change.
Not all houses have ductwork. If the house you are doing is heated by a hot water system, for
instance, then you would not add a Duct Component. Also, not all ductwork has a heat loss
and heat gain. If the duct is inside the conditioned space as it is for many houses, then it has
no heat loss and heat gain. Again you would not add a Duct Component.
Suppose that the duct for the first floor is in the attic, then you would add a Duct Component.
We are not going to add a Duct Component to our house, but click on the Duct button
anyway so you can see what the Duct Information Screen looks like. As you move the
mouse cursor around, you can read about it in the Help Panel.
The idea is that you only add components that actually contribute to the load, that is, they
have a heat loss and or gain. This idea is so important that we are going to make a rule!
Rule Number 1
Rule Number 1: If a component does not have a heat transfer then don’t
add it to the Tree, unless it is a floor.
This means that you do not add interior walls, you do not add ceilings that are below
conditioned spaces. It also means that this is a rule with an exception, floors. You always
add a Floor Component to a Room Component even if it is over a conditioned space. But we
are getting ahead of ourselves, we’ll talk about floors later.
We are not going to add a Duct Component, so let’s move along to Rooms.
Adding the Living Room

As you may have guessed, Rooms belong to Zones. When you have a Zone selected in the
Tree, such as First Floor, the only buttons enabled in the Button Bar are Duct and Room,
besides Zone itself.
The Living room is 21 by 14 and faces west with a 21 foot outside wall. There are two 4 foot
by 5 foot windows.
With First Floor selected (highlighted) in the Tree, click on Room in the Button Bar. The
Room Information Screen is quite simple, it contains a place for you to type in a name for the
room, or select from the list. Notice that the top one in the list (they are alphabetic) is “All
Rooms”. If you were doing a whole house calculation, you would do it Zone by Zone, adding a
room called “All Rooms” to each Zone. We will do that in the Basement Zone later so you will
see what I mean.
We are going to start a room-by-room calculation for the First Floor, starting with the Living
Room.
Select Living Room in the list and click on Add. Notice in the Tree how the Living Room is
attached to (means owned by) the First Floor Zone.
Adding a Floor
After adding a Room, the first thing we want to do is add the Floor, remember, we always add
the floor. Click on Living Room in the Tree to bring up the Floor Information Screen.
Step 1 is to enter the floor area. I don’t know about you, but I cannot multiply 21 by 14 in my
head. Click in the box labeled Length and type in 21. Hit the Tab key on your keyboard
twice, to get to the width box and type in 14. Now click on the little red Plus button to the
right of the blue Area box. HVAC-Calc does the arithmetic for you and puts the answer in the
blue box. If you were doing an L-shaped room you could put the dimensions of the other
rectangle in the Length and Width boxes, then click on the Plus to add the second rectangle
to the first.
In Step 2. “Select floor location”, select “Over conditioned space”. Remember, Floors are the
only Components that are added even if they don’t contribute to the load, such as when they
are over a conditioned space. Steps 3 and 4 are not applicable, due to our selection of “Over
a conditioned space” in Step 1. Below is a picture of my screen before clicking on Add. Take
a look then click on Add.
After adding the floor, notice how it is indented in the Tree underneath its’ owner, the Living
Room. Also notice what other buttons are enabled in the Button Bar.
If the floor of the Living Room was partly over a conditioned space and partly some other type
of floor such as a slab, you could simply add two Floor Components to the Living Room to
handle that situation. Let’s do that, just for practice. There are a couple of things I can show
you while we are doing it.
With Living Room selected in the Tree, click on the Floor button in the Button Bar in order to
bring a blank Floor Information Screen into view. If you had clicked on the Floor in the Tree
by mistake, you would bring up the Information Screen about that particular floor, already filled
in.
Let’s say there is another section of the Living Room that is 7 feet along the outside wall and
14 feet wide and it is a slab on grade. In the Length box type 7, hit Tab twice and in the
Width box type 14, then click on the red Plus button.7
For Step 2, select “Concrete slab on grade”. Step 3 is done for you, step 4 select “1 in. edge
R – 5”. Slab floors lose heat around the edges, and only the edges that are exterior. Step 5
is asking for the perimeter of the slab floor, outside wall only.
We should enter 7 in the blue box labeled Perimeter, however, let’s make a mistake on
purpose. Leave the Perimeter as 0 and click on Add. You can see that Floor(2) gets added,
but there is a warning sign. Select Floor(2) in the Tree and read the warning in the Help
Panel. Slab floors lose heat around the outside perimeter. If you had a room on a slab with
no exterior walls, then 0 would be the right answer, however that is not the case here.
The Double Click Feature

We want to change the 0 in the Perimeter blue box to 7. You could just click in the blue box
and delete the 0 but another way is to double click on the word “Perimeter” below the blue
box. Magic, the 0 disappears! This also works for the words Area, Length and Width or
Height.
Type in 7 in the blue box labeled Perimeter. Now click on the red Change button. This
immediately fixes the problem and recalculates the load.
The Change All Button

While we are fooling around with this slab floor that is not really a part of the house, I want to
show you another nice time saving feature of HVAC-Calc, the Change All Button. Select
Floor in the Tree (not Floor(2)).
This brings up the Information Screen for the real floor that we added to the Living Room.
Click on the “Change All” button. This brings up a little message as shown below.
Click on OK. Now take a look at Floor(2) (by selecting it in the Tree). See, it is no longer a
slab floor! It has been changed to match the original floor, the one that was on screen when
you clicked the Change All button.
You can use the Change-All button to make all Components match the one you are looking at
in the Information Screen. It is a quick way to make changes to many components at once.
Okay, enough fooling around.
The Delete Button

Floor(2) was just an experiment and now we want to get rid of it. Select Floor(2) in the Tree.
Click on the Delete button. You will see a warning message, click on Yes and Floor(2) is
gone.
Adding a Wall
The next component of the Living Room we want to add is the west wall. As I have said
before, every component is owned by another component and if you want to add a new
component, you must select the owner of that new component in the Tree. Actually, this is
so important we are going to make it a rule:
Rule Number 2
Rule Number 2: To add a new component, select the owner of that
component in the Tree.
Rooms own walls. This particular Wall Component is owned by the Living Room. So, select
Living Room in the Tree and click the Wall button in the button bar. This brings up the blank
Wall Information Screen.
Step 1 is to “Select Wall direction and enter wall area”. Click on the W for West in the
compass. Try clicking on the other directions so you can see how the cool little compass
works and then click back on W. Now click in the Length box and enter 21. Hit the tab
key twice to get to the Height box and enter 8. Now click on the red Plus button to do the
arithmetic. Notice that the gross wall area is entered. HVAC-Calc is smart enough to subtract
any windows, doors or glass doors that we might add to this wall.
In Step 2, select “Wood frame, with sheathing siding or brick”. Hold the mouse cursor over
Step.3 and read the Help Panel. If you are ever unsure of anything, be sure to read the Help
Panel. Select “R-11 (3 ½ in.)”. This is the standard insulation in the wall cavity of a wall with
2 X 4 studs. Step 5 refers to the outside insulation behind the siding or brick. If you don’t
know what lies behind the brick, don’t worry too much about it. R values add together so it
really makes almost no difference whether it is R-1.8 or R 2.5; it is the R-11 or R-19 in the wall
cavity that is the dominant factor. In our wall, select “none”. Here is a picture of my screen
before adding the wall.
After checking it out, click on the red Add button. You now see the W Wall has been added
to the Living Room in the Tree.
Adding a Window
HVAC-Calc does not insist that you add components in a special order, however it does try to
guess what you might want to do next. Right now, because you have just added a wall, it is
guessing that you may want to add some windows or doors to that wall. As you have probably
figured out by now, Walls can own Windows, Doors and Glass Doors. This wall has two 5 by
4 windows.
Click on the Window button in the Button Bar. This brings up a blank Window screen.
Because there are two windows, we could add two Window Components but since both
windows are of the same type, it is easier just to add their areas together and add them as
one component. Click in the Length box and type 5. Hit the tab key twice and put 4 in the
Height box. Now click on the red Plus button. The screen should read “20 + 5 X 4”. Click
on the red Plus button a second time. HVAC-Calc does the arithmetic for you and now the
window area is shown as 40.
Make the selections as shown on the picture below. They are all quite straightforward,
except perhaps for Step “6. Outside shading”. If the window has some sort of object or device
that permanently keeps this window partially shaded, then you can indicate that in Step 6. I
emphasize permanent, trees can be cut down, sheds or shading devices can be moved. I
personally almost always select “0% (No external shading)”
In Step “7. Inside shading”, I would only select draperies or blinds if it was one of those rooms
with an extremely large area of glass and there was no way you could adequately cool the
room without closing the blinds. Most people like to have their blinds open on a nice summer
day so you should probably select “No inside shading”. In talking to contractors, I find
they often have selected “Draperies or blinds”, to emphasize – I recommend against that,
unless there is a very strong reason. I always select “No inside shading”.
When you are ready, click on Add.
Adding a Ceiling
Okay, we have the Floor and the Wall done, the next obvious thing to do would be the Ceiling.
Remember Rule Number 2, if we want to add a component, we select the owner of that
component in the Tree. Who owns ceilings? Rooms do. So select Living Room in the Tree.
Look at the buttons that are enabled in the Button Bar. This is a good reminder of what all we
might want to add to the Living Room.
This time we will navigate the other way. Click on Living Room in the Tree again. And again
and again until you bring up the Ceiling Information Screen. Usually the Ceiling is the same
area as the Floor so HVAC-Calc has thought ahead and filled that out for you already. If it
was wrong, you could just change it, however this is correct for us. Remember also, if the
ceiling were below a second floor, we would not be adding a ceiling to the Living Room – no
heat transfer – Rule Number 1.
In Steps 2, 3, and 4, select “Under ventilated attic”, “Dark” and “R-19 ( 4 – 6.5 inch)”; then
click Add.
If there were any skylights, (they are owned by ceilings), we would add one now, however
there is none in this particular living room.
More Navigation
To be sure you understand how to navigate around the program, click on each of the
components owned by the Living Room. Notice how when you select an existing component
in the Tree, the Information Screen for that component comes into view. Notice the blue
check mark next to the Information Screen label, indicating that this is an existing component,
not a blank screen.
Changing Information
Suppose you had made a mistake and the wall really faced South, not West. You need to
change information that you have already added to the Tree. Not a problem. Select W Wall
in the Tree. Click on the S in the compass. Click on Change. That is all there is to it, the
wall and everything it owns now face South. Okay, click back on W again and click on
Change again to restore the wall to West facing.
Adding People
Select Living Room in the Tree. You can see from the Button Bar that you could still add
People, Fireplace and Miscellaneous. The people in a house add both sensible and latent
cooling load. When calculating the load, you should place the people in the room where they
may be found during the middle of the afternoon. Generally, you would choose the room
where the TV is. Let’s add 3 people to the Living Room. Click on the People button and then
click on 3 (or type it in) and then click on Add.
Here is what my screen looks like with the Living Room finished.
Adding the Dining Room

By now you are probably getting the hang of it, but you may not yet appreciate just how fast
things can go with this program because I have been explaining in such great detail. With the
Dining Room, I want to impress you a bit. Let’s say the Dining Room is a corner room with 7
foot long west outside wall and a 18 foot long north outside wall. The north wall has a 5 by 4
double pane window in it.
Okay, we want to add a Room, so, Rule 1, we need to select the owner of the room in the
Tree. The Living Room and Dining Room are both owned by the Zone Component First
Floor, so select First Floor in the Tree. Click on the Room button in the button bar, select
Dining Room and click on Add.
Click on Dining Room in the Tree to bring up a blank Floor screen. Put 7 in the length box
and put 18 in the width (or vice versa) and click on the red Plus button. Steps 2, 3 and 4 are
done for you so click on Add. Here is a shot of mine before clicking Add.
Now click on the Wall Button (assuming Dining Room, the owner of the wall, is selected in
the Tree). We’ll do the West wall first which is 7 feet. The cursor is already in the Length box
so put in 7, click on the red Plus, notice that the selections for this wall are already done, so
click on Add.
The West wall has no windows or doors so we want to move on to the North wall. What do
we select in the Tree? We select the owner of the North Wall. Who owns the North Wall?
The Dining Room does, so select it in the Tree, then click on the Wall button in the Button
Bar.
The cursor is already in the Length box so put in 18, click on the red Plus and then don’t
forget to click on the N in the compass. All the other selections are correct, so click on Add.
The North Wall, which is selected in the Tree, owns a Window, so click on the Window
button. The window is 5 by 4 so put 5 in the length box, tab, tab and 4 in the width box, click
on the red plus. Notice how all the selections are made for you, and click on Add.
Next we want to add a ceiling so select Dining Room in the Tree and click on the Ceiling
button. The area is already filled in, so are all the other selections, so click on Add.
Finished! Not bad, eh! I hope you were impressed. I think you can see that once you’ve got
the hang of this program you can just fly through a load calculation.
The Results
Let’s take a look at our results so far. HVAC-Calc instantly recalculates the load as you go so
you can check it anytime. Click on the Results tab on the Information Screen.
You can see a clear summary of the total heat loss and heat gain for each component type
and for the building as a whole. The top line shows the load for the individual component that
is selected in the Tree. For instance, select the Window that is attached to the W Wall in the
Living Room. You can see the heat gain and the heat loss for that window in the top line.
If you are using the free Trial Version, many of the items are blocked out. You can purchase
the Home Owner license for $49 at http://www.hvaccomputer.com/orders or by calling 1-888-
736-1101 between 8:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time seven days a week.
If you have already purchased your license and registered the program, you will see the full
results so far. This is just a quick, “as you go” summary. There are full printed reports
available also which we will see later.
Click on the Existing: Window tab, or whatever is to the left of the word “Results” to hide the
Results screen and bring back the main screen.
Adding a Fireplace
We are not going to do the complete house, I don’t want to bore you to death, but there are
still some components we haven’t seen yet so we’ll investigate them now. Let’s add a
Fireplace component to the Living Room. Select Living Room in the Tree and then click on
the Fireplace button.
Fireplaces make a significant difference in the infiltration load in the winter. Select “Average
– glass doors, damper” and then click on Add. Now click on the Results tab. You can see
that the heat loss attributed to the Fireplace is 1,170. Click on Fireplace in the Tree and click
on the Fireplace Tab on the Information Screen. Select “Best – combustion air from
outdoors, glass doors, damper” and click on Change. Now take a look at the Results, the
load is about one half of what it was.
Adding a Kitchen
The Kitchen has an 11 foot north wall and an 18 foot east wall with a door and a window
which is 3 ft by 3 ft 8 in. To add by new room, select the owner of the Room in the Tree,
namely First Floor. Click on First Floor in the Tree twice and then again to bring up the
Room Information Screen. Select Kitchen and click on Add.
I think it’s always a good idea to add the components in the same order as the buttons are in
the Button Bar, so click on the Floor button (or click on Kitchen in the Tree). Enter the Floor
area of 11 by 18, I won’t tell you exactly how, you probably know by now. Leave the selection
at “Over conditioned space” and click on Add.
Click on the wall button and add the North Wall. Do it on your own. Here is my screen
before clicking Add
Now add the 18 ft. East Wall. Try to do it on your own before reading this. Here are the
steps; select Kitchen in the Tree, click on the Wall button, click on E in the compass, enter
18 in Length, click on the red Plus button, click on Add.
Okay, now the Window. Make your screen look like mine, and click on Add
Now we need to add the Door that is owned by this Wall. With E Wall selected in the Tree,
click on the Door button. HVAC-Calc has already guessed that the square footage of the
door is 18, and that is correct. If it wasn’t you could replace 18 with the correct area. For the
selections, select “Wood”, “Solid” and “Metal Storm” and then click on Add.
We are finished with all the components owned by the Wall, so let’s select Kitchen in the
Tree and resume adding components owned by the Kitchen. The next button in order is
Ceiling, click it. HVAC-Calc has again guessed at all the right answers, there is nothing for
us to do but click Add. Gee this program is smart!
Select Kitchen in the Tree again, The next button is People, but we have put our people in the
Living Room. There is no Fireplace here but there is a Miscellaneous load so click on the
“Misc” button. Read the Help Panel. Click on 1200 and then click on Add.
Okay, there is no sense in boring you to death with entering the information for the rest of the
rooms on the First Floor, but there are still some things to show you.
Doing a Whole House Calculation

Many times it is not necessary to do a Room-By-Room calculation. If you need to size the hot
water radiators or size the ductwork, then do a Room-By-Room calculation and use HVAC-
Calc’s Tools to size the ducts or rads. But if you just need to determine the size of the
furnace or air conditioner, a Whole House calculation may be all that you need.
When doing a Whole House calculation, follow these steps. Add the Job, Design Conditions
and Infiltration Components as always. Then add the first Zone, usually First Floor. Then add
a Room Component named All Rooms. Then add the Floor, Walls and so on for the entire
first floor, the same as you would do for any room. If you have another Zone such as
Basement or Second Floor, add it to the Job Component and then add another “All Rooms”
Room Component. There is nothing special about the name “All Rooms”, you can call it
anything you want, such as “Complete Zone” or whatever, I just happen to like “All Rooms”
We will do the basement of this house “as if” we were doing a Whole House calculation. Feel
free to click the Results tab any time you want to check on the progress.
Adding Another Zone

The Job Component itself owns Zone Components so select Don Sleeth in the Tree. (Always
select the owner of the component you want to add). Click on the Zone Button, then select
Basement and click Add.
You may want to make a little more room in your tree by closing up the Kitchen. You can do
that by double-clicking the little down pointing triangle to the left of the word Kitchen in the
Tree. You can do the same thing to Dining Room and Living Room or you could use the
cool Expander Buttons at the bottom of the Tree.
To open them up again, double-click on them again.
Adding All Rooms

With Basement selected in the Tree, Click on the Room Button, select All Rooms and click
Add
The Basement Floor

You are probably pretty good at this program by now so I am going to show you some short
cuts. The basement has 8 foot ceilings with 5 ft of the wall below ground and 3 feet above
ground. The length of the North and South walls is 29 feet and the East and West walls are
51 feet. There are only two windows, one on the East wall and one on the South. They are 2
feet by 3 feet.
Click on the Floor Button. Enter the Length of 29 and the width of 51, click on the Plus
Button.
In Step 2, select “Basement floor, 2’ or more below grade”. We are finished with the Floor
component so click on Add.
Basement Walls
With All Rooms selected in the Tree, click on the Wall Button. Each wall consists of two
types of wall, the above ground part and the below ground part. This means we can add 8
Wall Components. (I said that we can, not that we will).
Let’s start with the East Wall. Click on E for East in the compass and enter 51 for the length.
We will do the below ground part first, so enter 5 for the height. (You can get rid of the 8 by
either deleting it or double-clicking the word “Height”). Click the Plus Button. Make the
selections as shown below, the click on Add.
Now we will add the above ground part of the wall. Select All Rooms in the Tree (the owner
of the Wall), and click on the Wall Button. Again it is East, enter the length of 51 and
change the height to 3. In Step 2, select “Masonry, above grade” and “R – 5” in Step 3 and
“8 or 12 in. Block” in Step 4, then click on Add.
The East Wall owns a Window so with E Wall selected in the Tree, click on the Window
Button. Make your Window Information Screen look like the one below and click on Add.
We are finished with the East Wall, and we could continue to do all the walls like this.
However there is an easier way. If a wall doesn’t have any glass in it, the direction it faces
doesn’t matter. This means that we could have entered all the below grade walls at once and
we only need separate above grade walls for the ones with windows, namely the East and
South Wall.
Let’s do that. Select E Wall BelowGr in the Tree. We are going to change this Wall
Component so that it includes all four below grade sections of wall. To add on the West
section, which is also 51 X 5, simply click on the Plus Button. Bingo, HVAC-Calc did the
arithmetic for us. Now change the 51 to 29 for the North Wall. Click on the Plus Button once
for North and again for the South Wall. Your Area should now read 800. Of course we
haven’t made any lasting change until we click on Change.
Now let’s add the other two windowless above grade walls to the above grade East Wall we
have already done. We won’t include the South above grade wall because it has a window in
it. Select E Wall in the Tree. Click on the Plus Button once to add in the West wall. Then
change the length to 29 and click on the Plus Button once for the North Wall. This should
give an area of 393. Click on Change.
Okay, that was easy. Only one above grade wall to go, with a window. Select All Rooms and
click on the Wall Button. Click on S for South and put the length in as 29, the height is
probably already there as 3. Click on the Plus Button. Here is my screen.
Click on Add.
Now we need to add the window to the S Wall. Click the Window Button. Type 6 directly into
the blue area box (even I can do 3 X 2 in my head). HVAC-Calc has made all the other
selections for you, so click on Add.
Finished
Select All Rooms in the Tree and take a look at the buttons that are enabled in the Button
Bar. There are no other components to add to the Basement! We don’t add a Ceiling
Component because above the ceiling is the first floor. No temperature difference means no
heat transfer. No heat transfer, and not a floor, means we don’t add it. Rule Number 1.
So we are finished with the house, except we didn’t do all of the first floor.
Loading in a Job
To view the reports, we will load in the Sample House that came with HVAC-Calc Residential
4.0. On the Menu, click on File and then click on “Open Existing Job”. (The menu is at the
top of the screen and says “File Reports Settings Help”.)
This will bring up the opening screen. Notice that the Job we just did is already in the list! We
didn’t even have to save it. Nor do we have to navigate around our hard drive trying to find
files. Everything is just there automatically. I told you I like things simple.
Select the “Sample House” as shown below and click on the Load Button on the right hand
side.
This loads the Sample House into HVAC-Calc
Viewing and Printing Reports

HVAC-Calc has many attractive and informative reports that you can print out. Following our
design philosophy, they are clear, simple and to the point.
On the menu, click on Reports. This brings down a list of the type of reports available.
Some of them are discussed further in the How Do I section of the manual.
To finish up this tutorial, in the reports menu, click on By Room. Then you see another
menu, click on “Each Component, with Sq Ft.”.
HVAC-Calc will make a report and put it on your screen ready for printing. Below is a picture
of one. Do not be concerned if the numbers are different than yours, the sample house that
ships with the program is not necessarily the same one that was used to make the manual.
If you are using a lower screen resolution, you will have to scroll around to see it all. However,
it is a report that was meant for printing, not viewing on screen.
To print the report, click on the Print Report button on the upper left of the report. Click on
the Close button to get rid of it.
Notice how HVAC-Calc immediately printed to your printer, instead of bringing up that
annoting “Choose Printer” box. This is just something to save you time, however, if you would
like to be able to choose printers, you can do that. To enable that “Printer Choice” box, on the
Settings menu, select “Allow Printer Choice”, and from then on, you will be able to choose
your printer.
Reports in PDF Format

Sometimes you may want to send a report via e-mail. The accepted standard for printed
material in a computer file is “PDF”, as designed by Adobe. In order to view, and print a pdf
file, you need the free Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is available from
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html.
HVAC-Calc allows you to make a file on your hard drive which contains your chosen report in
pdf format. To do so, click on the “Save to PDF” button. The usual “Save As” box pops up.
HVAC-Calc makes a folder called “HVAC-Calc Reports” on the same hard drive that you have
the program installed on, usually C:\HVAC-Calc Reports\. It also suggests a meaningful
name for the report. Just click on the “Save” button and your report is saved in PDF format.
Sizing the Furnace

On the report you can see the results of the heat loss heat gain calculation. The first line
under the headings is
This shows that your total heat loss is 67,558 BTUH. This means that at the winter design
temperature of –25 in Newville, the house will be losing 67,558 BTU’s each hour. If the
furnace puts out less than that many BTU’s, the house will get cool.
If the furnace can output say 80,000 BTUH, then the furnace will have to run for about 51
minutes of each hour to make up the 67,558. This, to me, is a properly sized furnace.
Sizing the Air Conditioner

The total Heat Gain is shown as 32,211 BTUH at the design temperature. A 2 ½ Ton air
conditioner would be a good choice for this house but I must say, a 3 ton would do fine as
well. One small technical fact that does come in to play if you have very high design
temperatures is that an air conditioners capacity decreases as outdoor temperatures rise.
The cooling capacities are rated at 95 degrees outside. Typically, that capacity would
decrease by about 5% at 105 degrees outside.
End of Tutorial
That is the end of the tutorial section of the manual. We covered most aspects of the core
part of the program. There are still other things you will want to know, such as how to store
your heading, how to register the program, how to make a copy of a job. Those items are
covered in the How Do I section
How Do I …
How Do I Register the Program

To register the program you are given a name and a number. On the menu, click on Settings
and then click on Register Program. That’s the easy part.
You will see there are two lines for your registration name. You will probably just need the top
one. It will be clearly stated if you are to use two. First, delete the words “Unregistered Trial
Version”.
Now here is the hard part. Type in your registration name. Yes, that’s the part that will trip
you up. It has to be exactly the same as it is in your registration e-mail or invoice. Same
capital letters, same lower case letters, same commas, same periods, same same. After
typing in your Registration Name move the cursor to the Registration Number box by hitting
the tab key or with your mouse and type in your registration number.
Then click on OK and, if you didn’t make any mistakes, you will see a “success” message. If
you get a “Not Successful” message, just try again. Yes, it is possible we gave you the wrong
number but, it is much more likely that you are missing a capital or a period or something.
Important, you must register the program on each computer you want to run it on. If you
change hard drives or computers, you must register it again.
How Do I Add My Heading

On the menu, click on Settings and then “Set Company Heading”. You are given 3 lines, the
first line is already done. Enter your address, and phone number and click on OK. The
information is saved and will not have to be entered again. It will appear on all reports.
How Do I Save My Slogan

If you want, you can have a line printed just under the line "Residential Heat Loss and Heat
Gain Calculation" on each printout. It is a good place to put things such as “Serving Newville
since 1977” or “Your heat loss is our gain!”.
To store your slogan, On the menu, click on Settings and then “Set Company Slogan”.
How Do I Do Mobile Homes

Go to the Settings menu and select “Include Mobile Home Choices”. This adds Metal Walls
and Ceilings to the appropriate Information Screen. If you are not doing mobile homes, just
be sure there is no checkmark beside “Include Mobile Home Choices”.
How Do I Do Insulated Concrete Forms

Some houses are being built with “left-in-place” insulated concrete forms, the whole walls are
poured concrete. This adds a lot of thermal mass to the house, lowering the cooling load.
Again, on the Settings menu, you can choose to include Insulated Concrete Forms as a wall
choice.
How Do I Change the Order of Rooms and Zones

As you add Rooms and Zones, HVAC-Calc adds them to the tree in the order you do them.
However sometimes you may forget a room and add it last, so it looks out of order in the tree.
You can fix this by selecting the Room in the Tree and clicking on the “Move Up” button at the
bottom of the Tree.
This also works for moving rooms from one Zone to another, or changing the order of zones.
How Do I Do a CFM Report

If the house is new construction, or you are troubleshooting, you may need to design the
ductwork. By using the Tools that come with HVAC-Calc you will be able to design the
ductwork. First you may want to print out a CFM Report.
To get a CFM Per Room Report, on the menu select Tools and then “CFM per Room
Calculation”. If you want to know how many CFM go in each room, you need to know how
many CFM your furnace or air conditioner is putting out. If you know that value, enter it into
the box and click okay. HVAC-Calc also has a best guess, based on 400 CFM per ton of Air
Conditioning.
After clicking OK, you will see a report like this:

The report shows the number of CFM needed for heating and for cooling. You should size
the ductwork for the larger of the two values, that is the value shown in the Both column.
These values are automatically carried over to the “Size Ducts” Tool which is discussed next.
How Do I Size the Ducts

On the Tools Menu, select Size Ducts. If you have already done a CFM Report, the value for
the total CFM of your air handler (furnace) is used, otherwise HVAC-Calc uses its best guess.
You can change the total CFM by selecting the house and clicking the Change CFM button.
On the Tree you see the rooms of the house, with the required CFM, assuming you are sizing
the ducts for both heating and cooling. Each box represents an outlet. Please note, the total
CFM will not add up to the same as the air handler because you always design the ducts for
the maximum air needed and some rooms need more in winter, others need more in summer.
This is built in to the HVAC-Calc program.
To size the duct to carry the air for, say, the Living Room, Dining Room and Kitchen, click in
the appropriate boxes. HVAC-Calc totals the air and enters it in the CFM box of Step 1.
Follow Steps 2, 3 4 and 5 and then click on the button 6.
The Duct Sizing Tool is extremely flexible, useful and easy to use. Here are some of its
functions:
Change CFM
Select the item in the Tree and then click on the Change CFM button. If the selected item is
the House or a Zone, or a room with more than one outlet, then the new CFM is instantly split
up among the children.
Split
Generally, 90 CFM is the maximum amount of air to put through one standard 4 X 10 floor
outlet. If the room requires more than this, you can split it into to or more outlets. Select the
room you wish to split and click on the Split button.
Delete
If you want to delete one of the outlets you made, select it and click on Delete. The CFM for
the remaining outlets is automatically recalculated.
Select All Children

This is a quick way to select outlets. If you select a zone and then click on the Select All
Children button, all outlets in the Zone will be selected. The same idea applies if the House or
a Room with multiple outlets is selected.
Clear All Children

Works the same as Select All Children only it clears instead.
Enter CFM Directly

You do not have to use the tree to size a duct. If you know the CFM you want a certain duct
to carry, simply enter it directly in the CFM box in step 1. The fact that this is a direct CFM
rather than a total of room outlets, is indicated by the box border turning red.
The Duct Report

You can use the Move Up, Move Down and Delete buttons to arrange the order of items in the
duct report. On screen you see just a summary of the report with the rooms and outlets
indicated by number.
View Full Report

If you have added items to the Report Summary by clicking on the button in Step 6, you can
use this button to view a full report and print it.
How Do I Do a Hot Water Baseboard Report

When designing a system that uses hot water baseboard radiators, you need to figure out
how many feet of baseboard to put in each room. HVAC-Calc can do this for you.
On the menu, select Tools and then Hot Water Baseboard Sizing. You then need to answer
two questions. HVAC-Calc knows how many BTUH each room needs but you need to tell it
how many BTUH each foot of your chosen baseboards radiates. If you don’t know then use
600. Also, HVAC-Calc needs to be told what safety factor you are going to use. For instance,
if the heat loss of a room is, say, 2,400 BTUH then you would need 4 feet of baseboard with
no safety factor. However, you are probably going to oversize the boiler by a certain amount,
say 25%. So that means you want the baseboards to be capable of radiating 3,000 BTUH.
You need 5 feet of baseboard.
Answer these two questions and click on OK.

How Do I Make a Copy of a Job

Again, it is simple. On the menu click on File and then on “Make a Copy of This Job”. HVAC-
Calc makes a complete copy of the job and saves it on your hard drive. (HVAC-Calc job files
are very small – you could fit approximately 100 on one 3 ½ in. floppy disk).
The program then loads in the copy and changes the name of the Job to the original name
plus “Copy 1”. You are now working on the copy.
How Do I Change Where My Jobs Are Stored

When the program (version 4.0.51 and newer) is run for the first time, it copies any old jobs
you had if you used an earlier version into a folder such as C:\HVAC-Calc Jobs and stores
any new jobs there as well. If you would like to start another folder for job storage, click on
Settings -> Set Job Folder and save a job in a new folder. All future jobs will be stored there
until you change it.
How Do I Turn Off the Tonnage in Reports

When you are working in a dry climate, you need to match sensible load to sensible capacity.
This will result in choosing a unit with larger total capacity than the one HVAC-Calc will show
by default on the reports. To remedy this, you need to click on Settings  Show Tonnage On
Reports to disable it (no check mark).
The End
I hope the manual did not bore you to death. It is difficult to know how much detail to include.
We try to make our products as high quality as possible.
HVAC Computer Systems Ltd.
don@hvaccomputer.com
http://www.hvaccomputer.com

Manual For Residential 4

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HVAC-Calc Residential 4.

HVAC-Calc Residential 4.0

WHAT IS HVAC-CALC FOR?..............................................................................................................4

REVIEWING THE HEAT LOSS – HEAT GAIN BASICS ...........................................................5

DESIGN CONDITIONS ...........................................................................................................................5

THE HVAC-CALC TUTORIAL ......................................................................................................9

THE DELETE BUTTON..........................................................................................................................20

HOW DO I REGISTER THE PROGRAM ..............................................................................................35

What is HVAC-Calc For?

Who is the Program For?

What About Support?

Homeowner or Personal Use

To order on-line, please go to http://www.hvaccomputer.com/order or call 1-888-736-1101

We also have special pricing for educational institutions, please call.

Reviewing the Heat Loss – Heat Gain Basics

What is the Heat Loss of a House?

Here is a summary of the factors affecting heat loss

What is Heat Gain

Sizing With a Rule of Thumb

Initial costs of the furnace and the larger ductwork go up.

Furnace life may be shortened due to condensation on the heat exchanger.

Sizing Air Conditioners

Sizing Heat Pumps

The HVAC-Calc Tutorial

Start the Program

The Opening Screen

The Finished Sample House

Add, Change &

Okay, enough fooling around; let’s do a load from scratch.

Starting a New Job

Adding the House

After clicking on the red Add button….

Adding Design Conditions

Adding a Zone Component

The Duct Component

Adding the Living Room

The Double Click Feature

The Change All Button

Okay, enough fooling around.

The Delete Button

When you are ready, click on Add.

Adding the Dining Room

Doing a Whole House Calculation

Adding Another Zone

To open them up again, double-click on them again.

Adding All Rooms

The Basement Floor

This loads the Sample House into HVAC-Calc

Viewing and Printing Reports

Reports in PDF Format

Sizing the Furnace

Sizing the Air Conditioner

How Do I Register the Program

How Do I Add My Heading

How Do I Save My Slogan

How Do I Do Mobile Homes

How Do I Do Insulated Concrete Forms

How Do I Change the Order of Rooms and Zones

How Do I Do a CFM Report

After clicking OK, you will see a report like this:

How Do I Size the Ducts

Select All Children