[Equest-users] Basic Question Regarding HVAC Zoning

[Nick Caton]

Hi Cole,


Wizard-level system/zone assignments are not the most intuitive thing.
Whenever in doubt, the best thing to do is to try one option, then
finish the wizards and observe the results in detailed view (look to the
airside component tree).

 

Your method sounds good.  The zone groups dialog does override the
percent-based allocations if you define something new (i.e. this group
of spaces under one system is 100% office).

 

Whether you wind up with one system serving a bank of 5 adjacent
offices, or 5 separate systems, or no new systems depends on the "system
per..." option for the system you select in the custom zone dialog
dropdown... ("unintuitive" is the kindest word I've come up with anyway
^_^)!  Play around with that to achieve what you need.  Note that a
typical VAV system should look like one "system" in the component tree
over all its child zones, with the individual terminal units defined at
the zone/space level.

 

eQuest can handle many unique profiles (the upper limit per project is
more than 1,000), so you could easily model the "flow" of children as
you describe.  That said, the wizards will only generate one set of
schedules (occupancy and otherwise) per shell, and your control over
that output is limited - you are describing a "post-wizard" task right
there.

 

Funday-Monday!

 

~Nick

 

 

 

NICK CATON, P.E.

SENIOR ENGINEER

 

Smith & Boucher Engineers

25501 west valley parkway, suite 200

olathe, ks 66061

direct 913.344.0036

fax 913.345.0617

www.smithboucher.com 

 

From: equest-users-bounces at lists.onebuilding.org
[mailto:equest-users-bounces at lists.onebuilding.org] On Behalf Of Cole
Hudson
Sent: Friday, August 12, 2011 4:47 PM
To: equest-users at lists.onebuilding.org
Subject: [Equest-users] Basic Question Regarding HVAC Zoning

 

I only want to make sure I'm going about this in the correct manner. 

 

The project I'm using to teach myself this program is a largish
elementary school. I've made a few models with simplified zoning, and
they worked alright. I wanted to graduate to custom zoning, with system
types that might better reflect our typical design (Parallel VAV in
classroom blocks, single zone VAV in cafeteria/gym, etc). 

 

I traced my CAD file for the envelope and preliminary zoning plan, and
set up a couple air-side systems (all in the DD wizard). I skipped over
the "area allocation" dialog, because I discovered that the "zone
groups" dialog allows you to override area allocations per zone group.
So, I set up a classroom zone group, and added each classroom zone to
it, an office zone group, etc... I changed the area allocation in the
zone group dialog for each zone group to reflect the zone usage. At this
point, does eQuest pretty much ignore entire building area allocation
numbers in the formal "area allocation" dialog, because I have custom
allocation profiles set up for each zone group? I did this because the
unless I'm mistaken, eQuest only allows you to assign systems to zone
groups, not individual zones. The model is coming up short, and this
method of zone/system assignment just seems wrong to me. Am I doing this
correctly? 

 

Related question: does eQuest allow you to set up occupancy profiles for
each zone, so that occupancy diversity (flow of children from classrooms
to cafeteria, etc) can be modeled?

 

Thank you guys. Lurking the list for past couple weeks has been very
informative. Have a good weekend. 

 

Cole Hudson, E.I.T.

Stridde Callins & Associates, Inc.

342 S. Navigation Blvd.

Corpus Christi, TX 78405

Tel:  (361) 883-9199

Cell: (361) 876-0560

Fax:  (361) 883-9177 

 

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