Articles by Argile

With lukewarm-water emitters, every watt counts. On site, oversizing can secure comfort during cold snaps, but it also means more bulk, more inertia, and sometimes a network that needs adjusting. By mastering power calculations, flow temperature, and balancing, you size things right and avoid callbacks.

5 min read

Your client has a fireplace that heats poorly and burns through fuel. By modernizing it with a pellet appliance, you gain in comfort, consistency, and cleanliness, without starting from scratch. With a well-prepared installation, you secure the flue, simplify daily use, and add value to the job in your clients' eyes.

5 min read

In renovation, the junctions between walls, floors, and window openings often make the difference between a "clean" job and one that comes back to haunt you six months later. By getting these details right from the site visit onward and coordinating them across your trades (insulation, airtightness, finishes), you secure performance, comfort, and above all your own peace of mind. Here we go straight to the point — the checks to run and the mistakes that cost dearly.

5 min read

When your rooms don't reach temperature or the boiler runs too much, it's often a badly set output, not a hardware problem. By starting from room-by-room heat loss, you ground your numbers in the reality of the job, then match the emitter to the need without oversizing. The result: customers who feel the difference from the very first start-up.

5 min read

In renovation, every kilo counts. When a screed isn't an option or ceiling heights are tight, a lightweight solution saves time and limits rework, without sacrificing floor comfort. It's up to you to run a cleaner, faster job that's compatible with many substrates, to keep your schedule and reassure the customer from the first site visit.

6 min read

No regulation sets a service life for a water heater, and the durations in circulation carry no legal weight anywhere. What can be decided and quantified is the point at which keeping the unit costs more than replacing it. Three criteria settle it: the declared standing loss, the row the energy assessment already applies to the unit, and the compliance of the installation.

6 min read

On the ground, limescale shows up fast. Flow rates dropping, heat exchangers scaling up, clients coming back. Between the promises of magnetic devices and the reality of a well-tuned installation, what you really need is facts, clear limits and good habits for advising clients without exposing yourself.

6 min read

An extract-air heat pump water heater is the best credited of its family in the French EPC, on one condition that is rarely checked on the technical visit: that the ventilation supplies it with enough continuous air flow. The minima of the decree of 24 March 1982 are often below what the machine asks for. Here is the calculation to run before you specify.

5 min read

Between a commercial kitchen and a home kitchen, it is not the order of magnitude that changes, it is the text that applies. In housing, one order sets a rate per room. In catering, nothing sets a rate for the hood: the figure comes from the county health regulation, and employment law only sets a floor per occupant.

5 min read

The choice between a vertical and a horizontal electric cylinder is settled by the room, not by the data sheet. Horizontal only becomes necessary when clear height runs out, and it then costs 419 kWh a year more at 200 litres according to the French EPC calculation method. Here is what to record before pricing, what makes an installation overrun, and how to justify the running-cost penalty on the estimate.

6 min read

On a hygro B mechanical ventilation system, a well-adjusted extract vent isn't enough if fresh air doesn't enter in the right place. As a tradesperson, you can secure the airflow, limit discomfort and avoid callbacks, just by taking care with the choice, placement and installation of air inlets. A few job-site details often make all the difference, without adding complexity.

5 min read

A humidity-controlled extract vent is not chosen on a catalogue modulation range but on two regulatory figures: the peak flow rate the room has to reach, and the floor that modulation allows you to hold. The French order of 24 March 1982 sets both, and the BAR-TH-127 sheet adds the conditions that have to be met for the installation to count towards energy-saving certificates.

5 min read