If you’re somewhat rural the contractors just don’t have the experience to do it so they try to quote you out of the decision. I had to shop around until I found a contractor that had done this before and I was able to get a whole home heat pump for about the same price as a regular furnace/AC system (because of the rebates).
A guy at work doesn't have a heatpump, just some really high efficiency oil boiler. He lives in a rural area and basically had to become an expert on maintaining and repairing it himself because no one seems to know how to service the thing.
My father had similar issues with his new boiler although in his case after constant failed repair attempts his local place finally hired some guy who knew what he was doing.
There's also rebates on heatpumps around here but local forums seem to suggest that the installers are super backed up and quote "go away" prices. You can't get the rebate unless you go with a state approved installer, so even if you can install it yourself you're out of luck. Seems like they've just raised their prices to compensate for the rebate since they already had to much work.
>> I had to shop around until I found a contractor that had done this before and I was able to get a whole home heat pump for about the same price as a regular furnace/AC system (because of the rebates).
Not sure the trouble is over. You are only good until you need servicing, and then you need to shop around again. Servicing is even worse, because it is an acute problem and you are under so much time pressure to solve the issue.
Sometimes even the company that sold the unit does not honor their warranty. They shut down. They re-incorporate under a new company, etc.
How well do they function? Do they provide nice consistent heat? How's the noise? Sorry to clog up HN with a random request of a product quality review but I'm in the market right now to replace my furnace as well. Thanks.
One anecdote I've seen is that the right way to run them is to maintain a near-steady-state temperature in the house, including overnight. I'm not sure if that's maybe a bit extreme and just how they suggest use to non-savvy home-owners, but it makes sense... They're not going to blast out heat to raise the house temperature 10 degrees in an hour in the morning. Spreading heat-increase over several hours is more feasible. Good insulation presumably helps a bunch, too.
For a similar reason, heat pump water heaters tend to have a larger storage tank, as they take longer to heat the water and you want more of a usage buffer.
You don't need to run it overnight. But I do set a timer for mine to turn back on an hour before I get up. Because exactly -- it's not blasting hot air, it's merely circulating warm air. An hour beforehand works fine for mine though.
Oh, sorry, I guess I was brainwashed by the "anti heat pump mafia". I had this conversation with three HVAC installers but according to this thread any HVAC installer that speaks ill of heatpumps is old and stupid. Recently, I stayed at an AirBNB recently that had a heatpump and the temps dropped during the deep freeze and it was running 100% of the time and failing. The AirBNB owner said it was brand new and I would be responsible for excessive electricity use. They didn't charge me. Based on this, I am sooo glad I replaced my dead furnace with gas three years ago and steered clear of heat pumps.
Old heat pumps didn't do well in old temperatures. In the 80s and 90s, a heat pump couldn't handle freezing temps.
Modern heat pumps do fine well below 0 degrees Celsius. Here's one that's great to -15 C and okay down to -25 C[0]. If you search cold-climate heat pumps, you'll find plenty of information about how modern heat pumps are fine in most the temperatures you'll find in most of the US (including up north).
(I have heard that a lot of them are still only available in Europe, but you can definitely find some in the US.)
You clearly don't know if this is your only source.
"Below 0° Fahrenheit, heat pumps can still heat your home with more than twice the efficiency of gas heating or standard electric heating (such as electric furnaces and baseboard heaters). They’ve been tested and approved as far north as the Arctic Circle, and are popular options in very cold countries like Finland and Norway."
Finland has over 60% heat pumps.
And heat pumps, just to be clear, work by generating a temp difference. The main problem is the efficiency and that drops also because there is a heating cycle needed for the air intake.
How many models did you actually research yourself?
The reply made no point, so what exactly stands? Reply just said I don't know what I'm talking about, so I explained where my knowledge came from, which is more than the reply did. And somehow that's a better "point"? kids these days.
This whole thread is people who don’t own a house or heat pump screaming they are right and people who do own a house just shrugging because they’ve experienced reality.
When you grow up and need to drop $20k of your hard-earned cash on a new HVAC, it'll be funny to see if you decide to take a chance when people you know that have heat pumps are bitching about them not working, or if you decide you want to be warm and not deal with the hassle.
It is practically true. Sure my heat pump can make heat below 28F - but it was sized for cool my house in summer and so it cannot make enough heat anymore and so I need the backup heat.
This isn't true, the latest models work at temps far below that. There are still thresholds where you'd want another source, but they're very functional even in the upper Midwest.
They come with an electric heater, but they don't stop working until far below freezing point. It's normal for a heat pump to still be better than pure resistive electric heating even at 10°F.
Ground source heat pumps are available that go down significantly lower than 30F. They are more expensive. Though running the electric wires is also very expensive due to their inefficiency. Typical heat pumps are often better suited for warmer climates because of this
It also appears that the tech for the more typical air source heat pumps has improved significantly in recent years which makes it more viable for colder climates
I believe they run a heat conductive fluid through heat exchange coils in the ground. This allows you to pump heat into the ground during winter and extract said heat (not sure how accurate this is) during the winter.
You're not storing the heat that's underground, it's just that the ground is a huge thing with massive heat storage capacity that doesn't notice weather as much as above ground does.
If above ground ranges from 0-100 degrees F, underground likely ranges from like 64-68 degrees F, which makes it really energetically "cheap" to get to your preferred temperature range, heating to idk 70 at most and cooling to probably not even 65.
I thought of that, I am not rural (town is about 300,000 people)... Perhaps that is rural in some areas I guess.
The HVAC contractors here are pretty small, maybe they do not want to take the risk.
As someone else said, if I had more time, I would have purchased a few DIY split systems... I might do that for AC only, as I did not replace the AC at that time.
> If you’re somewhat rural the contractors just don’t have the experience to do it so they try to quote you out of the decision.
Or they're so busy they can pick and choose their jobs. I had a quote to replace a 12 foot section of pipe come in at $700, not even two hours worth of work.
