OT Heat pump

So the compressor just died on my 20 year old heat pump. Working fine last night, quit this morning, started troubleshooting, motor's developed a ground. Great.

Need to replace with something, have thought about geothermal in the past, if we're gonna do it, now's the time.

So who has one, are you happy with it, did it live up to the hype?

I know there's a 30% tax credit on geothermal through the end of the year.

Don't know what we're going to do, just looking at my options.

Got plenty of room for a trench if needed, or to drill down.

We live in southern Ohio.

Thanks

Fred

We have friends outside of Owensboro, KY that have one with the line in trenches. They love it.
That is not too far from you.
Richard in NW SC

I have specified them in Homes I and My students design. They are a good answer to best practices and economy. If your happy with the heat pump, you will be astounded with the Geo. Get some local input on thermal source design to maximixe results (as the post below). Jim

My neighbors on either side have and like them (even though they whine about routine maintenance issues). I looked into it and found that it depends how old you are. My house is cheap to heat and if I were to convert to geothermal, considering my age and initial cost, I would never see a payback in my expected remaining lifetime so why bother.

Fred,
You are lucky to get 20 years out of a HP. If you google the life of a HP the average is 15 years.

Something else to think about is your old system was an R22. No longer available. R22 was tried, proven, been around for decades. So don't judge today's HP by what you had for 20 years, mistake.

Alternative freons are constantly changing. Seems like after patients run out, they come up with a new Freon formula.

The newer refrigerants run at extremely high pressures which means more likely to have leaks.

I know the owners of two HVAC business in Terre Haute. One guy refuses to install HP and the other one who has been business for 35 years recently decided to install them.

I worked my way through college as a commercial heating and air mechanic. Back them the term HVAC wasn't invented yet.

I talk to the two owners in TH and ask them will the savings really pay for the HP in it normal life. The 35 year old business, just rolled his eyes and shook his head no. He reply was that what people want, so I install them.

If you are happy with a HP, then you are convinced they are great.

I'll make anyone a deal. If they think a HP will pay for itself and save money, then I'll let them install one in my house and I'll pay them just the savings for the next 20 years. They have to pay repair cost. Do I have any takers on this once in a life time deal? No HVAC business in TH will take me up on the deal.

My central AC is a 12 seer, installed in 2000. R22 system and never the first service call. I think the going rate for 30# of 22 is over $600. Just in case, I have 30# bottle in garage. Not sure if I can still get a compressor.

I don't think the added cost of a GEO will pay dividends either. Like most green energy, you will get a tax break which may or may not be to your advantage.

Keep in mind, Freon is changing all the time. Who is to say 10 years down the road you need a new compressor and you are told, sorry you need to change everything.

Big investment and big risk.

I tried to talk my boy who lives in Avon, In, not to get a new HP. His was 14 years old, making a racket but still working. Well he spent $7800 on a new state of the art Trane. didn't save him a dime on his electric bill. Year later, boy said he wished he had installed a gas furnace. I didn't tell him, told you so, but really wanted to.

I'll never invest in a HP. Ask your finical advisor if he would, mine won't. Investment vs return.
George.

Fred,
I live in Circleville,OH. In a 2 story brick farmhouse built in 1846. Not energy efficient.
I put in Geothermal 12 years ago and have had no problems. Initial installation was pricey, though.
Will you live to see payback point? Depends on your age and health. I'm not that old (61), but odds are that I won't be around too much longer. My son would like to live here after we are gone, so maybe he can enjoy it too (and see the payback date).
I put it in mainly so I can sit on the back porch and not have to hear that annoying heat exchanger with an Air-to-Air Heat Pump, yet still have AC. House had an oil furnace when we bought it 12 years ago, and I figured Oil Heat would only get pricier.
Besides, I've already found out that you can't take your money with you, so why not get some enjoyment (AC), instead of leaving it to the kids (the house didn't have Air Conditioning till I put the Geothermal in).
John

I won't say to get or not get a heat pump. But I will say I'm a professional HVAC tech and if I had to write a check for the money I have made working on geothermal (water source heat pump) or traditional air source heat pumps it would require me having an auction to raise the money.

The pay back time on the geothermal really depends on your age and how much temperature change the system will have to handle. Meaning how much heat or cooling the system has to do. The systems seem to cool easier than they heat. In really cold areas they do not seem to have the real life saving that the systems are supposed to provide. In warmer areas they seem to cool well and the energy saving seems to be closer to what they manufactures claim.

I looked long and hard at one for the farm house. I even had a well that was not longer used for water (high nitrates as it was not very deep but would carry the geothermal system) The pay back from energy savings was over 25 years. This is assuming just regular maintenance not major components failing. So in my case I decided to just go with a propane furnace and central AC unit. The cost was about 40% of what the geothermal unit would have been if you had to lay the lines or drill a well. Even with me having a well it would have doubled the cost of the system we installed.

A big factor is your electric cost. The farm is on Alliant and the electric is about 10-15% higher than REAs electric cost. MY oldest son put ina Geothermal and since he is on REA his payback time was around 15 years. It made since for him.

We have had one since 2005. We live in central Iowa. It is most efficient in the cooling mode and good to heat until you get to 15 deg above. Then auxiliary electric heat kicks in (not efficient!)

I was hoping for a 10 year payback and haven't seen it yet. It is a cool heat..that is hard to feel hot warm air it takes a while to raise room temp say 4-5 deg.
If you put one in insulate insulate good Windows and use southern exposure passive heat that's free!

Same issue I had with the heat pump that just died...cooled well, heat, not so much

Fred

Another option is a heat pump with propane backup. Cheaper to install than geothermal, and cheaper to operate than an all-electric air source heat pump.

My dad was in the business, but when I bought the farm in 1985 we installed a condensing propane furnace with high efficiency A/C. We put ductwork and all in at the same time as the house had window units and wall heaters. My dad kept trying to talk me into a geo thermal heat pump, he was really sold on them. In 2005 I finally took him up on it. My unit was still operating fine, with occasional maintenance, but with my dad getting older I figured 20 years was good and I should buy a geo thermal while he was still in business (he was 82 that year). He sold me one wholesale and had it dropped shipped to Oklahoma (he lived in MO). When he told the distributor it was for his son they cut the price below his normal wholesale. He was pleased and I was tickled, geo thermal system for $5,000. I dug trenches in the pasture next to the house, hit rock and some of it is only 6-1/2 ft deep. We never got around to putting any backup heat in the system.

Dad died in '04 and the only issues I've had with the geo thermal system is when my condensate drain plugs up and the high level sensor kicks the system off. The coldest night we've had since we got this system was -25F, two or three years ago. The system has always kept up and we've never been too hot or too cold. My electric bill has averages $142/month, which I'm happy with. Thanks, Dad!

If this unit fails, all I need is a new unit, I can reconnect the ground loops. The interesting thing about a ground source heat pump is that the unit is like a window unit: all the Freon is contained within the box, no long lines to leak. I can swap out the unit with no special tools. If I'm careful, don't even need a flush cart.

It boils down to cost, but it's been a real deal for me.

I live in Southern Indiana and when I built my house we went with geo. Installed a large unit to do basement and ground floor and a small unit for the upstairs. Sorry I cant remember the tonnage but that was in 2003. I really liked the electric bills that summer but when winter rolled around I could not stand the "cool" heat it produced as I had always been around wood heat. A few years later we had a really cold winter and the back up electric heat ran a lot and the bill for power was $700 one month, by the next winter I put in a Central Boiler outdoor stove and solved that problem.

I don't have Geo but I was considering it a few years ago. We have very high elec. rates here in NH, so that would have factored in, but the potentially most expensive part of it is the digging for and installation of the tubes in the ground. If you need to have two wells drilled, that is extremely expensive. If you have a pond near your house that you can run the tubing into, the cost is very low. If you need to dig trenches, which appears to be the most common method, It can run fairly high, but is you have or can rent the excavator and do it yourself, the cost is greatly reduced.

Andy,
15 years ago, I turned off my gas furnace and installed electric baseboard heat in each room with thermostat in every room in my 2000+ home. It was very cheap to install. I've never had a repair bill in 15 years, never replaced an air filter either.

Tax included, I pay electric company $145 a month, sales tax included, fixed bill for 12 months, not average bill.

The real question is how much longer will it be until you have a major expense of replacing your system. I'll bet anyone, my baseboards will last as long as I'm alive.

31 years ago I installed electric baseboard heat in a rental. I've never had the first repair. How many heat pumps will go for 31 years, no repairs, no replacement?

Some say HPs will pay for themselves in X number of years, but they don't include repairs, replacement, service calls, service contracts, interest costs are, or what they could get back if they put the same money in the stock market for the same number of years.

I'm not a fan of HPs. I'm not a fan of cold heat source either. I'm not a fan that HPs only last 15-20 years before I have to pay big bucks to replace them. I like having each room the temp I want. I don't like the heat loss in duct work. I don't like the idea I have to put electricity in the blower motor to move the air. I don't like the idea of replacing blower every 7-10 years because blower motor doesn't have no place to oil bearings. And when you really need the hp to carry the load in the coldest part of the winter, THEY DON'T WORK, THEY GO TO BACK UP HEAT SOURCE.

geo.

Fred,

I live in central IL and have had a geothermal system with the pipes in trenches for about 10 years. We love the geothermal. It has electric backup but we've found that it doesn't come on very often. Our heating and cooling bills are much lower (roughly 30% lower in winter and 50% lower in summer)than our previous natural gas furnace and central air. We have had low maintenance costs also, some years we just changed filters, one year we had a small leak that required a service call. If mine goes out, I'll replace it with a similar unit.

Have used a ground source Geothermal for the past 16 years in central Minnesota and wouldn't use anything else. For the first 14 years our average monthly electrical bill for the Geothermal system was around $42-45. For the last couple years it was about $50. Haven't had a problem in the winters or summers. Does run a lot more in the winter, but has never been a problem. Our payback period was about 5 years for the additional costs and I did take advantage of several rebate programs. I did do a lot of the work myself and costs have gone up. Check with our local power company. They offered some wonderful discounts and special rates if you are willing to use off peak rates which I did. I do have a backup system but haven't turned it on in years unless we are going to be gone for several weeks.

do your homework. Geothermal is a good option if correctly sized and installed.