Anyone have a heat pump with their furnace?

[Asiel]

Living in one of the coldest parts of the country I can tell you heat pumps are not what they're cut out to be. My husband installs them but never recommends them. And ours are all inground heat pumps, trenches at least 6 ft deep . And you need a very large property because of the amount of piping required. One advantage is you get your a/c with it but as far as heating a huge house the air just does not blow as hot as electric or gas, most people here have gas unless the lines don't pass where they live. For our part of the country it's the cheapest way to go. Although we do have an electric furnace in the garage to kick in when we want instant heat but we also have a woodstove in the house and in the garage because I like dry heat. They are very cost efficient and not much trouble, being air tight. You can fill it in the morning and it lasts all day.

[kokopup]

Old heat pump technology required supplemental heat on colder days. In my area this was typically strip heat that on colder days could be costly. The latest heat pump technology uses two compressors and requires no suppliemental heat even in the coldest (lower 48 US) days. In fact one of the manufactures of the new dual compressor Heat pumps is in New Hampshire. The latest Heat Pump is worth looking into. iF YOU LIVE IN THE NORTH i DO NOT ADVISE THE OLDER HEAT PUMP THAT REQUIRES SUPPLEMENTAL HEAT.

[Grace]

Thank you all for your responses. And I'm sorry I didn't get back to this sooner. We lost power Friday night just after 9pm - in the nasty storms that went through. Just got it back 20 minutes ago.

We talked at length about the heat pump, and have decided that is not the way to go for us. We have a well insulated house, and generally keep the winter temp no higher than 64°. We heat with propane and I tallied up the cost of that for the past 10 years, and it would take us forever to make up the cost of the pump.

So we will stick with a high efficiency furnace

[carole]

I just wanted to say i have a heat pump and have only had it for one year and it is FANTASTIC, but then i live in NZ, the temps in my city rarely get below -1 and it works at minus 15, well so it says.

I have never been so warm and comfortable in my home ever, i have a small home, but we installed a bigger pump to help with upstairs heating, it takes the chill off the bedrooms and it can be even quite warm at times, i used to sit on my computer in the bedroom and by the time i left my hands were frozen,not any more.

With all my aches and pains, the heat pump has been a godsend, i absolutely LOVE LOVE LOVE my heat pump.

However i have heard they do not operate well in very cold temperatures and if you live within 1km of the sea, you can expect them to erode and rust and that will not be covered by the warranty.

A big mistake a lot of people make is not installing one that is big enough, and it has to work so much harder to maintain the heat and probably won't ever do a great job.

For North Island climates in NZ, they are perfect.

I have heard of an electric heating called NOBO, we have them here and they are used in Norway, and work very well.

Anyhow hope you are happy with your decision, seems like the right one to me.