Got a coal room in his basement and he shovels it right into this monster that heats water going through all the cast iron radiators. It's like a crematorium in the winter
That's awesome! When my wife and I first got together, we were renting a old turn of the century era house with an oil fired furnace/hot water heater sorta deal that pumped hot water through the cast radiators as well. Loved that thing. Would hold a ton of wood. We had a small storm style door that was used specifically for throwing the wood down into the basement for stacking. Loved that house!
When I was a teenager in CB it was my job to bring the coal from the "coal barn" into the house, not fun! My father still has his coal contract, but mostly uses the heat pump.
I think I may still have some Devco coveralls at the folks place lol. And yeah I learned how to shovel coal at an early age. The old man would get coal delivered to one of my grandmother's places (they got a cheaper rate as my both grandfathers were miners). We'd wait for dark, drive to Number 2 and shovel the tonne or two (whatever he ordered) into loads in his 1/2 ton and unload at our house. Jesus I got the shivers just typing that lol
Ducted usually have an electric heating coil to supplement. But all air to air heat pumps need to defrost
I remember the guy who used to deliver the coal. Used to show up in a big pickup with a pan shovel. He would empty the truck in 15 min. That guy was huge!
Maybe you both have duked it out already behind Red's Cell Block or the Guildwood, then had pizza together at Johnny's.
Bump. Looking to get a heat pump system installed. I'm getting some quotes and opinions from local installers but wanted to reach out to the HVAC guys on here as well to make sure I'm understanding all the options and getting the best system based on what we have now and what our needs are. Current situation: Raised bungalow with oil forced air. Home was built in the 70's and at the time I believe the basement was unfinished and finished later on. Heating system is one zone (thermostat is upstairs). As mentioned basement was finished later on so there are only like 2 vents for the basement so when we have heat on, the basement doesn't really get affected. For other heat sources: Basement - a couple rooms have baseboard electric (never turned on or used), and a wood stove (only used on cold weekends when we want to hang out in the basement rec room); Upstairs Living Room - propane fireplace (only used if it is a little colder and want additional heat or if we are in the room). My office in the basement has no heat source so I have been relying on a space heater however experienced some electrical issues because of that and want to stop using a space heater. In the winter the basement gets to 12-15 degrees so working down here with a space heater I still have to wear sweats to keep warm as it takes a while to heat up. What we would like: Since we have the ducting (main supply line is fine and 5" ducting going off to the rooms) I think it makes sense to take advantage of that and get a central ducted unit. The upstairs is fine for air flow, however, we would like to make the basement more comfortable to keep the heat consistent for when we go to the storage/workshop and laundry area and to have my office heated by the heat pump as well. Ideally I would like my office or at the least the basement to be on a separate zone from the upstairs. From the installers I have talked to already they said if we went the central unit way we could add additional vents to the basement to get more heat down there and manually adjust the dampers to get the heat even throughout the house, which would still be on one zone with thermostat upstairs. To me that doesn't really solve the problem we have and doesn't seem to be an efficient solution. We don't always want to be heating (or cooling) the whole house. If I am the only one home working in my office, the whole house doesn't need to be 'on'. Plus if we have the propane fireplace on upstairs and it is warm enough there, we would need to turn the heat on for the whole house just to warm up the basement making it even warmer upstairs... this is why multizone would be key. Can these central units be multi zone? or add motorized dampers for the vents? if not, what are the other options? Can we add a mini split indoor unit for the basement to the outdoor ducted unit or would we need a separate outdoor ductless unit to control the basement units? Any help would be appreciated!
I suspect your existing duct work is not going to work. I would be willing to bet it is too small. You need to remember that heat pumps are not putting out really "hot" air. so they move more volume at lower temps. Your ducting is not sized for that. You might be better off with a multisplit system with indoor heads in a few areas.
I don't know about all the technical stuff regarding duct size but I know when I had my central heat pump replaced and got a new one a few years ago, I asked a couple questions that might help. You can absolutely get motorized dampers to produce more airflow to the basement if you want, my old system had them...but as Gooch pointed out, the air isn't actually "hot", so in general it's best to just disperse it evenly through the house. That said, I do have uneven areas in my house as well, the back side of the house where kitchen, sunroom, laundry room, and dining room is always colder then front of house and upstairs. Partly due to lack of vents and placement of the thermostat. The option I was given was to place multiple temperature sensors in the house and have the heat pump programmed to take the average.
One thing I've experienced IRL via an experiment month by month was even though my heat pump is programmable and can turn up/down at night, morning, weekends whatever...doing so costs more money than just setting it and leaving it. I would alternate months during the winter where I would set it at 21 and leave it 100% of the time; and that proved over and over again to be cheaper than having it drop to 19 during sleep and turn back up to 21 when we wake.
I agree. My daikin at my old house had motion sensors and stuff but I never used them. I set it at 21-22 in the winter,it turns off from May-early June and then AC June- late September then off again until late October ish. set it and forget it
Set it and forget it! Absolutely turning it up and down to save energy is not going to give you the results you think it will.
I got some more assessments, and the contractors all said ducting size is fine. They all recommended going with the central unit and adding a few more vents in the basement and temp would be fine throughout the house +/- a couple degrees on the extreme days between floors. If I find we have hot/cold areas I'll get some Flair vents. Now the thing is, based on comments in this thread and what I heard from others, Daikin is the way to go due to quality. I was expecting it to be the most expensive however it was the cheapest by far. So what gives? 2.5 Ton Daikin Fit $11K (Ready Refrigeration) 2.5 Ton Fujitsu $13K (Sunshine) 2.5 Ton Lennox $15K (Shines through Costco) Leaning towards the Daikin for price obviously, and size of the unit. They are also supposed to be really quiet. However, my hesitation is whether the Daikin Fit is a subpar unit and not as good as the others since it's such a lower price point. That's a big price range for heat pumps. All the research I've done and reviews read indicate its a great unit.
I always thought Daiken was a budget brand of the bunch? They were when I got my heat pumps ~8 years ago. Maybe they've proven themselves over that time?
All those prices seem great compared to the $21k I paid for my 2.5T variable speed Amana one. That price covers tax, installation, removal of old one, and electronic air filter. Doing it over again, not sure if I would spend as much (no issues to report) as others I know have cheaper systems like Daiken and they have had no issues either. My budget billing dropped $175 a month from my old Lennox heat pump though.
