Furnace or heat Pump????

[Mark Hammons]

Good news/Bad news...

Bad news first-our furnace, only 7 years old is dead! Bad news-we spent over $600 on repairs last spring! Bad news-we had a guy come look at the furnace and to quote the late Dick Strickland, it is d-dd-d-dead!
Better news-a guy at church used to work in HVAC and recommended a local guy to replace our heating system. Bad news-to replace only the furnace is around $1500 and to get a heat pump, we're looking at around $2500!!!
Okay, so there's no real good news!
My question is, is a heat pump really worth the extra money? We live in Southern Ohio and we've been told, by non-HVAC folks, that we are in a border line area that a really cold winter a heat pump will not help that much on the electric bill. Others swear by heat pumps.
What's your opinion???

Thanks,
Mark

[Larry Osweiler]

I never cared for electric heat. I always seemed to me like a "cold" heat, if that makes sense. Up here in Michigan, you see very few heat pumps. But there are some who swear by them. The one's installed in the last ten years seem to be a lot better than the earlier ones. Most all of them now are the geothermal kind where all the pipes are underground in your back yard. I've heard that the colder the climate, the less sense it makes to have one.
As for me, I would go with a 95% efficient gas furnance. I am seriously looking into a corn burner for a supplemental heat source. The places around here that sell the corn burners have a waiting list of people to buy them. You might look at one of them also.
As for a furnace, I've always been partial to Lennox furnaces, but I'm sure others are just as good. Lennox has a furnace that combines the furnace and the water heater. Very efficient.

[Dave McClung]

HVAC is an area where technology is constantly changing. When heat pumps first came out, they had a distinct advantage over electric heat or gas. Since then technology has made it a closer call.

If you do a "pay back" analysis the outcome will depend on your assumption about gas prices. The outlook for electric prices is more stable than for gas prices. A significant portion of our electricity supply is from coal fired plants built 10 to 20 years ago. The cost of operating those plants is known and the coal supplies are stable.

On the otherhand. gas supplies are less certain and have been more subject to big price increases.

If it were me, I would probably lean more toward the heat pump just because of the uncertainty in gas prices.

[Walter Palmer]

mark,
what kind of heat do you have now? i am assuming forced hot air. does everything need changing? if it does i would consider base board hot water. we have it at church snd it really comes up quick and is good heat. hope this helps.
walt

[Walter Thompson]

Having had both. In the north a heat pump does not work well below 32 degrees. You will have to have heat strips to back up your system. Go with a furnace, set your twmp at 68 and enjoy feeling the hot air when it comes on. A heat pump doesn't blow hot air, that you can tell. I just replaced mine for about $1500 total. 3 1/2 ton air and 90,000 btu.

[Cindi Hammons]

Mark didn't mention that we live in an area where natural gas does not run our way. We have propane gas logs in our family room (but it doesn't heat our bedrooms) and the price would be very high to heat the whole house. Electric heat is really our only alternative. If we lived in town....well, that would be another story.

Cindi H.