In the fall of 2002 we installed an Invision3 closed loop system in a newly constructed single family home.  The system has had problems from virtually day one.  I've probably spent the geothermal savings in repairs.  Here's a list of items that have gone wrong with this unit from what I can remember.  This unit is a two compressor unit with the hot water unit.  The hot water unit heats 100% of our hot water needs.

• First thing we noticed --- hot water not hot enough.  If the unit runs most of the day (hot & cold days) the water is great.  Don't recommend the hot water option.
• Hot water or second compressor would continually lock out -- no hot water produced when this happens and no second stage heat.  This problem finally went away when the compressor died and Econar reluctantly sent us a new one.
• I've had two fans go out on this unit within the 8 years.  The first time this happened, a $700 repair.  The second time it happened ... that cut the rope.  It's now in the process of being pulled out to the junk yard and replaced with a Climate Master system. GOOD RIDDANCE!
  
• Issues with fluid leaks inside the unit that have had to be repaired and recharge the closed loop.  These leaks took place within the furnace, not the loop.  I saw them myself by opening the panel and visibly see them on the bottom tray.
  
• This unit is very, very noisy and is another reason its heading OUT to the scrap yard.
• Econar corporate, very hard to reach people, getting them to honor warranties a difficult process and they hold you hostage while determining charges.  For instance, the compressor, they had to analyze it before shipping out a new one.
• Shipping seems to be a problem area as well.  They say its shipped when its not.  Continual phone calls made to get the UPS tracking numbers after of course they finally ship it.
• Repeatedly call Econar asking for help and consideration, to no avail.
• Some of the parts were obviously not engineered for consistency. For example, the fan unit would not install due to housing not fitting into the unit.  My technician had to waste several hours taking the old motor out of its housing unit, put the new motor in then install into furnace unit.  Oh, and I distinctly remember Econar failed to program the fan unit.  SO guess what, we were out of service again while the unit traveled back to Appleton MN and back to my house.  Econar will not send out replacement parts for their screw ups.  The fan was kind of a red light that I knew we would probably have to junk this unit for a new one at some point.  I was just hoping to get 5 or 10 more years of good operation.  Not going to happen -- the fan died again.
  

Support, customer service and shipping are all equally incompetent.  When the unit works, it works well, except that its loud.  I've had it with the unit.  My technician will not install Econar units any more either.  He now installs Climatemastaser systems for several years and reports they are of high quality with a much smaller frequency of problems than Econar systems.   

Climatemaster has parts readily available in my area and we can deal with them in a neighboring town not far away as well.  Dealing with voice mails and parts hassles will not be missed by my technician.

I went to Econar's website and wrote them a warning that one of their products has been trashed on a very influential geo website.

I'm interested to see how they respond.

The format of their corporate contact form, demanding that one fill in every field such as phone number and street address rather than just name and email suggests that they are in fact a bureaucratic, non-responsive organization.

Posted By engineer on 25 Jun 2010 11:58 PM
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The format of their corporate contact form, demanding that one fill in every field such as phone number and street address rather than just name and email suggests that they are in fact a bureaucratic, non-responsive organization.

This is one  my peeves as well.

ssamet,
sorry you've had so much trouble.
how does installer intend to make your domestic hot water with new system?

virtually every company that made a 2 compressor system had trouble with it. i think i mentioned before that we don't see a lot of complaints about econar; or praises. i don't know what their market share is but they do tend to fall off the radar 'round here. aprilaire has purchased econar since your unit was built, so they did not see a dime for it's sale but they have backed other products sold before they bought up a manufacturer (I remember a hydro delta cust. who recieved a refund for the heat pump). i suggest you make sure that your installer is not part of the problem before paying him to solve it.
Good Luck.
Joe

I'm in MN and Econar was one of the firms I solicited for bids for my closed loop system.  I had researched the techonology a bit and found their warning to "run, don't walk away from installers who say you need auxiliary heat as the Econar was optimized for cold weather and we could run on geo at our frequent sub-zero days."  I also found similar complaints on various HVAC forums.

I went with a WF unit.  After 18 months, no real complaints other than I can't heat/cool my home for "free".

Posted By Pipemajor on 12 Jul 2010 02:10 PM
I'm in MN and Econar was one of the firms I solicited for bids for my closed loop system.  I had researched the techonology a bit and found their warning to "run, don't walk away from installers who say you need auxiliary heat as the Econar was optimized for cold weather and we could run on geo at our frequent sub-zero days."  I also found similar complaints on various HVAC forums.

I went with a WF unit.  After 18 months, no real complaints other than I can't heat/cool my home for "free".

PM,
Out of curiosity, does your WF have aux heat?
I had not heard this particular Econar quote before, but folks here know I'm an advocate if not fanatic fan/employer of auxiliary heat.
To briefly explain, I don't understand how any proponent of a 2 stage system could look down their nose at a three stage design.
Joe

Ssamet: out of curiosity, why did you select an Econar Invision3 system? Did it just come with the house, recommended by the installer, or did you research and pick the best unit based on price?

Tech Gromit,

In 2001 when we built our house, there were not many published resources to get information about geothermal systems. The utility company said they are all good, quiet and have a long life span. I made a decision based upon that. Looking back, we should have visited a system in Illinois if there is one and asked about part availability. The company behind the unit and parts availability are CRITICAL! ClimateMaster for example, is a huge organization and I can get parts in many locations where I live.

The Econar product features & specs initially sold me: it could heat all of our hot water, could be used for radiant heating application, efficient two stage design. This product was ahead of the competition at the time in terms of features & design.

I now have a ClimateMaster system and both of the estimates I received from two other installers both said the same things: the return air of this unit is extremely undersized. That is a factory/engineering defect with this unit I would say. They attribute the undersizing as the reason why we've burned out two fans. My installer swears he built the return air as specified. The hole on the unit is indeed what he hooked up for the return air duct work.

If I had to guess, I would say the return air on the new climate master system is 1 1/2 to 1 2/3 bigger than the Econar one.

Joe,

Decided to ditch the hot water heating with our new unit.  Most manufacturers have a desuperheater option.  My installer said it was an $800 option and that can buy alot of hot water!  I'm kind of sold on the tankless systems.  The tank the geothermal used to store the water in was an electric hot water heater.  We will now turn that on and use that until it dies.  Then probably move into a tankless option.

I did a search on Ebay to see what parts might be valuable ... I get 0, ZERO hits for Econar and many, many for ClimateMaster parts & systems.  Anyone want a junky 6 ton Econar unit?  I'll sell it for a grand.

I talked to a dealer that was wearing a Econar hat on while he was suggesting a different brand. He saw me look up at his hat and said he no longer would deal with them. sadly they make better hats then they do systems.

Econar hasn't responded to me or here, so I suspect they don't know or don't care what's going on out here on the web; perhaps Aprilaire has a tiger by the tail.

Posted By joe.ami on 12 Jul 2010 11:41 PM

Posted By Pipemajor on 12 Jul 2010 02:10 PM
I'm in MN and Econar was one of the firms I solicited for bids for my closed loop system.  I had researched the techonology a bit and found their warning to "run, don't walk away from installers who say you need auxiliary heat as the Econar was optimized for cold weather and we could run on geo at our frequent sub-zero days."  I also found similar complaints on various HVAC forums.

I went with a WF unit.  After 18 months, no real complaints other than I can't heat/cool my home for "free".

PM,
Out of curiosity, does your WF have aux heat?
I had not heard this particular Econar quote before, but folks here know I'm an advocate if not fanatic fan/employer of auxiliary heat.
To briefly explain, I don't understand how any proponent of a 2 stage system could look down their nose at a three stage design.
Joe

Yes it does.  I have the WF ND049 with a 10KW electric strip.  Electrician had to install a 60A circuit for the heat pump and a separate 60A circuit for the aux heat.

I also have the desuperheater option and never had a problem with hot water.

Thanks PM.
I am bidding right now on a home in MI that curiously is drivin by the cooling load. H/O wishes to maintain historic home's original windows....lots of glass.
I still insist on aux. coils. If for no other reason than they alleviate middle of the night emergency service if the heat fails.
Folks aux. coils are a few hundred to purchase and they keep you warm if loop fails.
RUN....don't walk away...from anyone who suggests you don't want them!
j

If you do run from a contractor who declines to install strips, stop running when you reach Florida.

We don't use them here on geo because our occasional cold snaps are little more than a nuisance. Frozen pipes are limited to hose bibs and lines in crawl spaces. I have a half dozen oil-filled electric heaters to deal with no-heat incidents.

However, anywhere freezing temps are likely during daylight hours, install strips. Keep in mind that strips aren't 100% immune to system failure - they still need the blower, low voltage circuits, thermostat, control power transformer and system board all to be functioning.

Would it be better to say that a person should have an emergency heat source (and not necessarily electric strips)? Depending on the house, could electric service upgrades be costly?

I do like electric heat strips since they can be used concurrently with geo as auxiliary heat, but so can a fireplace (for example). Personally, I don't like the idea of a gas fireplace thermostatically turning on automatically when a person is away (for example), but others may feel differently.

I know it will be awhile if ever that I get rid of my existing electric baseboard. It will disappear from the kitchen so I can put in more cabinets. and from the bathrooms if I do radiant heat in there. But in general, I'll have it in case of system failure

fair enough Curt;
"Folks aux. coils are a few hundred to purchase and they keep you warm if loop fails.
RUN....don't walk away...from anyone who suggests you don't want them....In heating dominated climates.
j

FYI we had an Econar system installed and running for almost 2 years now. I specifically went with them as I heard bad things from someone who so suffered with WF that he had it removed and Econar installed since. We are very happy with the system and have had absolutely no trouble with it. Our dealer who has worked with both units liked the Econar because of its simplicity...less to go wrong.

One of the reasons we went with them is that, being from MN, they make a unit that heats that also happens to cool...vs other manufacturers who design their systems to cool that also happen to heat. Being in a northerly climate, heat is our primary issue. We survived the snowiest January ever and had very cold temps and our unit maintained our house at an even 69 degrees without issue. We have the emergency back up electric heat switched manually and never had to turn it on this winter.

Of course, we also had our house super insulated with closed-cell insulation so whatever BTUs we generate, we hang on to them for a long time.

We also have the desuperheater and tankless hot water heaters. This way, the water heater only makes up the differential between the output temp we want and the input temp from the geotherm unit.

All in all we are very happy with Econar.

Thanks for posting

THANK YOU! THANK YOU! Everyone for taking the time to carefully explain your problems with this manufacturer.

Does anyone know a dual compressor system that is worth considering? (not for 100 % hot water, but possibly for a combination system for radiant heat and forced air in Connecticut, a heat dominant location and/or some help heating an outdoor pool for May through September for spoiled grand kids 91 degree pool water.

Thanks again for the warnings.