I would like to have a thread where people with geo heat pump units can tell what they like or dislike about  their systems. 

Please tell where you live, a brief description of your system, what type of system was replaced, what cost savings you have realized and  how long your system as been operating.

My intent is to have a place where I can send prospective customers to see what others have to say about geo heat pump systems.

Please don't ask use this thread to ask questions or offer opinions.

Dewayne, great idea, good thinking.
I live between Ann Arbor and Lansing in Michigan. My wife and I have a one story 1800 sf house built in 1990. We used about a 1000 gallons of propane each year for heat and hot water. As, the AC, heat, and hot water systems aged, it was time for replacing them. I had looked into geothermal systems in 1993, when we were considering building a house. We did not build. We bought the current house. So, it was natural for me to bring the old idea back.
In July, I contacted eight geo installers in my area. Joe AMI was not one of them, as I did not know about his company. Three contractors did not return my calls after a week. I made appointments with five contractors. One could not make the appointment. Four people came to take a look. One did not provide a proposal. One contractor tried to sell me an air to air heat pump with propane backup. Another one, was in the habit of allowing room for a negotiable price in his bids, I gathered from a reference I talked to. My wife and I chose Boyd's Heating and Cooling from Stockbridge, Michigan. A 3-ton Tranquility 27 was installed in October. A 6-pipe horizontal closed loop was installed by American Geo from Lansing, MI.
We waited about two months for the equipment to arrive. It had to be special ordered for Climadry dehumidification option. We live in a forest. In summer, there are cool, but humid days here.
Mike Boyd our contractor did a great job. The installation was clean, and prompt without any noticeable interruption in heating. He installed two well insulated electric hot water tanks, one as a pre-heat for desuprheater. The unit, initially, heated the house, using electric aux heat. The air ducts needed minor improvements. The ground loop was installed a week later. Tranquilty 27 with ClimaDry has been working quietly and hopefully efficiently for four weeks now, on its ground loop. Total cost was $18850. We are thankful happy customers.
Regards, Masoud

Bumping this hoping to get more posts.

Please tell where you live, a brief description of your system, what type of system was replaced, what cost savings you have realized and  how long your system as been operating.

I live in South Jersey, I had a Water Furance Premier P046T (R-22) system installed. (46k BTU, up to 26.2 EER/ 4.3 COP) with Desuperheater and 5KW Emergency Heat. The system has been in operation for two months now.   

The system is replaced was a Florida Heat Pump, LTV-50-1, EER / COP ratings unknown, was unable to locate any information about the unit. Units age was about 17 year old. 

Savings, unable to determine as of yet, Did not own house in October, 2007 and Geo system was down for repairs most of November, 2007.
  

We live in southeastern Pa about 35 miles north of Philadelphia. Our home is 5500 sq ft.

Our original installation was 8 years old and very "comfortable". It included multiple systems:

1. Energy Kinetics System 2000 EK-2, oil-fired, that provided:
        A. Backup for our three heat pumps
        B. Two radiant (warm floor) major zones with two hot-tanks.... all downstairs floors and all upstairs bathroom floors. Floors all toasty at 76*F
        C. Domestic Hot water (120 Gal)
2. Three York Stellar Plus 2000 (12 SEER) heat pumps:
        A. Downstairs 5 Ton
        B. Upstairs front 2.5 Ton
        C. Upstairs back 2.5 Ton
The Heatpumps were setup for a cutover at 40*F to oil hydronic (may be wrong word.... the oil furnace heated a water loop/hydronic coil in the HP Airhandler ducts when switched to oil).

Overall the design was comfort, but expensive. We were spending around 200 minmum per month on electric and oil previously was upwards of $3000-$4000/year. This year when the pre-pays went out, and we saw possibly $8K in oil costs, we decided to upgrade the heat pumps and remove some of the oil dependency.

We installed:

1 - ClimateMaster 5 Ton geothermal with 3x300ft closed loop for the downstairs system replacement (tore out the york HP and Air handler to replace with all new). Kept original duct-work.
     DeSuperheater is installed on the 5-ton unit feeding a pre-heat 80 gal tank that feeds over to the 120 gal primary domestic hot water that is heated by oil.
2 - ClimateMaster 2.5 Ton geothermal with 2x225ft closed loop for the upstairs-front system replacement (tore out the york HP and Air handler to replace with all new). Kept original duct-work.
3 - ClimateMaster 2.5 Ton geothermal with 2x225ft closed loop for the upstairs-back system replacement (tore out the york HP and Air handler to replace with all new). Kept original duct-work.

All systems were separate loops completely. They included electric strip for aux heat (we removed the oil cutover and the hydronic coils). We left the radiant floor system in-place as-is for now, until we see what geothermal is like. (We are considering a 5 ton GSHP W-W system to replace radiant floor and domestic hot water later, if ROI turns out OK). We also left the primary domestic hot water heated by oil as the lower desuperheater capability is only seeming to be a good pre-heat (though we havent run it long enough to see its value yet).

We have been up about 1.5 months so far, and our first electric bill and oil bills have arrived. We are amazed! Our electric bill (everything same in load as last year but for the new geothermal stuff) is over $100 cheaper for mid-oct through mid Nov. Our oil consumption is way lower (we had a lot of sub 40*F days already). We did decide to leave the radiant floors off until January this year - the only major change. We are predicting saving at least 60% on the oil consumption in heating and lower electric bills as we currently see. We can't wait until summer to see the difference there.

This was a huge investment (drilling alone was over $35K, retrofit inside the house was almost as much). We knew that going in, and since plan to hang around in the house, we likely will still be there to see the ROI.

We are thrilled with the 2-stage systems and the variable speed air handlers. So quiet....temps are stable in the house all over.... just great for the first 1.5 months!

Now, getting this far was a nightmare. Spending that much money makes one question everything and challange all. We did push things that our contractor did not want to do, such as lengthening our closed-loops for all the systems (and with our current EWT/LWT of 50/43 approx, we think we will be very happy that we did!).

Overall a good experience...but with OIL dropping so much, I would imagine that many people will look a little closer before taking a jump like this....its hard to imagine doing if the ROI gets pushed out past a handfull of years in these times.....

We live in Duluth Minnesota (today's high temp expect to be 26 degrees.) We replaced a forced air fuel oil furnace in March of '08 with a Geoexcel model GS036 three ton closed loop system with the optional desuperheater. We did not have AC prior to this unit so that is a fantastic added bonus. We were paying approximately $1600 a year to heat our 1368 square foot home. We were given a month by month estimate of what our cost would be with geothermal and I am very happy to say that this was VERY accurate. We are on track to have an annual cost for heating and cooling of approximately $400...yes $400 dollars. Living in one of the coldest areas of the nation, this is phenomenal.

We called 5 companies in our area who advertised geothermal for bids. Three came out to our home, two actually submitted bids, and one refused to even bid as he aknowledged that he could not compete on residential installs. Our bids came in with one for vertical drilling and one for horizontal. The company that bid horizontal was bidding $5000 lower than for the vertical drilling. Since we have the yard space, and the references were glowing for the company bidding for horizontal..that's the system we went with. Our complete system was $15,000 after a local power company rebate. We had an energy audit done and they estimated the system would pay for itself in about 4 years if the price of home heating oil continues to rise, or 7 years at the price of 2.55 per gallon. We are guessing we will be closer to that 4 year estimate.

The company was Summit Mechanical, based here in Duluth. They are dedicated to Geothermal becoming a large part of their future business and these folks have it down pat. They had us hooked up in days, made very little disruption in our home, and stuck to the bid price exactly as quoted. They did a great job from start to finish, and made sure after the fact that all was running and that we were happy with the system. They called us about a month ago to let us know about the new tax credit available, and just to check on how things were going.

We are very satisfied with the comfort level in our home. For the first time our home has no cold spots, no cold floors and it's a very nice even heat. We are able to keep it at 70 degrees constant. In the past we'd have our thermostat programmed at 68 when we were home, 55 when we were at work and 60 at night when sleeping...brrrr.

Thanks for contributing, Masoud, TechGromit, danielz and Kelly. Hope to hear from others out there.

I live in Montreal, Canada, a climate with approximately 7500 heating degree days per year and my house was built in 1898 with triple brick construction and little insulation. Previous heating system was an ancient oil boiler with cast iron radiators and was costing around Can$4000 a year. No A/C so in the summer it was unbearably hot in the bedrooms (temperatures staying in the 90s even with windows open). The internal oil tank was at the end of its insurable life and so decided to bite the bullet and kill several birds with one stone. The house is 1960 square feet with a 980 square foot heated (but unfinished) basement. The house is attached on one side to a neighbour.

A 3.5 ton ClimateMaster genesis was fitted in 2005 with a single vertical well of 420 feet drilled 6 feet in front of the house into silicated limestone. System sizing and drilling based on the contractor's experience in the area. Electricity is very cheap here so some auxiliary heat usage on the coldest days is cheaper than going for larger equipment/deeper wells and to avoid oversizing for A/C (multi-stage units were not an option when we installed). New windows were fitted which addressed a lot of air leakage issues (we had pre- and post-renovation energy audits with blower door tests performed). System installation was Can$16k and the borehole was Can$14 per foot. The energy audits enabled a grant of Can$4300 which covered most of the cost of the drilling. Payback was immediate as cash flow was much reduced compared to the oil beast. The thermostat is maintained at 70F in winter and 71F in summer. To get a free natural gas connection a gas hot water tank was installed and this is pre-heated with the desuperheater (no buffer tank - see my other posts). Gas consumption declines to around Can$2 (two dollars) per month in winter - to the consternation of the gas company who came to inspect the meter since they assumed it was defective. Annual electricity consumption is about 19,000kWh or around Can$1200 - so the total energy bill is about 1/3 of what it was previously. This is now the 4th winter and "payback" will be complete by the spring. Payback would have been sooner but the price of oil went down again :)

The comfort level is very good - the system is extremely quiet (much quieter than the oil boiler) and the heat is very even with no hot/cold spots at all. Friends always comment on how comfortable the house feels.

I've been an obsessive meter reader since installation and have correlated consumption with heating degree days. The post-renovation energy audit also included energy consumption estimates using hot2000 - the model has proven to be within about 5% of actual measured consumption over the past 3 years - around 22,000kWh per year (electricity plus gas). The pre-renovation audit estimated consumption at 85,000kWh per year (electricity plus oil) so I think it's quite an improvement. We've saved about 12,000kg of CO2 per year since installation. As our electricity supply is essentially 100% hydro, there's no CO2 emission; our natural gas consumption gives about 430kg CO2 per year.

Paul.

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we replaced an oil boiler with a WF Envision 049 in our 2000 sq' old farmhouse in SW Michigan. . narrowed down to 3 quotes- WF, hydro delta, and DX. DX was quite a bit more, the other 2 were very competive. Hydro delta guy diddnt have much experience so we went with WF..
Overall we are pleased with our choice. Some things to think about (that we diddnt at the time) need to make sure about duct placement as the air discharge feels a bit cool if its blowing directly on someone. I knew the yard gets tore up with all the digging, and I diddnt expect the installer would put new sod put down or anything, but it was left in pretty rough shape, not a big deal in the overall scope of things but a question I would ask the installer if I was to go thru it again would be if they could at least scrape off the top soil first and not leave equpiment tracks and roots sitcking up all over.
Used about 1500KW per month for Jan and Feb. So our electric bill went from about $60 to $160.
Most of the challenge was installing ductwork to the upstairs. using the old chimney chase for the return seems to work OK -its about 3 degrees warmer upstairs than downstairs . Duct placement is important, with the old heat, our kitchen was always cold, putting a boot under the cabinets so the air blows up and around the kick plate was a GREAT idea- seems to trickle out and heat the whole floor. However in the living room there are 4 along the outside wall with a lot of windows and when we moved our furniture around to make room for the Christmas tree, a couch was next to one of the outlets and if sitting there you would swear the window was drafty but it was the discharge blowing your arm just felt that cool. Our house has never been more comfortable and QUIET before and we cant wait to enjoy having A/C.

A curious situation in mi, DX equipment is curiously more expensive than my water source unit+loops and flow center installed and flushed by sub contractor. Distributor problem. You bring up a great point about the condition of your lawn. Many rural folks with large lots have an old Ford 9-n or some such around, so we leave finish grade and seed as an oppurtunity for sweat equity, but it should be clarified. I tell folks their lawn will look like the surface of the moon to avoid unpleasant suprises (I make sure they are pleasantly suprised).
Joe

Since my system isn't in. . .I can't really comment on it.

I did find this site though

http://www.hvac-for-beginners.com/geothermal-ratings.html

Now, I know that not everyone's system is on there, but it's interesting to see what a 'pro' says. Lots of stuff on this page, but a $100 load calc. Maybe that's both heating and cooling.

This guy must work for Water Furnace since he gave them  5 stars.

He has no credibility in my book since he rated Hydro Heat and Hydron  the same.

I looked at a couple other rating areas and they were similar - almost all rated 1-2 and then a few standouts rated at 5

That suggests to me the site is a shill for a distributor somewhere dealing in a few brands, including WF.

No credibility with me either.

Might want to start our own load practice though.
$100 for a manual J calc- I could make a living at that price.

That link is complete bunk!  No facts to it what so ever.  As far as the $100 for a load calc, that would break my bank for a 34,000 sq ft home!  What size houses are you talking about doing making a living at $100 a pop?  They must be small, but still 100 bucks is basically an hours work for an engineer, so you are saying you can model a complete home in under an hour?  Just interested.  Thx.

For me, with wrightsoft, it's typically 10-30 minutes for a regular 2,000-4,000 sq. ft. home. Some larger homes are more difficult and take a little bit longer.

If I'm also sizing the system or making a tonnage recommendation, add another 5-10 minutes. If I'm working up a cost comparison, that could add another 30 min.

I'd do load after load after load at $100 a pop--of course with some sort of sq. footage restrictions...

Thanks, I see where you're coming from now.  That makes sense to me, thanks for the info.

I'm a newb here but looks like an old timer to geo. I have been happily living with a dx sys since 1994. Located in northern MD close to PA border. We built a log home in 93-94 with the goal of long term low bills without having to live like monks. 6' cedar walls with 8" sip panel roof over exposed heavy timber construction. Good windows, efficient apliances, flourecent lighting. I believe geo works even better when it's part of a good big picture. The house was designed around a 4 ton "US Powers" gsdx with desuperheater single zone system. It has a single speed Trane air handler and a horizontal field buried 50'x50'x5.5" and a Regency epa approved wood stove. The house is approx 2,700 sq ft of heated space with 10" ceilings(20" in great room)plus an insulated unfinished full basement. 2/3s of the house is mostly open greatroom, loft, kitchen,and dining the other third is 2 bedrooms on first floor and one large master on second. We have 2 ceiling fans on the ridgebeam and one in every bedroom. All interior walls are insulated as well.
 I don't have much in the way of data and figures as we didn't have an old sys in this house to compare to. When we built this house geo was not that common and no one really talked to us about the numbers to expect like they do now. As we were doing our log home homework we were exposed to several geo systems. I'm a KISS principle kind of guy so dx appealed to me right away. For the record I'm now convinced more than ever that DX is the best way to do gshp.
 We historically set the thermostat in winter @ 66 and summer @75. If we come home from work and if the house is chilly we build a fire in the stove. Because of the thermal mass of the logs the house is very easy to heat. Building a fire with outside temps above 40 degrees will toast you out of the house quickly. We have gone for several days at a time without a fire in very cold(below 20 degrees) weather without the aux heat coming on. As a matter of fact the only time it ever comes on is if the sys has been off for a while and is turned back on with temps more than 5 or 6 degrees below thermostat setting. The system has had no trouble maintaining set temperature winter or summer. Spring and fall with moderate weather the house heats and cools itself be cause of the sun and log walls.
 Except for the wood stove the house is total electric. In the last year or so we have changed out the few incandecent lights for compact flourecents. In a normal winter we will burn about 1.5-2 cords of hardwood. We have typically had bills that were 1/2 to 2/3s of what our neighbors have had with well constructed  conventional homes.  For the 1st few years here the electric bill over the course of a year averaged out to about $100 a month. Lately we are paying the price for electrical deregulation. After the price cap was lifted our bills basically doubled. Our bill is now normally in the mid $250 per month(12 cents kwh) during heavy heating and cooling. This winter we lowered the thermostat to 60 and burned more wood.
 US Powers went out of bussiness about a year after we built. The system has been extremely trouble free. The one issue has been that during drought years the ground can dry out down to were the field coil is and it will not accept heat from the coil as readily. The solution has been to turn on the soaker hose that was buried with the coil to settle the ground. This puts cold water on the coil and wets the ground and all is back to normal. We did have to replace the compressor a couple of years ago and I believe the failure was related to this situation. We were painting the house which requires alot of pressure washing and I didn't run the soaker because I was worried about the well in the near drought conditions. The conventional inside parts are starting to show their age somewhat as we have had some little things go wrong which seems to be par for the course for any 15 year old heat pump system. Overall we are very pleased and are doing some homework to replace and upgrade some of the system in the near future.    

Great post , squatch thanks