I have a 2800 sqft house , 65 yrs old, g f a heating, on a 200 x200 lot.  near the centre of a small town in Ontario Canada. I would like to install  a closed loop system plus have under floor heat in the basement, and use the existing ducting  for the rest of the house. Because of trees and a pool I think I will  have to have a verticle loop.

 Out of 15 companies I have contacted , sofar only one has made it to look at this prospective job, and given me a ball park of 35-80k CAD for the job. I have spent the whole day waiting for a  salesman from  another local company to turn up for a 10.30am appoinment, it is now 2.50pm , he has just called to say he cant make it.

I have had 2 telephone quotes of  40-60k and 100k, but no other visits.

Do I smell?

Is  the  industry doing so well that my job is not worth getting out of the chair for?

What does it take to to get attention!!!  Is this normal?

Or should I start looking for  a heat pump myself, then get individual contractors to complete the different parts of the job.

Am I in the wrong part of the world ( 80 miles from Toronto)

Simon

Your job sounds trickier than average owing to constraints, and there just aren't that many contractors out there up to speed (and you DON'T want one who isn't).

Consult IGSHPA and geo heat pump mfgs for qualified contractors. Get local references as well.

Thanks for the reply.

Please can you expand on "trickier" . Is it the verticle drill that is frightening contractors off , and is this kind of installation rare?
 That would lead me to guess that a lot of  the contractors can handle a 2 acre garden  1 storey house  horizontal loop  new build installation job , but not much else.
I did get to speak to 1  master distributor of Nordic pumps, but there  contractor was  the no show, this dose not give me the level of comfort to go with there product. So who makes the most reliable  6 ton pump ? ( Thats what I have been told I will need . so far)

Trickier IMHO would include the radiant floor for the most part. The first thing that came to mind when I read that you want your existing basement to have radiant floor is that you won't want to spend the $$$ needed to do it right. There are a few ways to do it...

1. Install 1" foam board, then pex tubing, then 1.5" of gypcrete or concrete.
2. Use Warm Board or equivalent product
3. Install a radiant ceiling.
4. bust out your concrete floor and re-do it.
There are probably other ways, too...

Each of these options have their pros and cons, but for the most part, they are very expensive, which is completely unrelated to geothermal.

That being said, not too many contractors, let alone geo contractors, are able to efficiently do both forced air and hydronic heating. To accomplish this, you may be best off with two heat pumps. One for the forced air, and one for the water. I'd suggest that setup. Then, with the water heating unit, I'd use a domestic water heating exchanger and circulate in the floor via an open (open to domestic hot water) loop, so that the heat pump heats all the domestic water, too.

Another way to do it would be one heat pump that heats and chills water. Then the forced air portion uses either heated or chilled water, depending on the season. Of course, you may have little to no cooling load...foreign to me...

On your size of 6 ton, better make sure the contractor does his own accurate load.

Keep trying. Geothermal is worth it. Oh, and I would recommend EarthLinked DX.

Some may be put off by the vertical drill, others by the complexity of combined hydronic and forced air, others by the challenge of using existing ducts, whose capacity may not suffice for geo. Others may be put off by the age of the house - construction details buried in the walls increase uncertainty of the heat load calculation - might need a blower door test to determine how loose the house is, also hard to determine amount and effectiveness of insulation.

It's possible that the local contactors thingk that your pay back may be so long term that you wouldn't be willing to spend the money. i get lots of curiousity inquiries here where i know that their combination of small lots (vertical loops) with natural gas available will make their payback 20+ years. While folks insist that they are still interested, invariably once they see the price tag the send me and my 3 or 4 hour time investment packing with the promise to "think about it".
One thing you can do to let prospective bidders know you are serious is to pay for or perform your own heat load calculation as well as design (or pay to have designed) the basement radiant plan.
If you intend to do this, the few hundred you invest for these things will easily be bartered into a like sized discount from your purchase.
As an added thought, a customer today with a broken furnace, mentioned that he hoped to replace it for...... We've had sub zero weather for what feels like a month now. I suggested (politely) that July prices were only 6 months away. Point is if your job cost is going to be that high, you might save several thousand if you wait a month or two.
Good luck,
J

My advice to hornysettler, would be - get informed -spend a bit of money and take a good course on geothermal installation and/or design. It is well worth it - fun and informative. I took the course in Cambridge Ontario (near your area) - a CGCT course (Canadian Geoexchange Coalition Training). Check out geosmartenergy.com

I looked at the forms, it says the pre-req is the installers' course. Did you have this, how did you get around it? Thanks, Rob

First you have to you start with the installers course. And I must say, I believe that is the way to go. In the installers course, you indeed obtain a lot of information on the design side - rules of thumb type of design. The design course is more theoretical as it should be. You get to meet a number of experienced people taking the course. That is a plus. If you are going to spend $30K on geothermal, I believe you must be well informed and have fun at the same time.