schmelez,
I currently have the dining room stat set at 64 F (first floor) and the bedroom stat set at 62 F (second floor) , the Bonus room above the garage I currently have turned off.

Sorry the delta T was 28 not 38 my bad I meant to put 70 not 60.

Sorry the EAT should have been 70 not 60.

I still like the idea of letting the system run without aux powered as a test. This will also let you get air temperature readings without aux as well as seeing if the system can keep up without aux.

I meant thought that "jumps out" at me. fingers faster than brain......
new DT being 10* less is far less striking however.

A recent example of a duct system's impact on performance was a 3 ton I zoned.
When we were hanging the second trunk system, unit never shut off (maybe 10 minutes in the six hours we were there). 7* seperated 1st and second floor temps.
Next day with 2nd floor ducts on new trunk. Unit cycled off more often than I would have predicted DT between floors was 2*.....all before zone dampers installed.

This was a retrofit where original HVAC guy (one of those that only uses 100MBH furnaces and 18x8 duct) had 20 openings on an 18 wide duct. Poor design in this case probably added a third to their heating bill.
J

geome.
I will turn the W1 Aux switch off and see what happens. However throughout the day today it has taken in the region of 60 minutes to satisfy the diningroom stat therefore using the aux heat for 20 mins.

Let me explain in more detail. Assuming everything is functioning correctly (and I'm not saying it is), at some outdoor temperature aux heat will be needed in order to maintain the thermostat set point. The outdoor temperature at which your system can no longer maintain the set point without the assistance of aux heat is called the balance point of your system. If the outdoor temperature is above the balance point, then you may not need aux heat if the thermostat is not losing ground. Long run times are normal for geothermal systems. There is no point in engaging aux heat (at a COP of 1) and running up the electricity cost if the thermostat is not losing ground. Just let the system run.

Of course, other things may impact the balance point such as air infiltration, insulation, etc, but I am trying to keep this example straightforward. 20 minutes of aux usage sounds like a lot to me, but others here can better advise you on that since our system has been able to keep up so far.

You are leaving the thermostat set points alone, right (i.e. no setbacks)?

Posted By stantheman on 11 Jan 2011 02:52 PM
Sorry the EAT should have been 70 not 60.

Sanity check: How can EAT be 7-8 degrees warmer than your thermostat setpoints?

Looby,
I am mererly giving you info from the tech who was here on Friday. I currently have my Dining Room (first floor) set at 65 F and First Floor Bedroom set at 62F. I have a bonus room with its owns stairway over the garage area with the thermostat turned OFF at the moment in an effort to save dollars. Hopefully when the situation is resolved I will have all three set at 65F. I have the Aux Heat turned off so all the heating is being done by the geo system.
Thanks for the comments. I will try anything.

Posted By Looby on 11 Jan 2011 05:16 PM

Posted By stantheman on 11 Jan 2011 02:52 PM
Sorry the EAT should have been 70 not 60.

Sanity check: How can EAT be 7-8 degrees warmer than your thermostat setpoints?

Lots of ways this can happen poor delivery is one thing that comes to mind. Thermostat only knows the temp where it is, not the combined return air temps.
Joe

Posted By stantheman on 11 Jan 2011 05:35 PM
Looby,
I am mererly giving you info from the tech who was here on Friday.

I apologize for being unclear; I wasn't questioning your sanity -- but
perhaps the sanity of whoever installed your heating system.

It makes no sense that your EAT (a.k.a. return air temperature) is
(significantly!) higher than the temperature of your heated spaces.
Might there possibly be some sort of "short circuit" in your ductwork
that's shunting heated air directly back to the return duct -- rather
than delivering it to your diningroom and bedroom?

I admit that sounds rather far-fecthed, but the electric usage you're
experiencing suggests that something seriously weird is going on.

Stan,
For some reason, two old jobs of mine keep coming to mind even though they not seem to directly relate to your issue. 1rst: Had a similar issue with high electric usage. We ended up bypassing the zoning system and that solved the problem. We later found out that the manufacturer had a problem with the chip set in the zone panel. Sent us a new zone panel and problem was solve. (It wasn't that simple we went through all of the same issues you did). The reason I bring it up was because it was a little over 2 and half years ago. Around the same time as your install.
2nd job: Same issue of huge electric bills. This was a 10 year old home with a recent geothermal retrofit in addition to the basement being finish. We struggled for two months trying to find the problem going back & forth really searching for every possibility. Our geothermal installation was running performing as expected and clearly wasn't the issue. Here's the interesting thing. At the end of the process when we were searching for a possible blockage, after removing insulation in a bay to expose the metal branch run we found an exposed electric wire (from the basement being finished) that never made it into a junction box and the protection cap came off. The exposed "live" wire was causing the draw.
I hope you find your issue.
John

Posted By stantheman on 11 Jan 2011 05:35 PM
I have the Aux Heat turned off so all the heating is being done by the geo system.

It's (very) early, but how has it been going with the:
electric meter - since you turned aux off (did you record the meter reading when you started), and the inside temperature - holding set point or loosing ground?

Has the system been running non-stop?

Depending on the outdoor temperature you may need aux heat at some point tonight or tomorrow morning.  Don't freeze doing a system experiment.  You could start again tomorrow.

Yesterday the tech replaced the zone panel and it seems to have repaired a problem with the Aux heating coming straight on when there is a call for the geo system.
I have the dining room set at 65F and bedroom set at 62F. In the last two hours it has come on twice each time for right around 30 minutes before the Diningroom stat was satisfied. In the two hours the meter shows that I have used 11 KWH. That includes all the electricity being consumed in the house.

Thanks for all the help

Wow! I really hope that your problem is solved.

Look at the October kWh usage - this is close to "baseline" - about 1500 kWh per month. The additional usage in the summer for a/c appears to be about 900 kWh - about right for a 5 yr old 4k sq ft home in Carlisle, PA. From my experience the winter kWh usage is off the charts. Problem with geo or home? Likely a bit of both. We've seen the e-heat energize too quickly (and stay on too long) because of the algorithym in the t-stat. The suggestions are on the money - but from afar one of the easiest things to do is disconnect the e-heat either at the breaker (if there is one) or by disconnecting the W-2 in the t-stat. The stat will call for e-heat but it can't be energized. Run the systems and see if they keep up. Check the usage daily. This will be a good start.

Paul
www.TotalGreenUS.com
Specialists in DX Geothermal

Thanks once again for all the feedback,
Left the system on overnight with the Aux turned off. Read the meter at 5am and used on average 5.5KWH per hour. Keep in mind there is 4 inches of snow outside and it must have dipped down into the teens for a low last night.
The big question is how does the system react when I turn the bonus room stat on and try and keep that room around 60 F. I guess one step at a time. Last night up until about 10pm the system was cycling on for about 30 mins and turning off for about 30 mins. I am monitoring it now to see if the on cycle is longer and off is shorter given that it is in the teens outside now. Will update. Thanks once again to all of you out there it has brought some sanity back to me.

Remember, it's ok for the system to run hours at a time without turning off. It's not a furnace, as you know, but it will take time to get used to it running that long. I would suggest you monitor loop temperature periodically. If you don't know already, ask the installer what temperature the loop is protected to from freezing.

It seems like aux is being called for too early, but time will tell.  We can look at aux settings later.

a 50% duty cycle without using resistance heating is very reasonable given the conditions we've been having. Turning on your bonus room will tell you a lot about how that area is interacting with the system and will go another piece of valuable data. As others noted, your baseline usage is high, around 50kwh/day, so 2kwh/h of the 5.5 you measured may be baseline. Heating your house for 3.5kwh/h in these conditions is very encouraging.

I think we are starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. At the moment at the coldest part of the day the system seems to be cycling on for an hour and off for half an hour and back on for an hour. As noted in a comment by geome this is ok to let the pump run for this length of time. The next step will be to introduce the bonus room. Some concerns of mine is that the thermostat is mounted on a wall about a foot from an uninsulated door leading into an attic storage space which is not heated. There is no foam insulation around the door jam so my guess would be that the cold ear leaking out of that room would have a negative effect on the thermostat given the close proximity - right or wrong???

Thanks to one and all