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Learning, Sharing, and Teaching => Ask a Mustachian => Topic started by: SB on January 14, 2014, 05:43:26 PM

Title: Recommendations on replacing heat pump
Post by: SB on January 14, 2014, 05:43:26 PM
We own a apartment in NE US, that we bought around 2 year ago. All the heating & cooling for the apartment is electric and is done using a heat pump that is 15+ years old. Over the last 2 years our average monthly bills have started going upwards of $100. In the recent cold wave, we hit the $200 mark per month for the 1st time. Due to this I have been trying to read about replacing our heat pump with a new one to reduce the monthly bills, but I am not able to find any site that could show me recommendations based on our apt size or monthly bills. Also, how can I calculate the amount of time that we would need to recoup the cost of replacement.

Is there any other options other than replacing the heater that could help us reduce the electric bill?
Title: Re: Recommendations on replacing heat pump
Post by: Emg03063 on January 15, 2014, 08:16:37 PM
Time to recoup replacement cost = $ saved / $ spent

If you don't have super efficient windows, seal or get some of these:

http://www.windowinserts.com/?gclid=CP3ljLLcgbwCFepQOgodHFMA6Q

Insulate where needed if applicable.  Look for drarts around doors and address.  Open your blinds/ shades (especially on southern facing windows) during the day in winter & close them at night.  Make sure your air filters are changed regularly, and get your system serviced if it hasn't been lately.  The service guy should be able to provide some specific recommendations.  For basic data collection, put a clamp ammeter on a leg of your compressor power supply to determine your current draw (from which you can calculate your power use), and do some data logging on the duty cycle.
Title: Re: Recommendations on replacing heat pump
Post by: Milspecstache on January 22, 2014, 06:37:43 PM
Your heat pump is probably shifting to using resistors to produce heat in the extreme cold.  Nearly any other heat pump would do the same thing as they are limited by air temperature (unless you are talking geothermal which isn't an option for you in an apt).

What are you setting the thermostat to?  Any chance you could selectively heat just a room or two using space heaters?  Then keep the rest of the apt at a lower temp, say 60F?  That would probably keep the pipes from freezing.