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Is anyone familiar with the Hallowell Acadia heat pump system? We live in CT and currently have an oil furnace with baseboards. Since we want central air and need to run the duct work anyway, we thought this system might be a good solution. Any thoughts or personal experience?

 http://www.gotohallowell.com/acadia.html

Thanks, Kathy

I am not familiar with that brand of heat pump but here in south Alabama nearly everyone has heat pumps. The first thing you need to know about heat pumps is that the air they put out is about 72 degrees. The first time I turned ours on I called a repairman because it was blowing "cold air." He got a real chuckle out of that. The house never feels warm and when you step out of a shower under a vent blowing 72 degree air, it is freezing. The only way you can get warm air is to turn up the thermostat until the "heat strips" come on which consume more electricity and totally negates the reason you bought the heat pump--to use less energy and save money. What I would give for a natural gas heating system!!! but natural gas is not available where we live. If you have any options other than a heat pump, I certainly would consider those first.

One other thing, unless the systems have changed in the last 5 years, you cannot install an automatic humidifier in a heat pump system. So to keep some moisture in the air you have to have a humidifier running and sitting around in the way all winter. Humidifiers have to be cleaned regularly (every 2 or 3 days) and kept filled and the filters have to be replaced every winter.

I don't think any heat pump manufacturer will ever call me to do an endorsement, do you?

Yes, we installed the system last spring and so far are exceptionally happy with it.  We are in western Washington state.  Early this spring we had temps that were below freezing and topping in the mid 40's.  A regular heat pump would have turned on the auxilary heat (expensive); we had our Acadia unit just utilizing the extra stages that pull more heat out of the air.  Our register temps have been recorded with our own digital thermometers up to 107 degrees --- nice and warm.  Register heat ranges from low 90's up to the high of 107 (at least that is as high as we have caught!).  The 3.5 ton is quite adequately heating our 3400 sf home which has vaults and a second story.  Our electric rates are low out here, so instead of $45 a month budget payment when we had propane heat/hot water, we have upped it to $60 a month.  We'll see how it goes, but thus far no spike at all on kwh's consumed.  The heat pump also provided air conditioning that we previously had not had. Support has been very good from Hallowell; our contractor had never installed this unit, so it was important to have the support from the company.

Chris in WA, Thank you for that info. We are about to have our heat pump/air cond replaced. I will certainly do some research on that brand and I hope it will be available here in the South.

The Acadia was designed to provide years of comfort and reliability. Using electricity efficiently means that the Acadia can provide savings of up to 70% over other traditional heating systems. Even better, the Acadia was designed so that any HVAC contractor who currently works with air source heat pumps has all the tools and experience to install and service the system.

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