Re: Questions about Heat Pump (Update-Found Prob)
Yes, it's normal for them to have long run times. AUX and Emergency heat are essentially the same thing. <br /><br />If your outside unit fails, you will need to switch to Emergency heat so you don't freeze to death, and so you can watch your electric meter spin like a frisbee while you're waiting for it to be fixed or replaced.<br /><br />In normal use, your Aux heat may kick in on occasion using same heat coils inside the furnace as the emergency heat. This happens, for instance, when the temp drops so cold in the house that the heatpump can't keep up (you'll witness this when it gets colder.) The coils temporarily kick in and your "Aux" light on the thermostat will come on while this happens...that light is again just to let you know that your meter is temporarily spinning like a frisbee.<br /><br />It is also normal for a heatpump's outside unit to occasionally kick into reverse. This is an unnecessarily noisy and clunky sequence where the fan on the outside unit shuts down while the compressor violently shifts into reverse at full throttle and then continues to groan like an angry elephant for a while, then you'll see the unit start to steam as it melts any accumulated frost off the coils. During this cycle your Aux heat may also come on because if it doesn't, you're effectively running air conditioning in your house in the middle of winter and you're sucking all the heat right back out of the house that the heatpump worked so hard for the last 8 hours to raise by 0.8 degrees. Once the outside coils are dry and frost free, the unit coughs loudly as the compressor reverts back into normal operation and then lets out a massive sneeze of steam in one last hurrah, as the fan kicks on and it's back in normal heating mode.<br /><br />They're exciting and busy little monsters. Quite efficient at creating luke-warm drafty air, and barely maintaining enough heat in the house to keep you from slipping into hyperthermia. But they're cheap to run, MUCH cheaper than natural gas or propane, and that's all many people care about.<br /><br />As has been mentioned here...one of the worst things you can do to a heatpump is actually adjust the temperature on the thermostat. It doesn't take well to change...<br /><br />They also don't have very long lives. The inside air handler can be quite long-living, but in my experience the outside unit is doing real good if it reaches 10 to 12 years without going kablooey. Then again I suppose I wouldn't live very long either if I was forced to work outside 365 days a year in temps ranging from zero to 110 degrees.<br /><br />I had heatpumps for years. I finally got fed up with all their excitement and bit a very large bullet to install a geothermal system in my house (also another version of a heatpump, but not an air-to-air exchanger, which is the noisy irritating piece). Heavenly. Comfortable heat and A/C, almost completely silent, and notably cheaper to run than even the air-to-air heatpump. It even heats my hot water just 'cuz it's a nice guy. Was well worth the high install cost.
