House Heat Pump Experiences?
 

I have a forced air ducted house and have the provisions to throw on a traditional ac system. However for only a few grand more I can get a heat pump, which covers both heating and cooling. My current heating system is the Lennox complete heat. Researching lennox heat pumps it seems like they have very poor customer support and are constantly breaking down, this has lead me to the mitsubishi zuba central.
(the lennox reviews are here for a good laugh http://www.furnacecompare.com/heat-p...nox/reviews/6/)
What I like about the zuba is that it operates well below 0 where as typical heat pump systems dont work as well however the zuba doesn't have the best seer/hpsf ratings but hey if it doesn't break down... its worth it to me.
http://www.mitsubishielectric.ca/en/...ntral/h2i.html
I figure the hotter asian/european places have been dealing with this tech longer than we have.

From what I gather heat pumps work in such a fashion that it takes hotter air from outside and brings it inside using refrigeration technology. So they are 250-350% efficent in that they dont burn fuel to make heat/cold but they do require the fan to run more than normal to circulate the heat/cold. So while I'm all for going green this tech wont pay for itself if it keeps breaking down and most warranties only cover parts not labour.
(A rough guideline of how these work) http://www.bchydro.com/guides_tips/g...Heat_Pump.html
Or climate seems ideal for this tech as these systems dont work as well in extreme temps and the city is offering people rebates to switch to this tech.

Anyone care to share what brands and repair experiences they've had?

not too sure about residentials, but we use york and climatemaster at our work. Personally im leaning towards the climatemaster

H.P. are generally pretty reliable, at times you do get some built up in the condensate drain lines

My work is the distributor for trane. I don't work in that dept but we sell tons of them and people have always been really happy. Trane is is direct competition with lennox.
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Trane's stuff is :thumbsup: top notch as well

I work in HVAC controls. I would say about 80% of the new construction jobs I have worked on have Trane HP units supplied (Commercial grade units). I can't say whether this is because Trane has the market cornered over here (Victoria) or if their units are just better. Their wiring diagrams and documentation that they supply are absolute garbage though.