"He didn't check the strips--just made it defrost and said it was kicking in according to the amps." - The 10 kw strips consist of two 5 kw sections. Only one 5kw section may be operating properly. Bad wire or bad sequencer. Get his a$$ back and have him meter the strips while the condenser is in defrost to make sure that all strips are energized. If you have 10kw strips and both are working fine, replace them with 15 kw strips (Goodman part# HKR-15C, approx $100). Did he check the air temperature after the strips to see if you were getting the 76 degrees that he stated? "The defrost is on 60 min. I need to change this to 90??" - Depending on climate and conditions, a longer defrost initiation time saves you money and helps with wear-n-tear on your system. I moved mine from 60 to 90 minutes with no problems with freeze-up, in Baltimore. FYI 10 kw electric strips provide an approximate 26 degree temperature rise at 1200 CFM fan speedd. If the air temp before the coil is 50 degrees, then the air temp after the coil is 50 + 26 = 76 degrees. If one of the 5 kw strips is not working, then 5 kw provides only a 13 degree rise, so 50 + 13 is 63 degrees. This will cool the house. 15kw strips provide a 40 degree rise in temperature. Good luck.

tigerdunes: The installer is also the Amana service person. We have a 10 yr parts and labor contract w/Amana. I could call Amana and see if they will send over another company at no charge to us, but we thought if it was an install problem, then Amana wouldn't cover the service. So... 1) Is there any way we can tell if there is an 8kw heat strip installed? And, if it is, is there anyway for us to tell whether it is hooked up properly AND working properly? 2) Again, the installer/service person "tells" us it is working (i.e., he put the compressor into defrost, came inside and looked at something and said "yup, the heat strip is working") He has even called a couple other HVAC people to ask them questions while he was here. He feels since we are getting 36,000 BTU's of cool and only 30,000 BTU's of heat (with the 8kw strip) that it will always be colder. But what I've read on other posts is that the heat strip has a 30/70 and I wondered if perhaps in defrost mode that it is only operating at 30% capacity??? (Like I really know what I'm talking about, so forgive me if I'm WAY off base). We did have him adjust the CFM down to 1100. It was running at I think 1400 and the noise through the duct/vent was too much (the vents were cleared out, though). Also, in the summer, it would only run for about 4 minutes, not enough time to help w/the humidity in the house. When the temps are above 40, the "heat" runs for 9-15 minutes normally. If you or anyone else has any further info for me, let me know. Otherwise, I will try to get someone else to look at it. I'll let you know.

I think it is great for anyone who can think outside of the box as long as they are willing to ask and also listen. If you have the heat tape and ability to set up a test that will not put your system in jeopardy I say go for it. Sometimes the attempts lead to more thinking that lands a viable solution. Waste heat recovery is another system that runs residential water through a coil surrounding the hvac lines more for pulling heat about to get expelled into the outside air in the summer into the hot water tank and some are supposed to work with heat pumps. At the time of my system upgrade I could not swing geothermal but have since found a way to get the pipe and access to a trackhoe or trencher to do a loop large enough to support a geothermal system. I considered getting the loop completed and adding a waste heat recovery unit and running the loop through it to see what impact it would have before going geothermal. If it worked it would allow geothermal to be done in stages rather than swallowed in one project. The whole slugging the compressor and causing a complete system failure holds me back. I guess one of the units is designed for a heat pump and works in both modes. Who knows. Keep thinking.

I would suggest putting the sensor in the freezer for some time and then measuring its resistance immediately when placed at room temperature. Continue to measure resistance over time, say 1-hour at room temperature. There should be a change in resistance as the sensor warms up if it’s purely resistive. If there is no change, if it is and remains ‘Open’ (high resistance) or if it is and remains shorted (low resistance) then there is likely a problem with sensor. Which fan are you talking about, the fan coil blower or HP fan? It’s normal that the HP fan does not run during defrost but the compressor does. IMPO SR