Next Wednesday we are installing a heatpump hot water heater. My husband and I live beachside in Central Florida and in the 11 years we have lived here, we've never had a freeze. The HWH will be in our toasty garage--insulated to beat blazes and hotter than the hubs. Three cars--if one comes in hot, the garage stays stiffling for 12 hours. Good place, me thinks, for a heatpump HWH. We were able to find a local plumber who has installed two of the Rheem water heaters. He will charge a total of $2100 while Home Depot offered to install it for a total of $2700. Later in the week we will also upgrade our a/c with a Rheem 15 seer. It looks like there will be about $2000 in rebates on the a/c system. Oh how I hope this all works out. I'm really excited about the hot water heater. Strange old lady, I tell you, really, really strange! I don't know anyone else who would be excited about this!

its been running ON for 3 hours now, and its 68 degrees in my apartment, its 58 outside.' the maintenance guy just came by with it still running, and put his hand to the register, and said "yea, thats not very warm, but it taks a while for things to warm up.. I told him it has been running for 3 hours and he just shrugged his shoulders..' i told him that the last guy (the other maintenance guy, there are 2 of them) didnt use any gauges when he "topped off" the refrigerant.. and asked "cant you overcharge the system?" he told me flatly NO.. after sitting there and feeling the heat he went and got a thermometer out of his truck and stuck it in the regester and ot read 90 degrees.. he said "shoot, 90 degrees coming out of there, thats great!" im no expert, but 90 degrees after running for 3 hours on EMERGENCY heat, doesent strike me as "great" then, he tells me "come monday, ill put you in a new thermostat.. HOW THE HELL does that help!! I put a brand new one on (which he doesnt believe has emergency heat despite me showing him the wiring and everything) and it had this problem, i put the original back on and it does the same exact thing.. IT IS NOT THE THERMOSTAT! even i can see that.

So far here's what I have for estimates, there are just 2: 1) Rheem 13 SEER 2 ton heatpump model RHSL indoors and 13PJL24A01 outdoors. 10kw back up heater on the indoor unit, Honeywell Digital pro 5000 thermostat. 5 year parts warranty, 1 year labor. $3962 This would NOT qualify for a federal tax credit. I asked about the tax credit, he'd never heard of it, but gave me a price for an RHSL 15 SEER of $5200, and according the Rheem website that one doesn't qualify for the tax credit either. His lack of knowledge of the tax credit makes me nervous (nice guy though). 2) Trane 4TWXS024 2 ton 15 SEER heat pump (XL15i) and 4TEE3F31 2.5 ton variable speed air handler. BACHTR1410 10kw heater, Trane 7 day touch screen programmable thermostat. 10 year parts and labor warranty. $100 rebate from Trane. Total cost with the rebate $5625. #2 offers 6 months financing at 0%, but I'm don't think I'd use that. He was familiar with the tax credit and said he provides all the certification and ARI number that I need for it. I'm tempted to just go with #2. Do you think that sounds good, or should I get another estimate?

Hi shifrbv, Thanks for the response. So the only thing that will hook the gas furnace (as secondary/emergency heat) to the tstat is running W from the furnace to W2 on the tstat? What do I hook the W wire from the HP to on the tsat? Its doesnt hook into the O/B terminal with the O from the HP does it? It appears as though the W & O/B share a terminal on the tstat! Also (your last sentence) what did you mean by setting the defrost cycle to DP on the Heat Pump? What is DP? Also would the setup mode I am trying to run be considered multi-stage Heat Pump or Conventional multi-stage system? I assume it would be the latter? Correct? Since I am going to have a W and W2 for heat stages and Y for cooling stage. Thanks for your patience and time, I am new to alot of this so I know its difficult dealing with those like me who know so little in this field... I could let you see pictures of the terminal contact points on all of my components if that would help you understand what I am working with here ... I have schematic of hp as well.