My Geospring

[Brian26]

So about a month ago the filter light on mine starting flashing every few days even when I would reset it.I found the service manual online and went into the service diagnostics mode and found a code for f-14 dirty filter. Called GE and they sent me out a new evaporator fan and a temperature sensor wiring harness. There are 3 sensors, 1 for the evaporator inlet/outlet and the compressor outlet. When I changed the fan I noticed the new one had way more air output then then my original one. So either they upgraded it to a higher speed or the old one was wearing out.

After replacing the parts GE sent the filter light came back on again every few days. I took out the extended warranty from Lowes and I called them and they sent out GE to take a look at it. The tech came and hooked his laptop and software up to it, ran some tests, and found the control board bad. He ordered me one and said I could install it myself to avoid having to take off work again. Seems to be running fine now. Mine is the second generation from the beginning of 2013. The tech said he sees very little issues with these and its usually the control board but they now have a revised version.

 

[velvetfoot]

Oy vay. It's a water heater!

 

[woodgeek]

I had the control board go bad on my AO Smith HPWH (Voltrex 80 gal), they FedExed me a replacement and I swapped it in about 30 mins.
Its ~4 yrs old now, and has roughly paid for itself.

 

[Seasoned Oak]

Im interested as im making hot water for 6 people and i also run a dehumidifier. Plus my furnace room is 80 deg all winter which should help.

 

[johnnh]

Oy vay. It's a water heater!

I'm with you. I can't believe the aggravation for a water heater. I have read this thread and it's mind boggling. Especially for the amount of $ it claims to save. Here's what I did: One year ago I bought myself an 80 gallon electric water heater before the environmental police made them illegal. It costs me $40.00 a month for 4 people - wife, a 16 year old and a 19 year old. And that's with NH's expensive electricity. Done deal.

 

[Seasoned Oak]

Oy vay. It's a water heater!

Isnt this the "green room" thats what its for discussion about new tech and green energy. I dont think this discussion is out of place at all. Why visit this thread at all, unless your interested in this type of tech?

 

[woodgeek]

I'm with you. I can't believe the aggravation for a water heater. I have read this thread and it's mind boggling. Especially for the amount of $ it claims to save. Here's what I did: One year ago I bought myself an 80 gallon electric water heater before the environmental police made them illegal. It costs me $40.00 a month for 4 people - wife, a 16 year old and a 19 year old. And that's with NH's expensive electricity. Done deal.

I agree, but not exactly. I bought an 80 gallon HPWH which is aok by the EPA, which provides HW for my family of 4 for $15/month. After rebates its $1000 more than a conventional unit, with a simple payback of 4-5 years (relative to the conventional elec tank), and a 10 year warranty.

Done deal, easy money, and good for the environment.

Try to sell me a $10k active solar HW system with a zillion moving parts and holes in my roof....and I'm with @johnnh

 

[Brian26]

I'm with you. I can't believe the aggravation for a water heater. I have read this thread and it's mind boggling. Especially for the amount of $ it claims to save. Here's what I did: One year ago I bought myself an 80 gallon electric water heater before the environmental police made them illegal. It costs me $40.00 a month for 4 people - wife, a 16 year old and a 19 year old. And that's with NH's expensive electricity. Done deal.

Got my geospring for free essentially. $400 utility rebate plus $400 federal rebate and caught it on sale at Lowes. I don't think people realize how much money these things actually save. I had mine hooked up to my Effergy energy monitor for a month last year and posted about it here. Total cost was less than $15 and that's with the second highest electrical rates in the US here in CT.

Your using 4500 watt elements to heat your water. My geospring compressor pulls 9 times less the power at 500 watts and is 2.5 times more efficient at heating.


Ge standard claim is its uses $365 less power than a standard tank. Thats based on some standard of running it in hybrid mode using both the heat pump and elements. Running it in heat pump only mode saves more. I am well over a grand saved in power costs since I installed mine.

Also, If anyone is looking into getting one and is close to CT. Our local utility is giving $400 off these instantly at Lowes. They don't check if you are a resident. You can buy one at lowes for $599 instantly at any CT location. Just put in CT as your location to get the price. There is also a $300 or $400 federal rebate available as well.

You would also get the 3rd generation that is more efficient and the heat pump works down to lower temperatures. I believe 35 degrees.

 

[maple1]

I think HP tech is great stuff - might even have one myself some day.

But our 4 year old 80 gallon conventional tank resistance heater only costs us $20-25/mo of $0.18/kwh electricity to run. That's $240-300/year. So if a HP cut it in half, that's maybe $150/yr. No incentives here like I read of in other places, & I think the GE is going for around $1500 or so. Pretty long payback. I think most over estimate how little it can cost to operate a conventional tank heater, if installed & insulated well.

(Throw in that we heat our DHW with wood for half the year, and it's pretty well out of our picture, now at least...)

 

[fbelec]

what is the warranty on the geospring tank itself

 

[Brian26]

what is the warranty on the geospring tank itself

1 year labor and 10 years on the whole unit. GE is very accommodating and will send out the warranty parts and let you install them DIY no questions asked. So far they have sent me elements, an evaporator fan and temperature sensor, and recently a control board that I installed myself. I looked up the price on the control board and it was $700. All of these repairs were quite simple and I maybe spent maybe 2-3 hours on all these repairs combined. This upcoming June will be my 3 year mark of owning it.

I have the Lowes extended warranty and used it once recently when I was having an issue with the control board. Through the lowes warranty they sent GE out who hooked up a computer up to it and said the control board was bad. The tech said its like a 15 min install and I could diy so GE sent the newer upgraded control board and I installed it myself.

Since your in Mass you could drive down to any lowes in CT and pick one up and get the instant $400 off our utility is offering. It's currently $699 but Lowes has sales on these every few months. Last month it could be purchased for $599. If you haven't used it there is also a $400 federal refund available. I had to mail something in to get my refund when I bought mine but they are giving it instantly on the purchase now.

 

[billb3]

That's a unique metric for reliability.
How long without hot water each time ?

 

[begreen]

Call me when they have 20 yr reliability.

 

[Seasoned Oak]

I looked these up on the Lowes site and im reading one horror story after another ,seems some them are made in china. Now that GE appliance is chinese owned that could be a problem getting quality products. Home Depot sells the Rheem brand for more $ and the new model only has one review ,but its a good review if that means anything,but also about $400 more than the GE.

 

[Brian26]

I looked these up on the Lowes site and im reading one horror story after another ,seems some them are made in china. Now that GE appliance is chinese owned that could be a problem getting quality products. Home Depot sells the Rheem brand for more $ and the new model only has one review ,but its a good review if that means anything,but also about $400 more than the GE.

The first generation was made in China and had major issues. Almost all the bad reviews are for that 1st generation unit. The 2nd and now 3rd generation that are built in the US are extremely reliable. I talked to the GE tech himself and he said the 1st generation unit was a nightmare due to bad refrigerant sweating in China.

It has a 4.5 star rating on lowes.com. All of the bad reviews are from the 1st generation and people even comment that they are reviewing and older product and not the current one.

Here is an article about bringing the manufacturing of these back to the US from China and how it was more reliable and cheaper to do so.

https://operationsroom.wordpress.co...ging-appliance-manufacturing-back-from-china/

"
GE hadn’t made a water heater in the United States in decades. In all the recent years the company had been tucking water heaters into American garages and basements, it had lost track of how to actually make them.

The GeoSpring in particular, Nolan says, has “a lot of copper tubing in the top.” Assembly-line workers “have to route the tubes, and they have to braze them—weld them—to seal the joints. How that tubing is designed really affects how hard or easy it is to solder the joints. And how hard or easy it is to do the soldering affects the quality, of course. And the quality of those welds is literally the quality of the hot-water heater.” Although the GeoSpring had been conceived, designed, marketed, and managed from Louisville, it was made in China, and, Nolan says, “We really had zero communications into the assembly line there.” …

The GeoSpring suffered from an advanced-technology version of “IKEA Syndrome.” It was so hard to assemble that no one in the big room wanted to make it. Instead they redesigned it. The team eliminated 1 out of every 5 parts. It cut the cost of the materials by 25 percent. It eliminated the tangle of tubing that couldn’t be easily welded. By considering the workers who would have to put the water heater together—in fact, by having those workers right at the table, looking at the design as it was drawn—the team cut the work hours necessary to assemble the water heater from 10 hours in China to two hours in Louisville."

Summary of Customer Ratings & Reviews

4.5
515 reviews
462 out of 501(92%)reviewers would recommend this product to a friend.

 

[Brian26]

That's a unique metric for reliability.
How long without hot water each time ?

Never didn't have hot water. It reverts back to a regular element electric hot water heater if there is a fault with the heat pump and the elements and thermostat can be purchased at your local hardware store.

 

[Brian26]

I connected my whole house energy monitor to just my geospring for the past week. Here is what an average day looks like. My wife showers in the morning and I shower at night and thats when we do our dishes/laundry.

Keep in mind here in CT we have some of the highest electric rates in the US at over .20 kwh total cost delivered.

I had natural gas at my last house and just to be connected the service charge was over $15 a month.
I am heating my hot water for less than the service charge alone if I had natural gas. Oil would cost many times that.

Less than $15 a month with some of the highest electrical rates in the US to heat hot water is impressive.

 

[woodgeek]

I looked these up on the Lowes site and im reading one horror story after another ,seems some them are made in china. Now that GE appliance is chinese owned that could be a problem getting quality products. Home Depot sells the Rheem brand for more $ and the new model only has one review ,but its a good review if that means anything,but also about $400 more than the GE.

In my research on the different models (3 years ago) the Rheem unit was clearly an inferior design, and yielded inferior savings performance.

 

[Seasoned Oak]

In my research on the different models (3 years ago) the Rheem unit was clearly an inferior design, and yielded inferior savings performance.

Most likely Both models have been updated by now, a company can only eat so many returns, an still keep pumping out inferior products.Question is how good are the new models?

 

[Brian26]

I somehow cleared my effergy energy monitor data but I just recorded one of my lowest monthly cost to run my geospring. The month of May cost me roughly $8.50 in electric costs for hot water. A big influence was the wholesale cost of power dropping from around .10 kwh to .6. With delivery fees and other charges it still comes in around .18 kwh.

The warmer temps and higher basement temp has helped as well. I hooked up a sensor from my weather station a foot away from the outlet to monitor the temperatures. My data shows it has almost no effect on my basement temp as it always stays the same. The geospring has been recovering in about an hour from an average shower using roughly .6 kwh.

With the rise of humidity I have been emptying a 5 gallon bucket every few days as well. Huge benefit to these is no need to run a dehumidifier anymore.

 

[velvetfoot]

With the rise of humidity I have been emptying a 5 gallon bucket every few days as well. Huge benefit to these is no need to run a dehumidifier anymore.

Why not get a condensate pump? They not that expensive, maybe a hundred bucks, which is, though a quarter of the cost of my 40 gallon electric tank.
I feel I am authorized to comment on this thread, thank you, since I have a Nyletherm, and yes, a condensate pump. Both have been operating for two years, knock on wood.
If I spent a lot of time in the basement I'd think twice because of the noise and the fact that it's pretty cold down there, even in summer.
The relative humidity down there is about the same as ambient because of the lower temperature, so does it reduce mold factor? I'm not sure.

 

[fbelec]

condensate pumps are even cheap than you said velvetfoot 2 to 3 years ago i replaced mine on the boiler about 25 bucks. brian it will suck the first time you forget or the water builds a little faster than you thought and it spills.

 

[Brian26]

condensate pumps are even cheap than you said velvetfoot 2 to 3 years ago i replaced mine on the boiler about 25 bucks. brian it will suck the first time you forget or the water builds a little faster than you thought and it spills.

I have one and its sitting right next to the tank. Just haven't hooked it up yet... The main drain line for the house is about 3 feet away as well.

The tank is right next to the washer/dryer and my wife and I are constantly down there. We use the water to water the house plants.

On a related note. Here in CT the local utilities are offering $400 off these in rebates and there is still a federal tax credit on them for $300.

I got mine 3 years ago for essentially free when the rebates where much better.

I know many are skeptical on the reliability of them but I am over 3 years on mine with minimal problems and GE has sent the parts no questions asked to repair it under the 10 year warranty.

I have said it before but the advertised savings is running it in hybrid mode where it uses the heat pump and elements. I run mine in heat pump only mode where the savings for heating water are massive.

The new models are rated at 3.25 energy factor. So for every 1 KWH used they produce the equivalent of 3.25 in energy towards hot water. Besides solar no other form of heating hot water can touch that efficiency.

 

[cableman]

So right now i have a tankless coil on my boiler, yup i hate it. Bought a 40gal indirect but havnt had it hooked up yet.
My boiler is in the basement, hampton insert on 1st floor.
Would this hphw thing be a better option for me here on longisland? Im worried in winter while inserts kicking the boiler would hardly be on to help warm my basement for the hphw to rob heat off of.

 

[maple1]

So right now i have a tankless coil on my boiler, yup i hate it. Bought a 40gal indirect but havnt had it hooked up yet.
My boiler is in the basement, hampton insert on 1st floor.
Would this hphw thing be a better option for me here on longisland? Im worried in winter while inserts kicking the boiler would hardly be on to help warm my basement.

Is your boiler a cold start boiler? Can it go cold in between chargings of an indirect without leaking? Not all boilers are good matches for indirects.

Heating DHW with a boiler that isn't cold start or that has a tankless coil is about the most inefficient way to heat DHW. I had one for 17 years (coil). Cost me almost a gallon of oil a day for DHW in the summer. I changed to an ordinary electric tank heater, that costs us about $25/month of $0.18/kwh electricity (family of 5).

A HPWH would definitely be a good option for you as far as making DHW more efficiently, but not sure of your winter basement situation. If your boiler could stand being shut down & let go cold for extended periods, I might consider an electric tank heater (they're the easiest & cheapest to install) for DHW for the non-heating months, then turn the boiler back on in the heating months, if you need the boiler heat for heating down there. I would imagine the boiler is adding to the heat in the house in the summer also?