Joey Henderson returns to the podcast to talk about heat pumps and inverters.

The reversing valve, defrost cycles, and auxiliary heat can cause confusion for people who have primarily worked with furnaces or straight-cool A/C systems. Heat pumps use defrost cycles and bring on the auxiliary heat when the coil is ice-bound, which can present a challenge; we need to maintain cold coils without going into defrost all the time.

Even though heat pumps were significantly less effective in years past, we will still see reduced performance in very cold conditions with the newer inverter-driven systems. Proper design, installation, and commissioning will also help occupants get the best performance out of their heat pumps.

Inverters offer plenty of advantages for the cooling aspect of heat pumps, too, especially when it comes to achieving longer runtimes for dehumidification. They can also float their coil temperature, much like how refrigeration systems can use floating suction or head pressure. Condensate assemblies absolutely must be run properly to prevent backed-up drains and other related problems. Liquid line sizing and proper commissioning are also especially crucial for ductless inverter-driven systems.

Joey and Bryan also discuss:

Heat pump training and the electrification initiative
Balance point
Defrost strategies and universal defrost boards
Dual-fuel systems
Heat pump stigmas
Blower door testing in various climate zones
Surge protection and voltage monitoring
How inverters work
Occupant lifestyles and latent loads
Zoning and duct design for inverter-driven systems
Critical charge
Line length for ductless systems

Check out Joey's training, social media, and contact information at https://joejoehvac.com/. You can also check out Craig Migliaccio's book about mini-splits at https://www.acservicetech.com/mini-split-book.

Learn more about the HVACR Training Symposium or buy a virtual ticket today at https://hvacrschool.com/symposium.

If you have an iPhone, subscribe to the podcast HERE, and if you have an Android phone, subscribe HERE.

Check out our handy calculators HERE.

#294: Arjun Bhuptani, Co-Founder of Connext, on Ethereum’s Scalability Problem, Account Abstraction, and the SOL vs ETH Narrative