After years of having floor heating from our hydronic heating, it finally started giving us trouble.
I remember trying to keep the house heater running while my kids yelled that the floors were still cold.
We’d long given up indoor socks because we didn’t need them, and suddenly, the furnace was not enough to keep us warm. We needed an HVAC repairman for heater maintenance, but it wasn’t an emergency, so we had to wait for some days until the heating business could find a heat and AC product expert to send to our house. The heating maintenance happened four days later, and lucky for us, it was a minor issue fixed within ours. We had kept the system well serviced for years, so whatever the problem wasn’t something major. My daughters were glad to have the heated floors back on, at least for the season, because we were warned that running it for long would minimize its lifetime. The furnace/heater installation was a reliable backup, so we started limiting the number of hours the floor would be warmed. We also shopped for a heat pump because the backup was about to turn ten years old, which was its expected lifespan, which is when I learned about a hybrid heating system that sounded better than just getting a single pump. The heating dealership was also offering the option for a cheaper cost than other heaters except for the boilers. Still, I wanted to avoid boiler repair anywhere in my future as much as they came well recommended. Moreover, the hybrid unit seemed like a more modern and energy-efficient system for us. Replacing the backup sooner than two years later meant that we’d do it comfortably because, in two years, our kids would need more from us than they do now.