Mastering Home Comfort: The Art of Heating and Cooling with Dennis Stinson with Fujitsu General

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[00:00:25] Dennis Stinson: So somebody that's had a great experience, that enjoy who they work with, that's the best referral. No, no right or wrong. It's But when you're hot and sweating and you turn over the phone book shows my age, when you go looking for somebody, the best advertiser may not be the best person for you. They could be, but they may not be.

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[00:00:55] Intro: house. When it comes to remodeling and renovating your home, there is a lot to [00:01:00] know, but we've got you covered.

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[00:01:03] Eric Goranson: the Around the House show, the next generation of home improvement. Thanks for joining us today. And this is going to be a very important conversation, especially when you're looking at healthy homes, healthy air, energy efficiency, what is things costing you in your house? This could be a big one for you today.

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[00:01:31] Dennis Stinson: Thank you. It's always great to be back and amongst friends and looking forward to our great conversation today. So thanks for having me,

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[00:01:51] Eric Goranson: And of course, just. After the pandemic, people worried about what's actually in their air. It's a huge conversation.

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[00:02:13] Dennis Stinson: We're top of those topics and that's what we live for.

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[00:02:32] Eric Goranson: There's this is a big can of worms that we're diving into today.

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[00:02:59] Eric Goranson: [00:03:00] I think we're getting into an interesting time here.

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[00:03:21] Eric Goranson: It just, it's going to get to the point, especially with these refrigerant changes, it's not cost effective to do the repairs anymore.

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[00:03:44] Dennis Stinson: If you maintain it, you get longer life out of it. If you never touch it, then it probably not going to last as long. But. So there's a lot of great considerations when you look at that. There is what fuel am I going to go with? What, what am I looking at to do? Was I comfortable when it works? So all of [00:04:00] those conversations are great conversations.

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[00:04:22] Eric Goranson: Yeah. And taking an older home and trying to convert it over into a zoned system that had maybe just that standard gas furnace in there, for instance, with no AC can be quite the task because you've got to remake all that ducting. And you've got to resize everything. And it might not even be where you just got to start over with the ducting in there.

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[00:04:50] Dennis Stinson: Yeah, absolutely. So to remind your listeners a little bit about what it is that we do. So we're classified as a ductless heat pump, but the reality is, is that we put an indoor [00:05:00] unit in the place of distribution.

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[00:05:22] Dennis Stinson: So maybe one in the master bedroom, maybe one in the living room, maybe one in the family room. And what that allows us to do is to be able to put the amount of energy in that space that you're occupying. So we don't have to heat or cool the entire house to make one room comfortable. If all rooms are not being used.

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[00:05:52] Eric Goranson: you're able to condition it. Thanks for tuning into Around the House. We've been talking with Dennis Stinson from Fujitsu General about heat [00:06:00] pumps.

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[00:06:02] Dennis Stinson: And the other neat part about it is that each room can be a different temperature. So what that means is that if mom and dad like to have, uh, 68 degrees, but the kids are a little chilly and they want to have it 72, Nobody's grabbing blankets or open windows. You simply set the thermostat for the temperature you want in that space.

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[00:06:32] Eric Goranson: It does. And if you think about the traditional. American two story home, right? Millions of them across the U S where do we put the bedrooms in the summertime?

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[00:06:58] Eric Goranson: Maybe it's 65 degrees [00:07:00] downstairs. But it's 70 upstairs because of the heat. And that's where that really starts to save you some money because you don't have to bring down the entire house temperature just to get that hot. Bedroom cool down to where you can sleep at night.

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[00:07:24] Dennis Stinson: When you walk up your steps at nighttime. Does the temperature change when you walk upstairs in the winter time? Is it four or five degrees cooler than downstairs? And in the summertime, is it four or five, six, eight, nine degrees warmer when you ascend those steps at nighttime? And if that's the case, then you are a perfect candidate for some type of zoning in your house.

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[00:08:01] Dennis Stinson: Imagine the energy savings that would come from that, the comfort that would come from that. So big difference in the world.

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[00:08:17] Dennis Stinson: Yeah, absolutely.

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[00:08:34] Dennis Stinson: And really what that is, is that's the ability to drive the refrigeration system based on the load that it's seeing. So traditional. Air conditioning and heat pump systems, they're all on or they're all off. What we find with inverter systems, they're more like cruise control for your car. So based on the load on it, it ramps up and slows down.

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[00:09:17] Dennis Stinson: So 99 percent of the time you're heating and air conditioning system is oversized. So what if you're heating and air conditioning system could throttle back to match the load. And when you throttle back and match the load, there is tremendous energy savings to be saved with that. And really what that means is comfort in the home and comfort in your wallet is what that really means.

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[00:10:15] Eric Goranson: That's a game changer and it's a game changer on your pocket book as well. Cause there's nothing more expensive than a window air conditioner. It seems.

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[00:10:37] Dennis Stinson: We've, as a first world country, we've certainly got to that point to where the expectation of home comfort and efficiency is much higher than what it was

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[00:10:53] Dennis Stinson: Yeah, no doubt about it.

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[00:11:18] Dennis Stinson: Nowadays, we're tying all that into wifi. So if you want to change the temperature in your home or check on your property or cool it down before you get home or warm it up before you get there, you can change the temperature in your Fujitsu HVAC system from anywhere in the world. As long as you have a wifi at the property, uh, we have the ability to tie into some of the.

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[00:12:09] Eric Goranson: Yeah. And the one cool thing too, is if you've got that vacation property, maybe it's the family beach house or the family cabin up in the mountains. You can now monitor that 24 seven and go, Hey, we've got some high humidity, or we got something going on up there. I better go check this place out. Cause Something's not right.

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[00:12:29] Dennis Stinson: Yeah, absolutely. Or even more importantly, I got the family loaded up. I'm heading up there. Let me chill it down for me when I get there. So exactly. If it's 82 degrees

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[00:12:42] Eric Goranson: That's 82 degrees to get cooled down. Exactly. Yeah. So a lot of good stuff happened in there. A lot of really good stuff. What are you seeing on the technology front? We've talked about kind of efficiency, which is just a really wide brush, heat pumps and stuff, for instance, they keep getting better and can work in colder and colder climates.

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[00:13:03] Dennis Stinson: Yeah, we are. So really what we see is performance. So we're seeing very high efficiency as high as 33 seer. Now keep in mind that the baseline efficiency is 14 seer.

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[00:13:40] Dennis Stinson: So at minus 22 degrees, you'll get a hundred percent performance out of a heat pump. And if you told somebody that in the eighties, they would have thought you were nuts. Uh, but now we look at this inverter technology and look that a heat pump can be, and is a whole home year round. Heating and cooling solution and with inverter [00:14:00] technology, that's really chasing us down there.

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[00:14:24] Dennis Stinson: That's a refrigerant that is much more environmentally friendly, a refrigerant that is much more efficient. So this is the next step that the industry is taking. We've done this a couple of times now. But now moving in this to this A2L refrigerant that will start in the beginning of 2025 is when you'll start seeing that product coming in and you'll see that this is in terms of global warming potential to be much more friendlier for the environment for when we have leaks or what have you in a system, much, much more friendly to the environment.

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[00:15:08] Eric Goranson: Yeah, that's cool. And then of course it always changes things up when we do refrigerant changes, right?

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[00:15:24] Dennis Stinson: so it's a little bit different. It does change the physical construction of the unit that changes the how we handle the refrigerant.

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[00:15:49] Dennis Stinson: The rebates are strong in the marketplace. If I was a consumer, I think I'd be looking long and hard at if I'm ready for an HVAC system. There's plenty of [00:16:00] rebates out there today. You're looking at an R410A product. I wouldn't hesitate to replace the system today. I wouldn't go down the avenue that I'm going to wait until the new stuff comes out.

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[00:16:22] Eric Goranson: I'll double up on that and say, I would definitely, this is the season now to do it because the inflation reduction act, what is that early next year we're going to see, or maybe even this year in some States, because that big rebate that they've been talking about, boy, there's a lot of potholes in that, which is tough to navigate depending on where you live and.

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[00:16:47] Dennis Stinson: Yeah. So the inflation reduction act will eventually be a good piece of legislation. There was a couple of parts to that. The first part was to 25 C, which makes a lot of sense. And this is really a continuation of the [00:17:00] federal tax credit that we've had for Probably eight or 10 years across a variety of administrations if we want to go there.

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[00:17:23] Dennis Stinson: It is. It's easy. It qualifies, you take the deduction and you're there. The Inflation Reduction Act is a different animal because that was pushed down to the states for them to administer. And it's understandable that there's varying levels of readiness at the state level to be able to do this. There is conversations about income, so those with, the argument is those with greater need would receive more than those with not as much need.

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[00:18:08] Dennis Stinson: But to your point, you're spot on again, extremely well read. Probably early 25, second quarter of 25 is when you'll see this coming in more of a robust fashion. And that's incentives for an HVAC system. That's incentives for an electrical upgrade. There's a lot going on there. But. To your point, I wouldn't hesitate today.

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[00:18:31] Eric Goranson: Yeah, and I think one of the biggest issues, I started to dive into as best I could, because it's not that easy. It's a rabbit hole that's tiny to sneak down to try to figure out what's going on with it. But talking to my friends that are HVAC professionals, At least.

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[00:19:00] Eric Goranson: You're going to have a hard time finding some people to do that at what I would call the government wage of doing that. If you were working on a big commercial project, for instance,

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[00:19:16] Dennis Stinson: The basic income levels and the reward coming back and the qualifying equipment, uh, states can add in whatever necessities they feel are there to be able to do it. So, and that's so, so to some degree you embrace it and say it gives the locals the ability to address what's important in their market. Um, From a manufacturing standpoint, you say I got 50 different programs out there now.

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[00:19:40] Eric Goranson: the part that I'm looking at going. It's cool that the states are doing it so they can get it in there, dialed in for their area, totally get it. But it's going to be a nightmare for people like you that are going, okay, what's. You got a smorgasbord of things going on there.

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[00:20:04] Dennis Stinson: We engineer products to qualify for the rebates and then our outstanding marketing team makes sure that we break that down into usable soundbites to get it out. But yeah, some are more complicated than others. I'm glad we're talking about. Incentives for home HVAC really are not just because I sell it, because that is some of the biggest expense for consumers.

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[00:20:47] Eric Goranson: Absolutely, and having something that's reliable is key too, because there's nothing worse than being in the middle of a hot streak or a cold streak or wherever you're listening to us today. That machine cuts down because you forgot to do your maintenance [00:21:00] on it and having something that's built well and installed correctly and maintained, those are the three legs to that stool to make sure that you got that system going in there right.

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[00:21:31] Dennis Stinson: The most important piece of that entire equation is selecting the right contractor to put it in with the knowledge, know how to do it. So. Can't underestimate the value of finding the right contractor from day one.

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[00:21:55] Eric Goranson: You're only halfway there

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[00:22:16] Dennis Stinson: So somebody that's had a great experience that enjoy who they work with, that's the best referral, not no right or wrong, but when you're hot and sweating and you turn over the phone book shows my age. When you go looking for somebody, the best advertiser may not be the best person for you. They could be, but they may not be.

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[00:22:57] Dennis Stinson: Cause it will.

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[00:23:19] Dennis Stinson: Yeah. And much like a car, by having it maintained gives you a, gives you a small, inexpensive exposure to the type of company that you're working with and the personalities that you're working with, and really whether that's somebody who would want to do business long term. So having somebody come in and service your HVAC, much like servicing your car, gives you a really good feel for how they do business and just reaffirms that these are the type of people I want to do business with.

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[00:24:00] Eric Goranson: They call you and go, Hey, it's that time of year. It's like your doctor trying to get you in the doctor. Hey, it's checkup time again. And that way, many times, if you do have some kind of an issue that something happens down the road. You're already in this system. They might not even charge you for that weekend rate.

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[00:24:29] Dennis Stinson: Yep, absolutely. Couldn't set up better myself.

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[00:24:50] Eric Goranson: So there's

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[00:25:10] Dennis Stinson: Style, size, capacity, efficiency, get a feel for it. While you're on our website, go to a section that says eco rebates and plug in your zip code. And if you don't plug in your zip code, it'll auto locate you a little creepy, but it'll figure out where you are and it'll come

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[00:25:30] Dennis Stinson: tell you all the rebates that are available, where you're standing. So it'll tell you every piece of equipment that qualifies. So now you can look at it and say, if I go with this piece of equipment to rebates this, but if I go with this, it's that now I know to ask somebody, does that make sense to do it?

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[00:26:05] Dennis Stinson: And 15 years into it, I want to do something before it gives up the ghost. How do I do that? This room is warm. This room is cold. I've never really been comfortable here. I'd like to have wifi. I'd like to be able to control it from somewhere. Be honest with them and let them come back and measure your house and do a heat load and heat loss on it and decide what size system you need.

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[00:26:46] Dennis Stinson: Knowledge, experience, good referrals is much more important than a good price.

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[00:27:11] Eric Goranson: They had the night before when they're on vacation. That's not the case anymore. There's a lot of units out there that look really nice. That could fit into your decor in your house.

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[00:27:28] Dennis Stinson: It's the same interchangeable term. And most people think of that. Horizontal unit that hangs on a wall, the rectangular unit, if you will, that hangs on a wall, and that is by far most popular because they work really well and there they go in well and they perform well, but we also have one that's more of a console so that it would look more like a radiator and that would go on low on the wall and provides great heat air comes in the middle, comes out the top and the bottom and it's great.

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[00:28:14] Dennis Stinson: But then we also have ducted units. So I'm the ducted ductless product. So I can take a mini air handler and I can stick that in Matic or a ceiling or vertically in a wall cavity, and I can return the air from that room, treat it, and then put it back in the room. Again, giving me that zoning capability, but also if you're.

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[00:28:53] Dennis Stinson: They run small diameter tubing to each indoor unit. And so maybe in the master bedroom, you have a ceiling cassette. [00:29:00] Maybe in the. Hall bedrooms where the kids sleep. You've got one air handler and you zone all the kids bedrooms together. Maybe downstairs where you watch the watch the baseball game. Then you've got a wall mount unit.

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[00:29:32] Dennis Stinson: So

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[00:29:50] Eric Goranson: And they have really become quiet with this inverter technology.

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[00:30:09] Dennis Stinson: When it kicks on, it wakes you up when it you finally get back to sleep when it turns off. And and what you find with inverter technology, both indoor units and outdoor units, you don't hear the rush of air. You feel the tempered air coming out, but you don't hear the rush of air coming out when the unit turns on.

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[00:30:41] Dennis Stinson: This is a friendly unit to be able to do that because you're not going to be that obnoxious guy. You can annoy them in other ways, but it won't be your air conditioner.

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[00:31:04] Eric Goranson: And I don't want it in my front yard, but. Where's this going to go? And there's a lot of flexibility with these systems on where you can mount them.

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[00:31:24] Dennis Stinson: We can have wall mount brackets and stick them outside so we can go vertical really quick with them. So because they're smaller and compact and lightweight. We can take them up in elevators. We can get them through 30 inch doors. So just the ease of actually getting them installed along with the quietness is a big opportunity.

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[00:31:59] Dennis Stinson: a matter of what [00:32:00] style you pick.

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[00:32:18] Dennis Stinson: And then you look at some level of filtration, and that can be HEPA or MERV or whatever it is that you're choosing to do that. A traditional wall mount product is difficult to do that. You're buying that for space, but when you look at the ducted units or you look at the ceiling cassette units, now you have the ability to bring in that fresh air.

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[00:33:05] Dennis Stinson: And so certainly the right, picking the right system with the right contractor and adding the right. Indoor air quality to it. You can really address that. Make it very comfortable.

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[00:33:29] Eric Goranson: So I had to unplug mine in the house so I could actually make sure that it was She could cook . So yeah. So that was my bad. I got blamed for that one for a little bit. That was my learning experience.

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[00:33:47] Eric Goranson: at night.

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[00:33:56] Dennis Stinson: taken care

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[00:34:12] Eric Goranson: And I, it seems like right now we're at that brand new part of the innovation. We talked a little bit about it earlier, but it seems like over the last couple of years, we've just made this new step. Into really getting that indoor comfort and having that efficiency balance out with it.

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[00:34:30] Dennis Stinson: The big step is to drive the efficiency for the return on investment. Right. But it doesn't make sense to save money. If you're not comfortable, it doesn't make any sense to do that. And it doesn't make sense to invest in a more efficient piece of equipment if you're still uncomfortable. So we like to say that all that do is make you uncomfortable more, more efficiently.

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[00:35:10] Dennis Stinson: They hold up to the test of time. They're well made products. And it's something that we're proud to sell. And certainly as a consumer, you get some good use out of it. You get great return of investment. And if it all works right, you never know it's there.

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[00:35:34] Eric Goranson: And it's almost to the point now online that you can jump on Amazon and have a system delivered tomorrow of some name that you've never heard of. It's almost that ridiculous. It's not worth the money guys to go out and buy something cheap that you're going to spend more to fix when nobody shows up for the warranty.

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[00:36:12] Dennis Stinson: I look at the warranty that they put on it. I like to read reviews on how people do it. And then frankly, I like to talk to people that do it every single day. And that is HVAC contractors. Take the curse off of this refrigerant. HVAC is not a do it yourself project that requires a licensed professional to do it right.

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[00:37:00] Eric Goranson: And half the mistakes seem to happen just in the sizing part of that, where someone has not, did I do my system as a DIY project? No, I had someone come in and do it for me because there's a lot of heat load calculations to where you're going to install stuff to know on what energy code is and building code.

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[00:37:35] Dennis Stinson: Thanks for that. So the best way to do it is to go to our website, Fujitsu general account. And that gives you the ability to walk through the product and take a look at it. It gives you the ability to use that eco rebate and find out what incentives might be available to you. And then you go to our dealer locator and based on where you are, there's a chat feature.

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[00:38:18] Dennis Stinson: So, so I would recommend that if you're interested in learning more about Fujitsu, go to our website. You can see product, you can see incentives, and as importantly, you can get connected with a high quality contractor to make sure it all comes together. Well,

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[00:38:35] Dennis Stinson: Eric, when you and I get together, I can't believe that we miss a whole lot. The conversation is always good. It's informative. And at this point, I think we covered it all. So, so thanks again for the invitation. It's always a pleasure to sit and talk various things with you on your show. And thank you.

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[00:38:51] Eric Goranson: the invitation. Once again, thanks brother for coming on again. All right, everybody. If you miss this on the radio, go back and catch the podcast on [00:39:00] your favorite podcast player. I'm Eric G, and you've been listening to Around the House