My DIY Geothermal System Was So CHEAP!!! 

Thank you all for watching my video. Make sure to check out a couple of my other Geothermal videos: Geothermal Cost Breakdown: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-mjWsSmjAOeU.html Geothermal 4 year review: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-xc_BbbMi1cg.html

Wow! I'm a commercial building engineer and this is the best explanation I have seen of a residential use break down of a heat pump and geothermal systems. No youtube hype filler. Thank you for a great video!

I work for a Geothermal exclusive company in the NW Chicago area. We do the entire job start to finish. Vertical boring is what you do in a city...it is possible in most areas. 150ft/ton straight down. We bore 5" holes drop the pipe, grout with bentonite/graphite mix. Also we use methanol as an antifreeze and have protection to 15°F. Not possible on every city job. But many more than most people think. I am one of very few Geothermal service techs in the area as well. I cant lie. Self installed Geo systems scare me. I have seen some nightmare jobs. That being said. This is a VERY GOOD VIDEO. Informative and correct in all aspects. Great job on this sir!

"Try to do it right, so you only do it once" is an excellent motto and one that I try to adhere to.

I was digging a 14 deep 3/4 acre lake /pond on my property so I simply laid my collection system in the bottom of the pond which luckily was blue clay hardpan and then covered it with 4 inches of sand backfill . My unit was a 4 ton and my home was 2300 sq ft with 10 ft ceilings and 18 ft in my large living room . My electrical bill for the year was 825 dollars total for heat and air conditioning . Excellent

My parents did that way in 1979. Heating pump is still working now !

I have no intention of doing this and yet I couldn't stop watching this video. Very interesting.

Thank you for your video on geothermal heat/air. I built my home about 15 years ago and installed two 3 ton heat pumps. I have been considering updating them to geothermal to get more efficiency and because I have a five acre pond 250 foot from my home that I could use in a closed loop system. The pond stays at a consistent depth because of some springs that feed it. I also have a backhoe to dig a trench from the house to the pond. Being retired and 76 years old I have not been as inclined to do this as I would have 15 years ago! But you have inspired me.

Had a geothermal unit added at my home in the 1990's. I forgot to have it checked for 20 years, called my installer and he said if I was having no problem leave it alone so I have. Love this thig, figure I save $100. per month on electric bill from my old heat pump.

Important to note that when using distilled water or reverse osmosis water (RO), you have to be careful about what fittings and piping are used and where. Polypropylene, Polyethylene and 316L SS are preferred for high purity waters. You can use PVC and CPVC, but they are more prone to failure long term. This particularly true when using glycols for freeze protection.

I’m in school as an HVAC Tech, and my school had us working with a geothermal setup. Ever since then I’ve been fascinated. I’m glad I found your channel, I’m looking forward to viewing more of your content

I have a geo system in a suburban neighborhood with a 0.4 acre lot. It runs a closed, 460’ deep single loop. Been running flawlessly for 5 years. Only issue I had was my neighbors thought I was insane when the 30-ton drill rig showed up at my house!

Great explanation of heat pump technology! I put one in my house 18 years ago and cut my electric bill by about 60 plus percent and summer time hot water for free. Used my old hot water heater as tank and a new in demand hot water heater. I am absolutely thrilled with the technology! Regards

We have had geo thermal now for 5 years. Best hvac system for comfort and low electric bills year round. Can freeze out the house in august and not worry about the bill.

Hey quick comment. In my experience, I've used 50/50 for non automotive use. As an automotive professional, I know that antifreeze/coolant also has lubricants, anti corrosion, anti organic life, on top of other additives. Diluting antifreeze may cause premature impeller and bearing wear, loss of anticorrosive properties, and affect the PH level allowing organic life to grow. Mind you this takes a really long time. Even though you may not need "antifreeze", I do recommend something like freezetone that offers such additives to continue protecting your system with superior conductive properties.

I'm recommending this to my airport manager as he is thinking of developing some new hangers/building at our municipal airport. He loves DIY and this could spark some new ideas since we have a lot of land to work with. -Thank you!

Once I saw a system that uses solar vacuum tubes in which the sun heats the water inside and the water doesn't lose temperature to the environment because of the vacuum walls. It works even in forecast days and can boil water even in snow, that was pretty clever too!

I installed 2 geothermal heat pumps when I had my house built back in 2001. Had engineers design the system for a 2.5 ton for one area of the house and 3 ton for larger area. Used 300’ per ton as length of tubing. So ended up with 2 loops 6-8’ deep one goes out with pipe in bottom of trench leak tested and back filled with 2’ over that pipe, top pipe is 6’ deep for a total for 2.5 ton is 1000’ 3 ton unit has 1 continuous loop of 1000’ 8-10th deep. System was designed without additional electric heat for a backup. In 21 years have not needed it either, even at 10pm outside. Very happy with this system. Did not use anything but water with make up valve and expansion tank, no glycol at all. Pipes are in the attic which I run 2 pumps in winter 24/7 to prevent them from freezing, summer they run with compressors. Did all the work myself except for the digging, hired that for $1,000.00, and I tested for leaks and back filled myself. Would do it again except would use antifreeze with a back flow preventer. House has 6’’ walls and very efficient. Heat pumps are Trane.

This was popular back in the 70's where I live . However, were out in the middle of nowhere Tennessee. We also do something like this , but use compost piles instead. Our compost piles are 20 feet wide by 100+ feet long and about 10 feet tall. The water gets up to 150 degrees. I have one heating my shop right now.

We installed a closed loop geothermal five years ago in a single 450’ well. It supplies all our heating, air conditioning, and hot water. We did not hook up the backup hvac heat strips nor the backup hot water elements. No problems, and we have only had annual preventative maintenance services. We elected to do the single well rather than the ditches all over our yard. Our power bills have been low all year and we have been well pleased with the system.

They can go deep with a closed loop system, if you have limited space. Instead of drilling two wells for an open loop, you drill one hole and place the heat sink loop in the hole. It may not be as efficient as placing that loop at one specific depth, but it's still way more efficient than air to air heat exchanges.

I was shopping for a furnace once long ago and a normal natural gas furnace is $7000. So spending $17k on a geothermal unit is actually pretty fantastic. Especially that you don't have to spend the money on natural gas hookup or the monthly gas bill.

We're same boat. No natural gas, 100% electric. Trying to move our house off-grid for power and heating and cooling are the biggest obstacles. We have plenty of land and I'd love to try. We just replaced the downstairs unit and the HVAC guy talked us out of GT. My guess, even though they list it as a service, they probably don't like to do them. I like the idea of doing it myself. Another excuse to rent machinery!

here in sweden we do a lot of geothermal. the area required is about a few square meters as we use a borehole of about 120 meter depth (closed loop). the whole process is highly automated and a heat well is done in about a days work, start to finish. the heat pumps used have a cop value of about 5. in summer time they can dump heat from thebhouse down the well. abd thebwhole installation can be done on the parking lot.

I built 12 years ago. Three zones with 6T of cooling. Four trenches 12 feet deep with 9,000 ft of 1" HDPE tube. Great system and very efficient. 29SEER Florida H.P. now Bosch.

My father's cousin installed a well type geothermal system in her yoga center in the late 1980's. I have had dreams of building a system exactly as you describe for several years now. Since I would build this into my existing hydronic heating system, my main investments would be in a water to water geothermal unit and a some small fan-coils with condensate drains to be used for hydronic cooling on a separate loop. I have a backhoe attachment for my tractor, keeping the trenching investment down to diesel and time like in your case. Thank you for the guidance on tax incentives - I was considering looking into that aspect and you gave me some good places to start. Nice work on your build and I am happy to see that you have had such a positive result!

You're wrong about people in the city having only one option, the open loop, because there are vertical closed loop systems also.

I'm glad someone else has already done & proven what I've had in my mind for awhile that this is doable (I'm no expert but have a fair grasp of general science). Thanks for sharing! Hope the system's going strong.

An excellent rundown of what you did, good sir. I just found your channel and will most certainly be perusing the rest of your videos, especially the ones about actually building a working system, since I am currently looking at such a thing to complement the fully off-grid power system I am constructing for my own home.

Here in Denmark we often install geothermal on much smaller lots. Heating mainly. But a typical lot here in the cities is about 800m2 or 1/5 acre. We use a different layout of the heat collectors in the ground but have very good history with that. I service systems that are 20+ years old and have had nothing done to them other than yearly service.

I'll watch the other half of the video later but so far you are explaining this better than most teachers 👍🏼🍺

We had GT done here in northern west Michigan of course it’s all sand they went at least 15 feet down on a closed loop works great we have filled our propane tank once in 4 years and we use most of propane in the fire place, we received two years of tax breaks and money from the electric cooperative, one of the best investment’s ever we also run on solar and have batteries.

This was my first exposure to seeing how a geothermal system actually looks. I am very interested in this technology and have not bought land yet, so I really appreciate your tips about a large piece of land and building in clay soil.

A little over a decade ago, while living in PA, I had to replace our furnace and AC. I chose to go geothermal. The installer put in a vertical closed loop system with two wells to take advantage of the heat transfer properties of the water. My old furnace was propane fired and was really expensive to operate (over $600/mo in the cold season). After all the tax credits, the geothermal system ended up being $8500 more than a high end hybrid propane/heat pump system. This included installation of an 80 gallon hot water heater and 55 gallon buffer tank. I had estimated a return on investment of just over 3 years. It ends up, the gt heat pump was so efficient, I got my money back in just over 2 years. Winter heating costs dropped to less than $55/mo. Summer cooling dropped by more than $100, and I also got free hot water in the summer due to the buffer tank. And, because the system ran more frequently than my old one, it was way more comfortable. I really miss that system.

Thanks for that Video I can add some points that you didn't mention. 1) you forgot to mention that not only the cold side of the heat pump makes a difference in cop but also the hot side. At first I would optimize at the inside. You showed pictures of ducts inside the house. I assume your heat pump creates warm air that is going to be distributed across your building. As you mentioned water is more eglibe for transfering heat, i would suggest to use that instead of air. normally at my home country you would run coils in the floor of your building, warming that. That way the heat pump only has to heat up the water to 95°F in winter time to keep your home warm. The pump that delivers the heat to the whole building eats up only about 10 - 30 Watts, what is sure less than a fan needs. Additionally in the rooms you won't have noise and air movement. 1b) We here also do some ducts but we run them only to exchange the used air against fresh air from outside so you need to open the windows less for air quality. This air is brought inside the building by a heat recovery exchanger to lessen the heat loss. 2) to decide if a ground heat source or outside air source is better it is important to knwo where you're at, how many hours per year it is going to be how cold. If you know that you can do the math and then decide the annual more - or less energy you need for either system 3) you also want to have your ground analysed to know if it is better or worse suitable for the geothermal system you describe before making descisions 4) There is no xxx feet of pipe is needed per ton. this is absolutely dependent on the kind of ground and the operating hours per year, and if you plan to use antifreeze in the system. There are people around who have software to simulate this. 5) Antifreeze: Normally you want to use 0% or 20 - 33% of antifreeze, if you use glycol. the glycol we get here contains anticorrosive elements. Therefore you better inform yourself and fill in the mixture that is mandated by the manufacturer. If you design your coil for usage with plain water and get into trouble you can always later change to antifreeze filling. Be aware that you will never design your coil to be sub zero celsius (freezing point of water), or you'll suffer of performance of your ground coil, or even destroy it as time goes by if you repeatingly freeze the ground around it. 6) If you need to cool the house in summer you can use the water of about soil temperature and send it to your pipes in the floor. that way you don't need any energy (apart from the two pumps) to cool down your house. If you are at a warmer region and that is not enough you can reverse your heat pump or have a air handler that is connected to the outside coil 7) if your garden is to small then use vertical drilled holes. they need to be quite long and this is nothing for DIY, as it requires special skills. the length and the amount of those borings need to be simulated, to ensure that you will be able to use them for the desired life span. in several hundred feet depth the heat is not really easy moved and if your vertical collector is to small you risk of cooling it down to an unusable temperature in 5 or 10 years. by the way: if you connect your AC to it and heat your heat source up in summer time it helps a lot, so you need smaller borings and get an almost infinite life span out of it. 8) water quality: I'm pleased somebody speaks about the water that is going to be filled in a circuit. yes, you can use destilled water, that's great. At my place we have special water softener resin cartridge that take out all of the salt (not to mistake for ion exchanger resin that can be regenerated with salt), what gives almost the same quality of water as destilled water. Advantage: you don't have to carry the water around but have a small cartridge you connect to your tap water. Cheaper? maybe not, depends. 9) about the layout of your trench: it is not always best to dig as low as possibe. The design of your collector needs to make as much as possible use of the ground between the collectors. If you speak a little bit of german or know how to use the translator then you can find tons of useful informations and another angle of sight how we're doing such things in europe. Assumed you understand metric units maybe you will find it interesting to read on some forums and company websites. try following words in google: grabenkollektor, ringgrabenkollektor, trenchplanner.

Great video very informative. That being said I work for a company that treats these types of systems and there are a few things to keep in mind. Yes water is better at transferring heat but if you go below 18% glycol you will have sever bacterial growth in the system. This can rob it of efficiency while also causing maintenance issues. I wouldn't go below 30% with a glycol mix. Also if you are using a gycol mix it is extremely important that the water you mix it with is pure water whether that be distilled, DI or RO because regular water will form precipitates that can reek havoc on the system like the bacteria. I like the comment below me on using methanol although going with just water and keeping it moving would work too.

Thanks for this breakdown. It’s by far, the most comprehensive and UNDERSTANDABLE explanation of this type of HVAC system that I could find.

Going to do one on 5 acres. Northern nevada has crazy temperature swings. I think geothermal would be hugely efficient. Thanks for the video.

Always have been curious how a geo thermal unit works. Now I know exactly! Thanks👍

You can combine closed systems with standard submerged water tanks, especially if they are made from galvanised steel, which conducts heat to the surrounding earth well.

As a point of reference, a book I own about Earth Covered Houses, stated that the minimum amount of earth coverage required to decouple a house from the surrounding air was one metre (or yard), so going down to two or three metres would be more than enough earth coverage for the piping system. The only other thing to consider is that the deeper that you dig your trench the wider it needs to be battered back to prevent collapse during installation.

You can do something very similar on a boat in some areas. The water around the boat is typically cooler than the air in summer and warmer than the air in winter. If you can utilize this difference you are that much more efficient. Marine heat pumps have been around for years and my particular favorite is the MarineAir 16,000 btu 120 volt model. There are things you must do however. There must be an hull strainer and an in line raw water strainer before the water pump. The strainer and pump must be below the water level that’s outside of the hull. There must be a flow switch (not provided) to shut things down if there’s an obstruction. Loss of flow can be more catastrophic in winter because slow flowing water can freeze the water in the heat exchanger, rupture and flood the hull. Moisture alarms throughout a boat is always a good idea. A condensate pump to move water overboard is also required. It’s also preferable to have the heat pump unit above water level so when it cycles off some water runs backwards through the impeller pump and the two strainers help with backwashing and keeping things clear.

Well, I wasn't thinking about geothermal in my next house, but now,... it sounds like a wise notion.

Wow, outstanding job! Thanks for explaining how a heat pump works (best I have ever heard). The amount of explanation and knowledge from you helped me understand so much. Watching this video should earn you a diploma of some kind.

Very common technology here in the EU. We call it Ringgrabenkollektor. Very efficient and great for heating and cooling houses.

My aunt has a 15 year old one. It is on my list of things I want to do, but until the other things finished I'll need to put it off.

I'm not even sure how I got here, watched the whole thing though. Thanks for reaching me something new. Lol.

Thank you, looking at Bosch heat pumps now. I'm also a non-qualified (non-ticketed) builder planning to build a unique home and considering using underground cisterns as a switched heat source/sink for a seasonal boost in efficiency. Lots to learn. Thank you for this information.

Great video! Easy to understand. You explained very clearly how this works. You sound like an engineer that’s been doing this for years. Thanks.

I had my horizontal bored 4Ton system installed for $15k before tax incentives. The heatpump was a used unit purchased locally from a private seller upgrading to a larger unit with only 5 years of use on it. They were upgrading as they added an addition and needed more tonnage and a larger unit made more sense rather than a secondary. The horizontal bores were installed with 5 lines of 250 foot in length making a round trip loop of 500ft per loop. A manifold was buried outside by basement so a smallish excavation was needed for that. The manifold is thermally welded to the pipes preventing any possibility of corrosion to clamps. The loops are 1 inch in size and the output of the manifold is 2 inches all of the lines are high density PEX. Part of the install I was in-charge of getting the necessary electric to the unit (not insignificant as there is an emergency aux resistive heater that can carry the needs of the home if there is a catastrophic failure of the heatpump.) The unit was transported from the old home to mine by me but removed from service, validated, and installed in my home by the same company. The antifreeze is a 15% solution of methanol. The lines were pressure tested before attaching to the unit for 24 hours. The unit is rated for 6.1 COP at 68 degrees and 18.8 EER at 86degrees. (full loads reduce those efficiencies a bit). Another point to add is the de-super-heater. This permits me to offset my water heating costs by dumping heat into a potable water buffer tank that pre-heats my well water allowing my main water heaters to work less hard. I could have higher efficiencies with a variable system rather than a 2 stage and a variable pump rather than a fixed but it made more financial sense to buy a well cared for, inspected, used unit with proper service records than it was for me to purchase a new unit with these more advanced features. At some point I might upgrade the unit but even then the costs will be far less as the lines will never need replaced and have a 100 year warranty. The expected life time from a unit like this is in the decades so a unit with only 5 years is just getting started. When I was evaluating this I too was in a predicament with the cost to install natural gas at $80k and propane costing around $1500 for half a year. I upgraded my whole house and removed the old propane fixtures installing an induction stove, a heat-pump water heater, and an on-demand electric water heater. I also had solar panels installed that cover all of my electrical needs for over half the year. I also have an electric car and electric mower so those numbers could be higher for a person who drives a gasoline car. As a point of reference I have a builders grade home built in 1985 in NE-OHIO (Zone 5) that is 2016 square foot.

I installed a Fujitsu 12RL mini split heat . pump several years ago and am totally glad I did. 1 unit, centrally located in my 1900 sq ft ranch. I live in Maine and have wood as a back up. The unit produced useful heat at -15 F one winter - it is only rated to -10F by the manufacturer, I was told that is as cold as the testing equipment got. I usually burned 6-7 cords of wood a year, the installer said I would only need1/2 cord a year to supplement the few extreme cold days. I could hardly believe him but he was right on the money. I burned 1/2 cord a year for several years, and last year burned no wood at all. Essentially, a good heat pump is roughly cheaper than any heat source but wood, and about the same as wood but without the labor and mess of wood, which is considerable. I got the heat pump because I was getting older and the wood was not getting easier. I am totally happy with the result. The coldest part of the year I would burn 1 cord a month, at $200/cord. The heat pump costs, during the coldest months, about $150/month extra on my power bill. Yes, in my case it has been cheaper than wood since with wood I heated my basement also, and liked to keep the woodstove cranked right up to keep the chimney clean and heat both floors.With the heatpump, the basement is cool but not too cool. In the summer, the heat pump is way more efficient than my air conditioner was. During the hottest part of the year, the AC added $80/month to my power bill. The heat pump is much better at cooling than the AC was, and much cheaper to operate as an AC too. A mini split has no inefficient ductwork to heat or cool, and loses no electricity pumping through ducts (my understanding is ductwork can sap up to 10% additional electricity). There is a dehumidifier setting that costs about $15/ month to use continuously in the hot part of the year, and I find that when used, which is all the time in the summer in my case, the AC setting rarely is needed. When the AC setting is used, there is not much impact on my power bill, so it is clearly getting a much greater cooling bang for the buck than my old AC did. I'm totally happy with my switch to a cold climate heat pump. It paid for itself in 3 years when compared to my old oil furnace, so it will be well worth it even planning on replacing it every 12-15 years or so. The woodstove is excellent backup for power outages, which can be quite long where I live, in fact there was a three day outage this past month, and as a supplement for extended extreme cold, which has not been happening in recent years. The correct heat pump is the obvious best choice for most homes now, imo. Electricity costs are much stable than heating oil in the long term. You can make your own electricity too, with solar panels. A grid tied solar power system with a mini split or geothermal heat pump is the sweetest arrangement of all, also imo.

I too have a geo unit. One thing he never mentioned was how effective your insulation package is. It makes no sense to spend more money to efficiently add or remove heat, only to allow it to disappear through poor insulation. Poor insulation means your system works harder then it needs too, thereby reducing efficiency.

Yes, I would like to do a Geothermal System for my heating & Cooling for my residence. Thank you for sharing. I was certainly inspired by the information.

Thank you, clear and concise, you eliminated all the mystery involved in G/T with your explanation, appears pretty simple, just labor intense.

I think this makes sense in almost any climate but especially new builds in cold climates (along with going above code for insulation and air sealing).

I converted our large rural home to propane from electric furnace a little over a year ago. The cost to operate dropped by 60%. The cost to install was pretty close to what you ended up spending. Looking back, I should have given more consideration to a ground based heat pump.

Thanks for showing the unit and not just talking the whole time. It really helps to understand it.

I didn't know you could do this! Thank you. Saving this for later watching.

I spent over 30 years in HVAC. I think this is the most ACCURATE and informative RU-vid video I've seen yet. Great job!

I think going deep was a smart idea. thats around the point where your're going to have a consistant temperature year round. You may want it cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter but it's about 55f-60f depending on where you are and the material you're in... a heatpump with a geothermal loop sounds like an amazingly efficient thermal producer.

We also own a pretty small property in Austria and we go for a vertical borehole of about 120m depth (close to 400ft). Here many people install a „Ringgrabenkollektor“ which is essentially what you did but with a 6-7ft wide trench and in one long loop. Variable compressionrates are a thing and we expect to pay less than 400$ a year for heating, cooling and warm water...

Explained very well...

When i retired i changed my baseboard heat system to geothermal closed horizonal loop system, i have a large 2 story hobby barn with different shops in it and installed a 3 1/2 ton in my house and a 3 1/2 ton unit for my barn. I installed a 6000 foot loop bed 3 foot wide and 10 foot down, 6 1000 foot continuous runs, my 2 units can simultaneously use off of the bed, i got 30% from gov, 1500 from my co-op, 1200 from my geothermal unit manufacturer and 800 from my indiana state, i also have the prewarmer coil for my waterheater and a humidifier and air unit to help with any bacteria and virues. I am happy with my units and am doing a little here and there to make my buildings more air tight. One thing also and a pretty big carrot, i have increased the value of my house and made my house and workshop safer with no worry of Co2 and i also gave up burning wood as a suppliment to my base board heat and i am burning no fossil fuels except at the power plant to run my pool pumps and motor to run blower to deliver my heat or cold.

This was one of the best, most informative videos I've ever seen on RU-vid, possibly on the interwebz!!! ❤️❤️❤️❤️ Thank you sooooo much, Garrett. Ima show my bf and this is the system we'll prolly use on our new house! 🏡

I put a Geothermal system a few years ago myself. The I add the solar and now have a net zero house. I did it all as experiment on build a new ICF house. I have 4 ton variable speed fan and heat pump system for Geothermal. Both are drive by dc motors. My cost was 14k with one 3-day weekend rental of backhoe and horizontal loops down 12ft. I have five 600 ft loops 12 ft apart. New house will have Geothermal but will go to radiant though out the house. I am down in southern CA.

I am considering a geo thermal. I am purchasing 20 acres, however am also going to build a sunken green house on my property -about 20w x60L x 10 feet deep - 2 feet above ground glass, with a glass roof. This is in Minnesota, very cold in winter, very warm in summer along with large fluctuations during fall/spring in temps. This may be a viable option to make year round temps for the home and greenhouse. Yes, I would do most of the digging, pipe laying and unit installation myself. Very helpful video.

This is fantastic! I can't wait to do this myself when I get a land of my own. I'm also studying these topics in my engineering degree so I also understand about energy efficiency in thermal systems :)

Picturing you with that shopping cart, groaning under the weight of all those water jugs, provided a much needed bit of humor to finish my day. Thanks.

Good information. I have a several acre rural property that when I build I would like to go geothermal but haven't looked into the costs and workload. This sounds pretty manageable and we also have an electric co-op out there so I'll have to check into that as well.

Thanks for the video and I am changing my old unit out next year and I am researching best options.

My folks have a geothermal heat pump in finland. I think they had to fill the lines with just about pure antifreeze, so the efficiency of that is not great. Fortunately, they have a large field next to the house, so the losses in fluid are covered by the pure distance of pipe running underground. Its a hell of a system.

Great video! I have zero plans to go geothermal, but watched the whole vid to learn about it. Very informative!

This is a great video and provides more "real world" explanation than any I've seen.

I have been wanting the technology to get more affordable. I have had a concept for using geothermal since i was a kid. I am getting close to actually building my dreamhouse. Thank you for this video.

I doubt if I'm going to install this system but thanks for a really clear explanation. Probably the best I've seen on the subject.

I did this too. Dug really deep and long tracks all over the place. I can honestly say it worked great! My neighbor was really annoyed that I dug up his yard, but hey, 'if you want to make an omlette...'

Could you show more pictures or more video time of your actual work? That would be awesome!!

Lots of good information. I had a heat pump back in the 80s. It was crap for heat, and the compressor went out after 5 years. I was told that was good service at the time. Unless they have improved greatly I would never have another. Geothermal is the way to go.

This is awesome. I'm in Virginia, this may work pretty well. We do have a lot of red clay, hopefully I can set up our retirement homestead and implement one of these. Using this to run a small self-sufficient farm for my retirement work and allow support the local community.

I was on the design team for the largest geothermal system in the U.S. I can tell you flat out that the ground temperature will drop during the heating system. You absolutely need an antifreeze. If your state allows it, Water Furnace makes an ethanol blend named Environol. It is 20% better heat transfer than glycol, and has a much lower viscosity, making it easier to pump.

Outstanding presentation - good, practical content that didn't skate over the surface or shy away from theory; it was thoughtfullly organised and edited, and fluently presented. Thank you very much. And what a joy to hear proper un-mumbled sentences entirely free of 'like' 'insane' 'awesome' and other examples of sloppy education & thinking.

I've had a water furnace for 14 years now and it has performed as it should 4 years ago I added solar so now heat is free as far as monthly payments are concerned. I did the pump and dump and it has worked well.

When I replaced the A/C unit last spring, I asked the gentleman who installed it for me about the heat pump system and he honestly told me that he has one and that it cost him more to use because it has to run all of the time. I'm very happy that he was honest with me.

Great video. I only have one small correction. Closed loop is generally more efficient than open loop if done correctly when you look at total system energy. Open loop typically uses a 1/2 hp well pump vs closed loop using 1/8 hp recirculating pump. This more than negates any small temp rise losses vs an open loop system.

one thing you need to be cautious of is the real high SEER units have fine fins and some of that savings goes right back into seasonal calls for coil cleanings.

The one job we worked on the go thermal was under the parking lot and driveway then pavers were placed over it. They loved it

We did two of these back in the 90s I was young and helping kind of run the job. the first one never worked right and the second one we did they had gotten better and were laid flat in the entire yard as opposed to just a deep trench with tubes run up and down on wood stakes . These were entirely different than yours they were extremely complicated units that used freon for their operation. Ive always thought it was a cool idea , if it works properly.

Father-in-Law had a home built system that saved him a bunch - lots of land and a huge backhoe! We're going to relocate back to our roots (small farm) and will undoubtedly be putting in a system ourselves. Both of us retired Engineers, too. ;-> Great video, Garrett! Now I've got to peruse your other stash of videos!

I'm considering GT as an option for my retirement/downsizing home on the farm. Plenty of land but wells are not a good option (water well is 420') so the closed loop is a better fit. Thank you for the info. Well presented and very educational!

Yes I always wanted one of these geothermal systems... Thanks for some new ideas and all of your information

In denver I installed a geothermal unit in a small property with a 10 by 20 by 8 feet deep pool, then ran the water to a collector on the roof for heating, when the water got below a certain point the geo would kick in, if anyone wants a shortcut, or is short of land. the bills were always under $40

I have seen people invest heavily in systems like this only to find out it only takes one little gopher to chew a hole in the pipe rendering the whole system useless. Maybe coarse gravel (not crushed gravel) could be a gopher barrier but that’s also a gamble because I’ve seen gophers dig through road bed gravel.

Garrett: "My system was so cheap!" Also Garrett: "I paid top dollar for all my equipment!" I can't wait to do mine.

G.T. is the way to go and your xtra ideas are awesome !!!

Wondering how long it will take to amortize the cost of the system vs the savings you get. For example, at my house which in only about 1000sq/ft of living space on 100 x 50 ft land, a geothermal system would have cost about 28K (turnkey) however they would have had to dig an 8" diameter hole/well to about 400ft deep for the piping(because of the lack of land to install a horizontal system). Because of cost, my bride was totally against the installation of the system however, it would have been about 11 years to recoup the investment which means, this year, it would have finally paid for itself and this in not taking into account the forever rising cost of electricity and natural gas. BTW, thanks for your many clear explanations of various systems and for the interesting talk.

Regarding depth, I read a university study that showed its more efficient to run the pipe relatively shallow but spread out over a lot of area. Probably a different climate than yours though. Also, the home run straight pipe sitting on the coils will reduce the efficiency due to heat transfer. In any case you've put a lot of hard work in and it looks pretty good. -Ken

Thanks for sharing your experience, that was great information.

This is truth! Smart friend!

Straight talk, No BS! I’m glad i watched this. Thanks for your time.

Wish i had more smart people like you in my life well done sir.