Say What You Will About AI...

12:46 Wednesday, 28 October 2026
Current Wx: Temp: 58.87°F Pressure: 1027hPa Humidity: 64% Wind: 9.37mph
Words: 374

But Claude is my hero today.

That may be just a bit premature, but I'm fairly confident and very excited about a productive session I had with him (it) this morning.

As I've lamented here before, it has been a struggle finding an HVAC contractor to do the install for our house. Now, shame on me, it turns out I don't need an HVAC contractor.

Because I am installing a mono-block heat pump. There are no refrigerant connections to be made, no lines running into the house, it's all contained in the heat pump, so no HVAC license is necessary. The only thing that connects to the heat pump is power and water.

Now, you might want to go with an HVAC contractor if you wanted someone to perform Manual J calculations to properly size your air-to-water heat pump, but I've paid an engineering firm to do all that already.

I just need a plumber!

But how does a plumber know what to do? What size circulators, expansion tank, how much glycol? No plumber is going to take on that job!

He will when you sit down for an hour with Claude and complete the entire design, to include circulators, head tanks, glycol percentages, everything you need to know. It's all just a matter of plumbing it all together.

After chatting for an hour with Claude. it took him about 15 minutes to actually draw the entire schematic and produce the equipment list. He also told me that because I'm using an AWHP for domestic hot water, I need to check code and I may need to run propylene glycol and label the pipe accordingly.

I've forwarded that plan to our equipment supplier and my design engineer for their review.

I was up half the night last night ruminating on this issue. We had another contractor bow out yesterday, and it's just so frustrating.

But now all I need is a plumber with some good piping skills, and an electrician to run the power to the heat pump.

I got another bit of potentially good news. Apparently there is now a rebate incentive for all-electric new construction homes, which we may qualify for.

So I'm pro-AI today at least.

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