Heat pump installation, service and repair in Hamilton

Yes, with the right unit. A cold-climate air-source heat pump keeps its rated output down to about minus 15 and still heats, at reduced capacity, to minus 25 or lower. Hamilton sees a handful of nights a year below minus 15, so a correctly sized cold-climate unit carries most of the season on its own. The older heat pumps that gave the technology a bad name in Ontario were not cold-climate models; the difference is in the compressor and the refrigerant, and it is the first thing we check when a homeowner has been quoted a cheap unit.

What a heat pump does not do is produce the blast of hot air a furnace does. It delivers long, steady, lower-temperature heat, which most people find more even once they are used to it. Ductwork sized for a furnace usually carries it fine; we measure airflow before quoting.

For most homes in the Hamilton area the best answer is both. A hybrid (dual-fuel) system runs the heat pump through the fall, the shoulder seasons and ordinary winter days, and switches to the gas furnace automatically when the outdoor temperature drops below the point where gas is cheaper to burn than electricity is to run the compressor. The switch-over point is set at installation from current Enbridge gas and Ontario electricity rates and can be changed from the thermostat.

A hybrid keeps the furnace you already own, qualifies for the heat pump rebates, and gives you central air conditioning in summer from the same outdoor unit, which is the honest answer to anyone searching for heating and cooling in Hamilton. If your furnace is near the end of its life, the two can be replaced together as a matched system.

A ducted heat pump uses your existing furnace ductwork: one outdoor unit, one indoor coil on the furnace or an air handler, and the whole house is heated and cooled from the thermostat. A ductless mini-split is one outdoor unit feeding one or more wall-mounted indoor heads, with no ductwork at all; it suits homes with radiators or baseboards, additions, finished attics and the room above the garage that never heats properly. Many Dundas and Hamilton homes with boilers add a mini-split for cooling and shoulder-season heat and keep the boiler for January.

Typical 2026 installed prices in the Hamilton area: a single-zone ductless mini-split $3,500 to $5,500; a cold-climate heat pump added to an existing furnace as a hybrid system $7,000 to $12,000; a whole-home ducted cold-climate heat pump with a new air handler $9,000 to $16,000. The size of the house, the electrical panel (a heat pump usually needs a new 240-volt circuit and sometimes a panel upgrade), the line-set run and the outdoor mounting move the number. Running cost: at current Ontario rates a cold-climate heat pump costs about the same per hour of heat as a 96 percent gas furnace in mild weather and more in a deep freeze, which is why we set hybrids to switch, and it replaces the electricity an older air conditioner used in summer. The full breakdown is in what a heat pump costs in Ontario and the comparison in heat pump vs furnace in Ontario.

Most of the rebate money in Ontario right now is for heat pumps, not furnaces. The programs change through the year and most require an energy assessment before the work and a registered contractor; we sequence the installation so the claim is valid and handle the paperwork. What is open now is in the rebates guide.

A heat pump runs all year, heating and cooling, so it needs a yearly service the way a furnace does: coils cleaned, refrigerant charge and pressures checked, defrost cycle tested, drain cleared, electrical connections and capacitor tested, filters changed. We repair all makes of ducted and ductless heat pump: failed capacitors and contactors, reversing valves, fan motors, sensors and control boards, and refrigerant leaks. Refrigerant work in Ontario must be done by a licensed refrigeration mechanic, and ours are. A heat pump service can be booked in the same visit as a furnace tune-up.