r/DIYHeatPumps

Finally got around to posting my DIY mini-split setup on our detached garage in New England. It heats and cools an upcoming 1,000 sq ft in-law suite upstairs, and after a full winter with single-digit nights and zero backup heat, this 24k Gree Sapphire has been an absolute beast.

To avoid vibrations transferring into the framing and keep it out of snow drifts, I anchored a DiversiTech offset bracket straight into the poured concrete foundation. Had a electrician fish a dedicated 240V circuit across the garage, then I took over and wired up the disconnect with an AG3000 surge protector (plus Square D HEPD80 surge protector at the actual panels) i ran a liquid-tight whip, and pulled 14/4 shielded tray cable with heat-shrink on the terminals for the communication wire.

Also patched the siding where an old framed-in sleeve A/C sat and moved my propane tanks for clearance. Bending that 5/8" line was a fight —my Harbor Freight bender met its match, so I had to gently warm the pipe to sweep it cleanly without kinking. I Cut the factory flares, re-flared with a NAVAC tool, put a dab of Nylog on the seats, and torqued to spec with a CPS BlackMax wrench.

I Rented a nitrogen tank from airgas and did a pressure test before pulling a deep vacuum and cracking the valves. Whatever you do, don't skip the nitrogen test—plenty of connections hold a vacuum fine but leak under positive pressure and by nitro testing it replicates actual operating pressures. I know many get lucky skipping this step and have no problems but for the cheap peace of mind i feel it’s important for the longevity of your unit to be properly nitrogen tested and be 100% sure that it’s not gonna have a slow leak over time.

On our 18¢/kWh municipal electric rate, running it barely moves the needle on the monthly bill. All in for what I paid for this unit you can’t beat it - I’d put it up against the big dogs like Mitsubishi , Fujitsu , daiken etc. Spec for spec it’s very close for cold weather performance at a fraction of the cost.

Tip: Gree Sapphires and Blueridge S5 units are the exact same hardware under the hood, just rebadged, and you can often find the Blue-ridge for way less. Especially if you check there clearance section at alpine airs website. They also include a DIY warrant and great customer support I’ve heard for help when doing your install.

Happy to help and answer any questions - I spent a lot of time learning in this group and am appreciative of it!

I love DIY installs. This one's in a ritzy neighborhood. Not like they're worried about copper thieves.

If I have to get on a ladder or use a crane to service your heat pump the service charge increases in correlation to the height.

10x higher off the ground than necessary... 10x my normal rate... Ladder falls kill more construction workers every year than electrocution. Think about it.

Title mostly says it. Had a knucklehead contractor that installed this for me, and doesn’t seem to know what he was doing. One sob story after another, and now he has completely ghosted me, and so have limited information about what was and wasn’t done. I haven’t installed on myself, but am fairly handy and wondering if any ideas for troubleshooting before I call an HVAC company out. Hoping the brain trust has some ideas for me. Definitely learned my lesson.

Description of issue: New install LG 2 ton unit. Cooling works, but maybe not as well as I would have guessed. Temperature was about 20 degrees below garage (garage 65 here where we live.) The heat does not work at all—tried to turn it on and the unit never blew. The lines appear to have frozen when the heat setting was turned on, and the compressor was not engaging. This makes me think maybe a Freon leak when it was installed? Maybe the 4 way valve failed, but doesn’t seem super likely out of the box?

Any ideas of things to check for? If other problems are visible, please let me know so I can get a list together of what should be fixed. Be as mean as you want, I honestly think it would have looked better if I had just done it myself from the start but oh well lol.