GENERAL AIRSTAGE Aquila R32 Dual Zone Heat Pump | 36,000 BTU | Montreal, Laval, South Shore, North Shore

GENERAL AIRSTAGE Aquila 2-Zone Heat Pump, 36,000 BTU: the cottage's basement family room and upper floor on a single outdoor unit, with AirGreen

In a Saint-Hubert cottage, winter and summer are not lived on the same floor. From December to March, it is the basement family room that chills the house from below: a concrete slab, windows at ground level, and kids who spend their evenings down there in front of the TV. From June to August, it is the reverse: the heat rises, builds up under the roof, and the upstairs bedrooms become the hardest place in the whole house to put up with.

The GENERAL AIRSTAGE Aquila 2-zone 36,000 BTU settles both seasons with a single outdoor unit, the AOUH36KWAS4, and two wall-mounted heads shown here in a 7,000 + 7,000 BTU configuration. It is the same system as the Fujitsu AIRSTAGE Aquila 2-zone built on this compressor, coming from the hands of the same manufacturer, renamed GENERAL Inc. on January 1, 2026. The AHRI certificate 215447689 is identical, the certified values too, and so is the warranty: 12 years on the compressor, 12 years on parts, 6 years on labour.

Our way of installing it in a cottage is simple: one head in the family room, one head upstairs, and two independent setpoints. In winter, both zones heat. In summer, you switch off the basement one, which stays cool on its own, and let the upstairs one cool the bedrooms. And since this 36,000 BTU compressor accepts up to four heads, the main floor can become a third zone whenever you decide.

GENERAL or Fujitsu AIRSTAGE: the same machine

What changed fits on the label. In August 2025, Paloma Rheem Holdings, the owner of Rheem since 1988, made the acquisition of Fujitsu General. On January 1, 2026, Fujitsu General Limited took the name GENERAL Inc., a name in use since 1946. The head office and the R&D centre stayed in Kawasaki, Japan, the factories did not change, and AIRSTAGE products retain both their model numbers and their warranty program. Rheem Canada has managed sales across the country since February 2026, while Groupe Master remains the distributor AirGreen buys from.

The Fujitsu brand is being phased out gradually, so the same machine is still sold under both names. We therefore leave both pages online: the person who remembers the Fujitsu logo on the neighbour's unit finds us as easily as the one who sees GENERAL on the new box, and both read exactly the same figures in the table below.

To look at the original version, see the page Fujitsu AIRSTAGE Aquila 2-zone 36,000 BTU: same AOUH36KWAS4, same certificate, same compatible heads.

Let's start with the basement, since it is the one working hardest in winter. The following values are certified by NEEP (ashp.neep.org) under AHRI certificate 215447689. At −8 °C, the temperature of an ordinary January morning on the South Shore, the system delivers 23,600 BTU/h with a COP of 3.1, and it can climb to 29,000 BTU/h at peak. At −15 °C, it delivers 24,000 BTU/h with a COP of 2.2: capacity does not sag between those two temperatures. Heating is guaranteed down to −15 °C; below that threshold, the baseboards or the house's existing heating take over.

COP compares the energy delivered with the energy bought. At 3.1, every kilowatt-hour paid to Hydro-Québec comes out as a little more than three kilowatt-hours of heat in the family room. The HSPF2 of 10.0 is the grade for the whole heating season, not for a single day: it accounts for mild mornings, cold nights and defrost cycles. For summer, the SEER2 of 22.0 and the EER2 of 12.0 measure the same efficiency in cooling. It holds the ENERGY STAR Most Efficient designation, granted to the most efficient systems of the year. The ENERGY STAR cold-climate designation, for its part, does not appear on its listing, and we would rather tell you plainly: what protects you in January is the heating certified at −15 °C shown above.

The Inverter compressor goes down to 11,000 BTU/h at low speed, its minimum capacity certified by NEEP. In spring and fall, when only the basement asks for a little heat, it slows down instead of piling up stops and restarts, which gives a steadier temperature and spares the mechanics. Outside, the outdoor unit is measured at 56.0 dB(A); we take that into account by placing it away from the patio and from bedroom windows, yours as well as the neighbour's.

The two refrigerant lines carry R-32, a refrigerant whose global warming potential ENERGY STAR puts at 675, where R-410A reaches 2,088.

The 7,000 + 7,000 BTU configuration on this page is a starting point, not an obligation. With a compressor of this size, you have room to choose, level by level, heads suited to each space among the compatible indoor units:

• ASUH07KPAS, 7,000 BTU, for a closed family room of modest size;
• ASUH09KPAS, 9,000 BTU, for a finished basement with a small office corner;
• ASUH12KPAS, 12,000 BTU, for the upstairs hallway that serves the bedrooms;
• ASUH15KPAS, 15,000 BTU, for a basement finished over the full footprint of the house;
• ASUH18KPAS, 18,000 BTU, for the open main floor, if you add a zone;
• ASUH24KPAS, 24,000 BTU, for the largest open area in the house.

This compressor feeds up to four zones. Two today means the basement and the upper floor; a third and a fourth can be added on the main floor or in a spare bedroom, without touching the outdoor unit. During the visit, we confirm the combination of heads with you based on the actual size of each room.

In a cottage, the installation plays out on two very different levels, and we treat them separately.

• In the basement: the head is mounted at the top of the foundation wall, and its refrigerant line exits through the rim joist, above ground level, out of reach of water infiltration;
• Upstairs: the head's refrigerant line runs down the exterior wall, in a line cover matching the siding colour, to the outdoor unit;
• Outside: the outdoor unit rests on a stand raised above the snow, on the side or at the back of the house, with clearance that lets the air circulate;
• Drainage: the upstairs head drains by gravity to the outside; the basement one, lower than the ground, connects to the floor drain or to a small condensate pump.

A dedicated electrical circuit runs from the panel, which is almost always in the basement in this type of house. Each head gets its own refrigerant line; there are no ducts to build and no ceiling to open.

The indoor filters of each head slide out of their slot without tools; a rinse in lukewarm water, as often as use calls for, is enough to keep the airflow up. The basement one deserves more attention, because a family room with carpet and pets loads the filters faster. In winter, you clear the snow around the outdoor unit after the big storms, and a refrigeration technician periodically checks the R-32 charge, the coil and the drains.

This system appears on Hydro-Québec's LogisVert list of October 27, 2026, with an amount of $1,180. We guide you through the application; the amount and the eligibility remain subject to the Hydro-Québec rules in force at the time of installation.

This 2-zone system is meant for cottage families who live a lot in the basement and sleep badly upstairs in July, for owners who want to cut the work of their baseboards without installing ducts, and for those who would rather start with two zones while keeping the capacity to add more. Wi-Fi is available as an option, handy for starting the family-room heat before the kids get home from school.

Saint-Hubert, all of Longueuil and the South Shore: two well-placed zones in your cottage

Call 514 316-2973 or request your free quote online. We go down to the basement, we go up to the bedrooms, we look at the panel and the yard, then we propose heads sized for each level. Holding an RBQ licence, AirGreen is an HVAC contractor and an AIRSTAGE Elite Plus installer; our crews install GENERAL AIRSTAGE and Fujitsu AIRSTAGE systems in Longueuil, Montreal and Laval, and likewise on the North Shore and the South Shore.

Before the visit, write down the rooms where you are cold in January and the ones where you are hot in July: that list is what we use to place the heads.