HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical in Contoocook, NH

The village at the covered bridge

Contoocook is the main village of the town of Hopkinton, in Merrimack County, wrapped around the Contoocook River just up from Concord. The river runs through the middle of the village past Fountain Square and under the Contoocook Railroad Bridge, the oldest surviving covered railroad bridge in the country, first built around 1850 and rebuilt on its granite abutments in 1889. The 1849 depot beside it is a museum now. Many homes near Main Street and the depot went up before central heat existed, which means their walls, plaster, and mechanical systems were never designed for what we ask of them today. We work on those homes for a living, and we respect what makes them worth keeping.

Old oil heat against a Hopkinton winter

Winter here is long and hard, and a lot of Contoocook homes still lean on oil-fired boilers and furnaces that were oversized decades ago by rule of thumb. An oversized system short-cycles, wastes oil, and leaves rooms in an 1800s farmhouse cold at the far end. We run a real load calculation on your house as it stands, insulation, windows, and all, then size the replacement to match. Before the first hard freeze we service what you have: clean the burner, test the safeties, check the tank and lines, and bleed the zones. A boiler that fails at zero degrees off Fountain Square is an emergency we would rather prevent than answer.

Cold-climate heat pumps for antique homes

Modern cold-climate heat pumps hold real heat output well below zero, so they fit a Contoocook winter far better than the units of ten years ago. For the antique village homes near the depot that have no ductwork, ductless mini-splits mount without tearing open horsehair plaster, and they cool and dehumidify through our humid river-valley summers on the same equipment. Sitting in the Contoocook River valley, these homes get muggy in July, so we size for latent load, not just temperature, and set the equipment to pull moisture instead of just chilling the air. That keeps a stone cellar and a first floor dry, comfortable, and free of the mildew smell humidity leaves behind.

Wells, arsenic, and hard New Hampshire water

Water in Contoocook splits two ways. Homes in the village precinct run on treated municipal water, while houses out toward the back roads and the hills draw from private bedrock wells, and no one tests those but you. New Hampshire granite gives up arsenic, radon, manganese, and hardness into well water, and USGS studies put roughly one in five NH private wells over the arsenic limit, all of it invisible and tasteless. We test for the full New Hampshire panel, then build treatment to the result: arsenic removal, a softener for hardness, and radon or manganese stages where the numbers call for them. You get water that is safe to drink and easy on your plumbing.

The Contoocook River and a wet basement

The river that names the village also floods it. The 1936 and 1938 hurricanes drove Contoocook water into the Merrimack and led the Army Corps to build the Hopkinton Dam in 1962, but homes on the river flats still sit over a high water table, and spring freshets and winter ice jams push groundwater up through old fieldstone foundations. A sump pump is your front line, and a sump with no backup fails on its one big test, because water peaks in the same storm that takes the power out. We install sumps sized for real storm volume, add battery or generator backup, and fix the grading and drainage feeding the problem.

Fuse boxes, knob-and-tube, and careful rewiring

The antique homes around Fountain Square and Main Street were wired for a few lights and a radio, and many still carry a 60-amp service, a fuse panel, or live knob-and-tube behind the plaster. That is not enough for a heat pump, an EV charger, and a modern kitchen, and it is a fire risk on older insulation. We upgrade to a 200-amp panel and rewire in stages, fishing new cable through existing bays so we protect the historic plaster, trim, and wide-board floors that make these homes worth owning. When you want a car charger, we run a dedicated EV circuit sized for the panel we just built, done to code and inspected.

When the lines go down

Ice storms and nor'easters take out the overhead lines through Contoocook regularly, and an outage that lasts days is not rare here. For a home on the river flats, losing power means losing the sump at the exact moment groundwater is rising, so the outage and the flood arrive together. A whole-home standby generator solves both: it starts on its own within seconds, runs on propane or natural gas, and carries the heat, the well pump, the freezer, and the sump until the utility is back. We size it to your actual house, set it on a proper pad, wire the automatic transfer switch, and handle the permit and inspection.

One call instead of five

Most Contoocook homes need heating, water, and electrical attention that all tie together, and chasing three or four separate contractors around Hopkinton wastes your winter. High Ground is veteran-owned and runs its New Hampshire branch out of the Concord area, with HVAC, plumbing, and electrical under one roof, so one call covers the boiler, the well treatment, the panel, and the generator. We come same day where we can, pull the permits, schedule the inspections, and stand behind the work with a lifetime workmanship guarantee. You get one number to call and one team that already knows your house and this village.

What we get called for in Contoocook

The work that comes up most around here. Same team, same guarantee, whichever one you need.

• Water Treatment - Cleaner, safer water for your whole home.
• Generator Install - Keep your home powered no matter what.
• Boiler Repair - Restore heat fast with reliable service.
• Heat Pumps - Repair or replace modern heat pumps.
• Furnace Repair - Restore heat fast with reliable service.
• Panel Upgrades - Boost home power and improve safety.
• Oil-to-Gas Conversion - Upgrade your home to use modern, efficient fuel.
• Water Heaters - Repair or replace tank and tankless units.

Worth reading before you call us in Contoocook

Our own research, sourced and dated, on the problems that come up around here.

• What's Really In Your Tap Water (And What You Can Do About It)Your municipal treatment plant was built to solve 20th-century problems. The list of things that end up in the water supply has changed a lot since then. Here is what the research actually says, and what you can do about it at your own house.
• PFAS: The Forever Chemicals In Your WaterNearly half of U.S. tap water contains PFAS, the federal deadline just moved to 2031, and four of the six regulated compounds are proposed for rescission. Here is what that actually means in New Hampshire, Maine and New Jersey - and what removes them.
• Chlorine Byproducts: When the Cure Creates the ProblemChlorination is one of the great public health achievements of the last century and I am not going to argue against it. But the chlorine reacts with organic matter in the water and makes something else - and your hot shower is a bigger exposure route than your drinking glass.
• Microplastics: What We Know and What We Do NotMicroplastics are in tap water, bottled water, food, air, and human blood and placental tissue. The WHO says current levels do not appear to pose a health risk. Both of those statements are true. Here is how to hold them at the same time.

We also serve near Contoocook

Same team, same guarantee, a short drive away. Find your town for the local details.

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• Concord, NH
• Goffstown, NH
• Hooksett, NH
• Allenstown, NH
• Francestown, NH