Heat Pumps and Electric Heating - heat pump problem?

my goodman heat pump is doing something funny and I'm not sure if its normal. When its cold the outside unit will sometimes stop running, but i can still hear a humming sound like a motor. Then it will start back up and make a sound like its releasing a bunch of air, and a bunch of steam will rise up out of the unit. Is this normal? Also i'm not sure if its blowing warm enough air. It is currently 30 degrees F outside, and I have the thermostat set at 67. I have been measuring air temperature coming out of the vents, and it is as follows. When i first cranked the heat up and the auxillary heat strips came on the air coming out was about 102 degrees F. When the heat strips turned off the air coming out was about 86 degrees. Then the thermostat turned the unit off. When the unit came back on without the heatstrips this time, the air temp was about 68 degrees at first and got up to about 86 degrees towards the end of the cycle. Does this sound normal?

Defrost mode is the one with the noise and steam. It is OK and will happen about once an hour. The air temperature seems pretty close too. It will usually be about 20 degrees warmer that the room temp. Yours is close.

Ken

All sounds good! When the fan stoped on the outdoor unit it was in defrost.