• Please be sure to read the rules and adhere to them. Some banned members have complained that they are not spammers. But they spammed us. Some even tried to redirect our members to other forums. Duh. Be smart. Read the rules and adhere to them and we will all get along just fine. Cheers. :beer: Link to the rules: https://www.forumsforums.com/threads/forum-rules-info.2974/

Coldest night of the year, and the furnace goes out.

Melensdad

Jerk in a Hawaiian Shirt & SNOWCAT Moderator
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
Mine was acting up too.

It ultimately worked well enough, it never fully failed, but it was having problems. It would short cycle so the house was cooling off slowly as the furnace was not able to keep up because it would shut itself down.

On my furnace there is a condensation trap, that trap needs SOME water in it but if it over fills it stops the furnace. Mine kept filling up. After a couple of attempts of getting out the excess water I got it working properly and the furnace seemed to run properly.
 

tiredretired

The Old Salt
SUPER Site Supporter
We only had -6.2F last night. How cold did you guys get?

One thing about my two wood burners. It's all on me whether we have heat or not. I do the cutting, splitting, lugging for the cord wood, and all the lugging for the wood pellets. :yum::thumbup:

The Doctor told me I was in good shape. I told him I should be, its been a cold as hell winter up here. :yum::yum::yum:
 

Melensdad

Jerk in a Hawaiian Shirt & SNOWCAT Moderator
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
It was predicted to get to -27(F) here. It did NOT. According to WGN the official temp right now is -21(F)
 

NorthernRedneck

Well-known member
GOLD Site Supporter
Mine was acting up too.

It ultimately worked well enough, it never fully failed, but it was having problems. It would short cycle so the house was cooling off slowly as the furnace was not able to keep up because it would shut itself down.

On my furnace there is a condensation trap, that trap needs SOME water in it but if it over fills it stops the furnace. Mine kept filling up. After a couple of attempts of getting out the excess water I got it working properly and the furnace seemed to run properly.
That's what pissed me off with the furnace in my old house. It was a fancy new high efficiency furnace but kept cutting out when the vapor lines plugged up. Nothing but problems from day one. My other house had a 50 year old furnace that never once missed a beat.

Canadian eh!!!
 

tiredretired

The Old Salt
SUPER Site Supporter
It was predicted to get to -27(F) here. It did NOT. According to WGN the official temp right now is -21(F)

That right there is the temperature where my truck starts talking back to me and tells me to get my ass back in the house because we are going nowhere. :yum::th_lmao::yum:
 

Melensdad

Jerk in a Hawaiian Shirt & SNOWCAT Moderator
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
That's what pissed me off with the furnace in my old house. It was a fancy new high efficiency furnace but kept cutting out when the vapor lines plugged up. Nothing but problems from day one. My other house had a 50 year old furnace that never once missed a beat.
Agreed. This is one of those fancy high efficiency things. That water trap is a PITA. One of the HVAC techs showed me how to work around it several years ago, which has saved me a dozen service calls. Its an easy work around but by the time you realize what is wrong the whole house is cold. Worse yet it shuts down at night or while I'm not home. Literally 3 minutes to remove the panel, blow out the condensation trap, reattach the hose and reinstall the panel.

But damn :hammer:




That right there is the temperature where my truck starts talking back to me and tells me to get my ass back in the house because we are going nowhere. :yum::th_lmao::yum:
Yup, I agree with your truck.
 

bczoom

Super Moderator
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
Like TR, I run 2 wood burners. My furnace did kick on a couple times this morning but when it does run, I heard it and re-loaded the stoves. They struggle to keep the temp up at these temps but definitely great to have so I'm not relying on an electric furnace.
 

NorthernRedneck

Well-known member
GOLD Site Supporter
Our furnace in this house is a 20 year old mid efficiency without those stupid vapor lines. It hasn't missed a beat. Sometimes newer isn't always better.

Canadian eh!!!
 

Doc

Bottoms Up
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
This furnace is 20 years old. It's high efficiency but no vapor trap that I'm aware of.

Emergency call got our local repair guy here (Tony). He got us back up and running by 2am. By 2:30 it was getting close to comfortable in the house. Thanks Tony!!!!!!
 

Jim_S

Gone But Not Forgotten
GOLD Site Supporter
This furnace is 20 years old. It's high efficiency but no vapor trap that I'm aware of.

Emergency call got our local repair guy here (Tony). He got us back up and running by 2am. By 2:30 it was getting close to comfortable in the house. Thanks Tony!!!!!!

Glad you know Tony! :thumbup:
 

pirate_girl

legendary ⚓
GOLD Site Supporter
My son's furnace was supposedly acting up too yesterday.
After much panic, turns out it was the batteries in the thermostat needed replacement.
 

FrancSevin

Proudly Deplorable
GOLD Site Supporter
My house was a burnout when I bought it to flip. It was equipped with a "builder grade " just barely big enough for the house. The AC unit failed because of fire damage.

So we went without AC for 24 years and the furnace worked reliably the entire time. Then my grandmother moved in so we had a new high end unit installed with AC. It lasted five years.

We put in a new High efficiency unit and oversized it so it would last "forever."
Wrong. Three $1,100.00 fan motors later it went out the door in 6 years:hammer:

We are now on our fourth furnace and in the second year. So far so good. But we have two "Heatilator" wood burners, and 3 chords of firewood out back, just in case.:unsure:

We have a greenhouse on the south side which, with solar power and a small fan, can heat much the house during the day. But we haven't seen much of the sun in weeks. It has two electric heaters that currently barely manage to keep it above 40F.

I am so done with winter!!!!!
 

jwstewar

Active member
I feel your pain. Back in the summer our heat pump acted up on Father's Day. 95 degrees and no AC. So I had my buddy come over and he replaced the fan motor and 3 lbs of Freon. $500 later we had AC.

So Sunday I hear it buzzing funny just like it did back in the summer. I take a quick peak and it was all iced up. So I assumed something froze up. I flipped us over to emergency heat. Monday night it is now 50 degrees. I flip us back to heat pump and listen. I hear the same funny sound and walk out and take a look from the porch in the dark. I can tell the fan isn't running. Figuring it is the same issue. I call my buddy again. I tell him no big deal, we are on emergency heat. He is scheduled to come Tuesday. Tuesday morning Monica sends me the attached picture. The fan is wedged into the case. I text him and tell him no need for him to come, we found the issue. He said text him the model & serial numbers and look for fan damage. When I do that, I see the coils are chewed up by the fan. He is supposed to come today to look to see if we can fix it or if we are replacing.
 

Attachments

  • Heat Pump.jpg
    Heat Pump.jpg
    122 KB · Views: 24
  • scrapped coil.jpg
    scrapped coil.jpg
    46.4 KB · Views: 23

Doc

Bottoms Up
Staff member
GOLD Site Supporter
I think batteries in the thermostat were the root cause of mine (not sure at this point). I had not changed them in 10 years. Of Course they waited until the worst possible time to fail. Such is life.
 
Top