Now this should be enough of a warning to shake all of us off our duffs and down to the hardware store to pick up a new furnace filter.
My wife and I just bought a new home. Everything seemed to be working fine and the previous owners had signed off that everything was working up to expectations. We signed the papers and started moving in. After we got in and it started to get cold we fired up the furnace. I use to work on commercial heating systems and I remember noticing that there was no filter on the furnace. I had also noticed that there was an old central air conditioning unit around the side of the house, even though this was not mentioned on any paperwork (I had actually noticed it before we signed the papers, but was told that it did not work and was not hooked up).
Once the furnace was lit I noticed that it did not seem to put out a lot of air. I also noticed that it seemed to just run and run even when the house was nice and toasty (usually from the sun, not the furnace). Its been long enough since I worked on heating systems that I decided it would be best to call an expert. It helps to have a friend in the business. He came in and took a look at the system. He had to remove a subpanel and basically climb into the ductwork, but he finally found the problem.
It seems that the central air conditioning unit was not hooked up, but the coil was still in the system. That would have been fine if the previous owners had used filters. But since they did not, and apparently operated the furnace this way for years, the coil had acted as the filter. Consequently, the coil had filled up with dirt and dust and was completely clogged up. We had to pull the coil out, and to do this we had to disconnect the gas and invest about 3 hours worth of labor. All of that work and headache could have been avoided if the previous owners would have just used filters as the manufacturer recommends.
The story is not completely a sad one. I called the real estate agent and bemoaned the fact that the owners had signed off on this and that it was obviously their fault. They called the sellers at their new home and they sent us a check to help cover the costs.
Go To Page: 1 2
The copyright of the article That pesky furnace in Home Repair is owned by . Permission to republish That pesky furnace in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
