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Furnace Repair | Regular Furnace Maintenance Part 2
Welcome back to part two of the furnace maintenance series! In part one, homeowners learned how doing some simple tasks can help their furnace work more efficiently, as well as last longer. By doing some simple things every couple of months, or once a quarter, homeowners can often delay an unnecessary furnace repair. But part of your important furnace maintenance involved schedule an annual inspection.
This inspection will help troubleshoot areas of concern, but is also a great way to ensure component parts are functioning well, helping you have an efficient, functioning furnace. Most professionals recommend scheduling the annual inspection a month or two before cold weather sets in. July, August and September are perfect months. Don’t wait until the cold weather arrives to find out that your furnace needs work in order to function!
What Will Happen During Your Furnace Annual Inspection
The furnace professional will do a wide variety of things, not in any particular order. They will check the thermostat to ensure it’s working properly, and reflects the temperature accurately. If it’s not accurate, they will recalibrate it, which will go a long way in helping you to reduce your energy costs. Here is part one of the list of what your furnace professional will do at the annual inspection.
The professional, during Furnace Maintenance, will clean all the motor parts, and ensure they are properly lubricated. A furnace is a piece of equipment that will work virtually non stop throughout the coldest months of the year, so ensuring the motor and components are in great working order is important. While they do this, they will also be inspecting any component parts that may need replacement. Having this done yearly will help you avoid an untimely furnace repair in the future.
Check Ignition and Flush Drains
Checking the performance of the ignition and flame. This is to ensure that the furnace can cycle through it’s off and on functions properly. If not, this is a sign that replacement parts or repairs are needed. Sometimes, all that’s needed is to adjust the pilot valve, or replace the furnace ignitor. They will keep you in the know at all times what they are doing before they do it. The furnace expert will also flush drains and traps, as condensation can accumulate and impact the furnace’s ability to ignite. Water leads are also a sign of larger problems that will need a furnace repair, such as cracks, holes and loose connections.
Inspecting and Cleaning Venting and Blower
Venting is what ensures the furnace directs gas away from your house, via a flue pipe. Your furnace professional will inspect your furnace to give you peace of mind that there is unobstructed ventilation. Things that could obstruct ventilation include leaks that will be indicated by rust and water streaks, debris and even slopping. The furnace’s blower must also be removed, in order to be cleaned, then the furnace professional will ensure the run capacitor is functioning normally as well.
Furnace Repair | Tighten Panels and Check Controls
In order to avoid a furnace repair, the company that comes in for your furnace tune up will check to make sure that the unit panels are tightly in place. Panels that have moved with time can cause ineffective operation. A homeowner may hear rattling noises in the furnace when it’s in use, and these inefficiencies can actually cause your furnace to shut down.
In addition to that, panels that are not tightly in place can put your family at rusk for carbon monoxide exposure. The furnace professional will then check the safeties and controls of the furnace. The furnace has safety features build in that allow the furnace to turn itself off if the furnace starts to malfunction.
It’s imperative that the furnace company checks these important safety features. The most important one turning off the gas supply if heat is detected outside the burner chamber. During the tune up, they will also check the controls responsible for showing error messages. Furnaces with any error messages or safety features triggers will not turn on and must be manually reset. A furnace inspection and tune up will ensure these are all in place properly.
Checking the Flue Pipe, Heat Exchanger And Manifold Pressure
Just like a chimney, the flue is for venting the burning by-products from your house. For a fireplace, the flue will vent out smoke and carbon monoxide, for a furnace it’s the by-products of burning carbon monoxide. Checking the flue involves ensuring it has a proper, snug fit, so the by-products are appropriately vented out. The heat exchanger only needs a cursory inspection to ensure it’s problem free.
They will look for soot, cracks, noises and checking to see if there is a formaldehyde type smell. And the furnace expert will also ensure the gas pressure from the valve to the burners is functioning properly with the manifold pressure check.
Checking Air Openings, And Fun Extras During Furnace Maintenance
Your furnace will have vents on the outside of your house, and it’s return ducts in rooms, halls and stairwells. If any of the vents are blocked, then carbon monoxide build up can cause imbalanced pressure that makes your furnace run inefficiently. Therefore, the expert will inspect these vents and ducts to ensure they aren’t blocked, but if they are, they will unblock them.
They can get blocked or clogged by essentially anything including dust, pet hair, soil, insects, leaves, mold and pollen. Your furnace expert will also perform quick inspections on some very important furnace components. Checking these, especially if you have an older furnace can help ensure your furnace is performing optimally.
Things like gas pressure testing, combustion gas analysis, static air pressure test and temperature-rise assessment. If things are not working properly, your furnace pros will let you know, what’s going on with your furnace, and let you know options, such as fixing components, or if it’s time to start thinking about replacing this with a newer and more efficient model.
A Bonus Comes With Your Furnace Tune Up
A bonus for you is that your reputable furnace company is going to leave your furnace in immaculate condition. It’s normal for furnaces to develop a thin layer of dust, and not only will they take care of that, all the parts of the furnace they inspected will also be clean. However, if you want to help ensure that your furnace continues to work optimally, all you have to do is wipe down the surface of your furnace, and do a quick sweep or vacuum around it, whenever you replace the furnace filters.
And that will help your furnace pros, as well as help your furnace functioning fantastically, especially as we head into another winter season.
If you have not have your furnace maintenance in over a year, it is time to schedule this in. Inspections can help fix small problems before they get larger, and help ensure your furnace is working it’s very best. Contact the furnace experts at Hot to Cold and get an inspection and tune up, so you can avoid a costly and unnecessary furnace repair in the future. Call today to schedule your annual inspection!