Furnace Frustrations

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Originally Posted by emmett442
When your furnace was "shutting down", silly.

Did I incorrect y assume that your furnace stayed lit after it shut down?

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It shut down after the high limit temperature switch shut it down but it had flame before that...
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I feel your pain. I have a ~2012 'pilotless' Aire-Flo that likes to malfunction at the beginning of EVERY holiday weekend like clockwork. It's 54.7° in my house right now....

I'm not an old man, but I'm absolutely firm on saying...

NEVER again will I choose a furnace without a pilot.
This thing has been headache after headache.

And ALWAYS have two or more DIFFERENT sources of heat. Aside from my main gas furnace, I have an old school gas wall unit. Prime it and press ignite button. Instant heat. Old school.
Old school never seems to let me down. The room it's located in is a toasty 70°
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Originally Posted by emmett442
Nope. Not the high limit!

Pressure or rollout, if vent pipe was a confirmed fix. Not high limit.

Round and round we go!

So the tech that replaced it under warranty and the problem didn't go away until they changed the air intake pipe was wrong then? Ok. I'll get off the bus here.

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I don't think you have a clue what he replaced or what the diagnosis was.

"BLAH BLAH BLAH INTAKE PIPE BLAH BLAH SWITCH BLAH SOMETHING SOMETHING" might be about as much as you can remember.

No big deal. My memory isn't always the best, either!



See ya!
 
Originally Posted by emmett442
I don't think you have a clue what he replaced or what the diagnosis was.

"BLAH BLAH BLAH INTAKE PIPE BLAH BLAH SWITCH BLAH" might be about it.

That's probably why you had to hire him, after all.



See ya!

I didn't hire him the Furnace was under warranty. I had no choice but to go with what they said because it was on their dime under the 10 year parts/labour warranty.
And seeing as it fixed the problem (replacing the intake pipe with a larger diameter one) after the high-limit temperature sensor didn't fix the problem, and seeing as it hasn't returned in 6 years I'm going to side with them.
 
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Originally Posted by StevieC
Originally Posted by emmett442
I don't think you have a clue what he replaced or what the diagnosis was.

"BLAH BLAH BLAH INTAKE PIPE BLAH BLAH SWITCH BLAH" might be about it.

That's probably why you had to hire him, after all.



See ya!

I didn't hire him the Furnace was under warranty. I had no choice but to go with what they said. And seeing as it fixed the problem and it hasn't returned in 6 years I'm going to side with them.



No doubt it's fixed. Sounds like 6 years was too long ago for you to remember the details, though!

I thought you were leaving?
 
Yeah I didn't remember them replacing a high-temp limit sensor and 2 days of no heat until they figured out the intake air pipe and redrilled the hole through the side of my house and then removed and installed the new section of piping right?
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As for leaving.. thought you were too...

Originally Posted by emmett442
See ya!


It's a holiday here for me so I got all the time in the world if you want to keep the crazy bus in motion...
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Originally Posted by StevieC
Yeah I didn't remember them replacing a high-temp limit sensor and 2 days of no heat until they figured out the intake air pipe and redrilled the hole through the side of my house and then removed and installed the new section of piping right?


Huh. So the limit switch (if that's what was actually replaced) was replaced but wasn't the solution.

Go figure! How could that be? Maybe it was a... incorrect call...and the limit switch had nothing at all to do with the problem???

Lots of poor HVAC techs out there.

We're done here now, right? Just asking because you were the one a while back that indicated you were done. Yet you keep coming back for more!
 
I'm done if you are... 6 years and the problem hasn't returned with air intake being bigger and this was after it was shutting down with the limit switch being replaced and that not correcting the problem. The furnace has been untouched since then other than filter changes and the humidifier I installed.
 
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Getting it going could be as simple as setting the thermostat blower switch to "ON", which will force the blower to run at high (A/C) speed, and then turn on the heat. If it keeps working you know it's blower/airflow related. My Lennox actually has a dual purpose limit switch that turns the blower on & off AND functions as a high limit too, will shut everything off if there's not enough airflow, but the blower part can be bypassed as I said above. It's possible to lose the low speed blower motor winding but still have high usable.
 
Not an expert here but about 13 years ago I had a problem with my furnace that was unusual. Brand new furnace/house. Dead of winter and below freezing outside. Furnace would attempt to light a few times and finally stop. Wait 1/2 hour and try again. This would happen all night but repair itself during the day.
 
like cars + oil newer is NOT always better. i live in the coal region but many are converting to gas as the new lines are being installed. i added a Harman coal stove 10 years ago + it heats my house on less than 3 ton yearly aka $500 when its colder, moderate weather i shut harman off + fire the oil monster $$ as i am on the same chimney. i need nothing but air + coal for heat but a blower helps circulate heat, god bless simplicity + reliability. i realise many elderly need automatic heat but anyone else can have cheap reliable coal heat or even wood if your really energetic!!
 
Right above the burner section there should be a silver metal box 2.5" x 3 .5" . If it has a cover on it just squesse the long sides and pull. Their you fing a round disk with numbers on it and in the slot there are three tabs. Left is fan off middle fan on right is high limit. So the fan on has to turn on before limit trips and you can watch it operate dial will turn. Do not manually turn dial. If you want to change any setting have to hold the dial wbile moving the little tab. If theres a fan switch on the thermostat you can turn the fan on till the serviceman gets there.
 
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Originally Posted by Fitter30
Right above the burner section there should be a silver metal box 2.5" x 3 .5" . If it has a cover on it just squesse the long sides and pull. Their you fing a round disk with numbers on it and in the slot there are three tabs. Left is fan off middle fan on right is high limit. So the fan on has to turn on before limit trips and you can watch it operate dial will turn. Do not manually turn dial. If you want to change any setting have to hold the dial wbile moving the little tab. If theres a fan switch on the thermostat you can turn the fan on till the serviceman gets there.
That's exactly what mine has, there's an audible click when it moves enough due to heat to kick on the blower-but if the blower doesn't move enough air, the dial will keep on moving to shut the furnace down.
 
And I'm back. Between snow removal and dealing with the furnace guy I wasn't able to check back in.
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Someone mentioned the intake/exhaust piping. We had a problem many years ago with the pipes being too small so they're 3" until right before they hit the furnace and they transition to 2". When this first started I also checked the pipes and they were clear as far as I could see.

Fortunately, the furnace failed when they were here this time, and acted exactly the same way it's acted whenever I described the situation to them. But they were able to check additional things now and it looks like we're getting new control boards. We'll see what happens after that.
 
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First visit the guy says that the draft inducer had water in it and that was affecting the system.


Assuming I understand what a draft inducer is, (is that the integrated exhaust blower motor)?

I have been battling random problems with my furnace. When I turn off the furnace switch (I don't think it cuts 24V transformer as I can hear faint buzz of it even with the switch off). The furnace also has switched outlet to which electrostatic filter was initially hooked up. I moved that to constant power and have a night light hooked up to the switched outlet which tells me when the main blower turns on.

My furnace problems are listed below and they seem to happen after running fine for close to 12-24 hours but after turning off that switch and turning it back on, it works for next 12-24 hours.

- I come back in the evening and I notice I am getting room temperature air. The main blower is on but the burner is not on. At this stage doing anything at the thermostat does nothing. The thermostat as fan auto/on and heat on/off. Changing those button does NOT turn off the blower. I reset the furnace switch and turn it back on and watch
- draft inducer starts running
- I see the glow inside the window
- Now I see the burner flame light up
- in 15-30 seconds, I see my night light turns on and then I hear the main blower coming on along with the electrostatic filter indicator light
- I have heat now for next 12-24 hours

- One morning, heat is again at room temperature. I reset the switch. See the glow inside the window and see the burner flame light up for couple of seconds and immediately shuts off. At that time I noticed that the on-demand water heater (just installed about a month ago) was supplying hot water for the shower use upstairs. Couple of resets while the shower was going did not work for the furnace. Once the hot water was not providing the water, the furnace stayed lit. At that time, I was convinced that I have some gas pressure problems and put a call back to the plumber who had installed my on-demand water heater. I just assumed that when water heater was running AND then furnace needed to *fire up*, it had trouble but if it were already running, it kept running.

- I had the plumber come in and I tried to simulate the fault by having the shower turned on and asking the furnace to come on. The furnace fired up fine. Plumber opened up the furnace cover (he is NOT in the HVAC business) and noticed funny sound from that "draft inducer". He also showed me water drops coming under the inducer (motor/blower) assembly and the connection where it hooked up to the exhaust pipe and suggested to call for service. "May be the drain is clogged", so I removed the tube connected to the inducer and forced air through it. I don't think I noticed any restriction.

- after removing the bottom furnace cover we noticed some of the dripping water was coming down to the connectors and circuit board area and on the floor. The plumber says "may be you cleared the block; watch for next day or two and see if you are having still problems and if so call the service"

- Any DiOxit spray recommendation on the connectors that I see could have had water droplet?

- There is obvious "add drop of oil here" type of hole on the draft inducer motor and I am not even sure I want to even do that.

This is Trane XE90 furnace. As you can figure out, I have no idea what are the technical terms for the doodas which are in the typical hot air furnace but Emmet seems to know his stuff and I and am hoping he will give me some clues before I throw in the towel and call for service. But with the intermittent and non-reproducible problem, I need to be able determine the failing part myself. I would not change it myself but at least would know that if they replace it, at least it will stay fixed.

I was going to start a new topic last week myself. Sorry if I hijacked OP's! I have got much thicker skin, so go ahead and go at it.
 
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Now I am in the habit of closely listening to the start up and shutdown sequence. I just noticed that this time blower missed coming on the 1st try. I checked the window, the burner was on and the night light was OFF and the blower was OFF. After waiting for almost a full minute, I saw my night light and blower came on.

What component/sensor/actuator decides to turn on for the blower and is that the same one which will eventually call to turn the blower off? I believe that one is flaky on mine and needs to be replaced before giving up completely.

I would appreciate if somebody can explain this to me.
 
Just had mine fixed today. Any wild guesses? Nah, you'll never guess.

Of all things, the FLOAT SENSOR was my issue. Yes, I typed it right and said the correct part. The A/C float sensor was killing power to the furnace, no water involved! Air pressure was forcing the sensor to lift and kill the safety.

Screw these systems. I'm going old school af in my next place. Maybe even wood burning stove.
 
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