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Fun With Furnaces

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  • Fun With Furnaces

    You know the story, it's 5° outside, the furnace is running, the house is nice and warm, everything's just dandy. Then.., at 2 o’clock in the morning it takes a shit! Well that's what happened to me last night. I was dozing off around 2am, and noticed the furnace sounded funny not HA HA. Our furnace ain't no spring chicken. I 'thought' it was a 1989 model, but after cleaning the label I noticed it was installed in 1985,.. uhhh 31yrs ago. So, I busted out the tools and a multimeter, and stayed up most of the night tearing it apart and troubleshooting it. The induction motor would kick on, but I didn't hear the ignitor relay clicking, and the gas valve was off. I searched Google & Youtube, found out how to test the components, and came to the conclusion that the ignitor module/pilot control had gone south. I was able to manually light the furnace with a BBQ lighter so we'd have heat for the rest of the night. Today I called my friends brother who has an account at a local supply house, and ordered the part through his company. My friend, who did HVAC work with his father for over a decade, helped me wire in the new control module. It took us 3hrs to figure it out, but I have a warm house again. Those guys saved my ass on this one..

    Here's what we had to deal with...

    The furnace: Lennox G16R down draft unit circa 1985. It's been a good furnace.



    The failed ignitor module: Johnson Controls G600-AX1. It lasted 31yrs so I can't bitch too much.



    The replacement 'universal' ignitor module/pilot control: Honeywell S8610U. It cost $115 and did the trick.



    The finished product: We found a 'safe' place to mount the new module, extended a bunch of wires, and had to wire it 6 ways from Sunday to get it to fire.



    My friend gave the furnace his blessing, he says it should be be ok for the rest of the season. I'm very fortunate that I got off cheap, and didn't get butt raped by a HVAC repairman on this deal. My friend said they likely wouldn't fix the furnace, and would've tried to sell me a new furnace for sure. In the meantime I'm gonna start looking at new furnace/ac units.

    It's time....
    Last edited by tardis454; February 11, 2016, 10:02 PM.

  • #2
    Glad that worked out for you. Much better to have to buy a furnace in the summer.
    Previously HoosierL98GTA

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    • #3
      I hear this every time, no matter how new the furnace.. or what the problem is. I had a complimentary service done for AC coil cleaning since we smoke in the house. "There's rust, you need a new heater". I heard this the first year after mine was installed - they do love their sales pitches.

      Dad's is pilot-less piezo ignition and LOUD. I have a fairly new Trane and it's never made noises like his ... TICK TICK TICK TICK TICK TICK FLoowoooosh (heat). If the thermocouple doesn't get hot enough quick enough, it turns off the gas and does a retry a few seconds later. I keep waiting for the house to go up. It's got some kind of proximity sensor too I think because it waits until I'm standing near it to do it. lol.

      Flying south, with a flock of bird dogs.

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      • #4
        Why is it they always puke in the wee hours of the morning?

        $115 repair = major win in my book. Good job, and it's cool of your friend to help out like that.

        Beags, you would have loved our old oil burner.......the pump must have kicked on slightly before the arc would light. BOOM-WHOOSH! Great fun when a guest was in the chair right above it.
        Last edited by STINEY; November 2, 2016, 06:35 AM.
        Of all the paths you take in life - make sure a few of them are dirt.

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        • #5
          We have electric heat (AC is generally more important here) so no funny noises. We just had an unvented heater (LPG) installed in ME's studio and that little bugger works great with no moving parts though you have to be careful not to gas yourself (so far so good). While it has a blower it works just fine without it and we now have a place to go and stay warm in the event of a power failure as I don't do well if I get cold. It doesn't solve the issue of the plumbing freezing but our outages rarely last more than a few hours.

          It's great that you got this sorted out and for not a ton of money, Kudos to your buddy for helping out a friend - that's a REAL friend right there. My understanding is that if the firebox isn't cracked you essentially have a safe furnace and the rest can be fixed.

          Dan

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          • #6
            wee hours is the cold shot, just before dawn.

            I remember in this very town I am in.. the battle of materials just for the draft gave an odor like it was burning. started at 15 below.. we into the 30s... below. Fuel gelling, pumps failing.

            Those big furnaces, they can go a long time. Looks like you got some modern guts on the tricky stuff already. I would not scrap it.

            I rented a lpace in bangor maine that used the big old heavy 1940s iron values for a tiny 1gph per hour beckett furnace mounted to the front...

            a mobile home burner creaking the old 1940s cast iron heaters with some hot steam.

            That is something that can change on yours I could guess. The precision of fuel delivery...just like cars.
            Previously boxer3main
            the death rate and fairy tales cannot kill the nature left behind.

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            • #7
              Been there done that twice in my old house. One time it was about 9pm on a Friday night. We were in the midst of a very cold spell and were just about to leave for the weekend. Call a friend up who was also a HVAC guy. I needed a thermocouple. Luckily he had a spare. After that I made sure I had a spare right by the furnace!
              Tom
              Overdrive is overrated


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              • #8
                I had furnace issues a few months ago at my "up north house"
                which was built 10 years ago.. of course the builder put in the
                cheapest thing out there... while the wife and I were up there
                hunting I smelled a little "hot electrical smell" so I went down
                to check it out... the furnace was still working... later that
                evening it quit.. the induction motor took a crap.. I called in
                the morning about getting one... I had a guy come out and put
                it on... all better... 3 days later.. the furnace craps out again..
                this time I was checking it out and seen the circuit board is
                fried..(this is the 4 board on this thing).. I called a Lenox dealer
                thats local and got a price on a whole new furnace installed..
                they got it in and installed 2 days later.... the problem on the
                old one was mice.. pissing and crapping on that board which
                was laying flat on the bottom of the cabinet.. I asked if they
                had a 100% sealed unit... they did and thats what they installed
                and I found where the mice were coming in.. corrected that
                and put out decon for the little bastards...all is much better now
                and I can feel at ease because we are only up there about 4
                months out of the year.. so I damn sure didnt want the place
                freezing up

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                • #9
                  Tardis, I would get out the mop bucket, place it next to the water heater. Then, buy new 9 volt batteries for the smoke detectors and get the ladder out of the shed. Do all this before going to bed tonight, just in case.
                  BS'er formally known as Rebeldryver

                  Resident Instigator

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                  • #10
                    The furnace we grew up with made such a racket, it scared the daylights out of us kids. We would be down in the basement, doing whatever kids do when suddenly a loud "POOF-WOOF" would scare the bejesus out of us and we would go running upstairs, screaming bloody murder. Poor Mom. It was always a fight to get one of us to run downstairs to the pantry for her.

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                    • #11
                      Just replaced my water heater. It STANK Electrical melting stink!
                      The "spare" (6 months old) is not enough! Guess I'm getting another.. Would love to tandem them..

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                      • #12
                        Originally posted by Scott Liggett View Post
                        Tardis, I would get out the mop bucket, place it next to the water heater. Then, buy new 9 volt batteries for the smoke detectors and get the ladder out of the shed. Do all this before going to bed tonight, just in case.
                        The mop bucket is next to the water tank (we store it there), I put new 9v batteries in the detectors a few months ago, and there's a ladder in the garage next to the man door.
                        Why do I need that stuff Scott? You think our house is gonna burn down or something?

                        The furnace is working good so far. It lights up much faster now, and the heat seems a lot better now to since I cleaned out the burners.

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                        • #13
                          I used to build, sell and install HVAC systems.... so this advice comes from that... you will save more money in a year with a new, efficiency gas furnace then you spend on a new, gas furnace. Bonus is the firebox on those tend not to last more then about 20 years - so you won't die of carbon monoxide poisoning.
                          Doing it all wrong since 1966

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                          • #14
                            Originally posted by SuperBuickGuy View Post
                            I used to build, sell and install HVAC systems.... so this advice comes from that... you will save more money in a year with a new, efficiency gas furnace then you spend on a new, gas furnace. Bonus is the firebox on those tend not to last more then about 20 years - so you won't die of carbon monoxide poisoning.
                            I'm aware of the Lennox Duracurve heat exchanger issues. It appears that it's been replaced once already according to the service sticker on the furnace. Maybe under warranty? I don't know. As I said earlier my friend did HVAC work with his father for a decade. He inspected the heat exchanger and said it looks fine. There's always been a CO detector located about 2ft away from the furnace since we've lived here for that very reason. I'm looking at new furnace and ac units right now, but I won't have the money for them until summer.

                            I appreciate the concern and the information Aaron, thank you.

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                            • #15
                              Originally posted by STINEY View Post
                              Why is it they always puke in the wee hours of the morning?

                              .
                              It runs longer, harder at night, when it's colder..

                              115 bones wasn't bad..
                              I had to replace my furnaces 2 years ago..
                              The iron monster built in 1934 finally said, nice knowing ya..
                              New one is 1/4th the size.. but doesn't throw off any heat... the basement used to be nice and toasty, not anymore..

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