furnace replacement

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Any central cooling going in?
Does the furnace have multiple heat stages?

I have never seen a flexible gas connector in my area for boilers, furnaces or hot water heaters. Not sure if permissible or not. Interestingly, in California (the land of earthquakes) they are REQUIRED.

Also I have always seen a rigid conduit bring electricity in to that required on-off disconnect switch on the side of the heater, rather than an exposed plastic-sheated cable.

Ah...lools like a piece of "transition" (old work to new worlk) ducting is fiberglass. Dees anyone fear particles of glass being blown off the ducts and into the air?

Thanks for posting this!
 
Hey,
strange to see that not only washers but also furnaces are determind by culture. You guys use mostly Hot air furnaces while we here (belgium) use more hot water and radiators... is there a reason?
 
Furnace types depend heavily on where you live. Here in the south, you NEVER see a hot water or steam system simply because it doesn't get very cold in the winter. Up north, there's a wide array of different furnace types, and due to the addition of the basement up north, they have a bit more flexibility in what kind of system they can use. Here in Texas, steam is TOTALLY out of the question since a basement is scarce as hens' teeth. Hot water systems are also not very practical. So forced air is pretty much standard down here. Gas is pretty common, but electric is far more the "norm" with heat pumps being phased in as pretty much the de-facto standard.

The old argument used to be that gas was more economical to operate since it was cheaper, but with the recent hikes in gas prices, it's actually cheaper to go electric. I know some friends around here who were shaking and shivering this past winter trying to conserve gas, and their gas bill alone was close to what I paid for my electric bill!
 
Strange thing the high cost of natural gas in the south. Perhaps related to recevering the cost of laying the pipes and minimal overall usage.

Askomiele:
1- Furnaces (heats air) are less expensive to install than boilers (heat water).

2- Much of this country needs central air conditioning. Adding a furnce to exisitng ducts is inexpensive.

3- In terms of fluids, (defined as something that flows, i.e. water and air) water is a much better medium of heat storage and transfer than air is. Therefore pipes can be 1/2 an inch (say 1.25cm and up). Ducts however have to be MUCH larger to hold and move a similar amount of heat. (Figure 4 inches round or 100mm round, jsut for argument's sake). It is MUCH easier to add hot water heating to a very very old buidlng that doesn't have central heating than it is to add warm-air heat with ducts.

4- Some of our structures are stand-alone deteched buildings in remote locations (summer homes, winter fishing cottages, etc). Without hydronic (hot-water) heating systesm, there are fewer pipes to freezes when the home is desired to remain unheated during the winter.

5- Zoning or leaving certain rooms unheated (or partially heated) is still not all that popular in certain areas. So the benefits of a quickly zonable hot-water system are not enough to outweigh other concerns. Zoning warm-air systems is a PITA (pain in the @$$).

Sorry you asked? *LOL*
 
If you need help with the dip switch setting on that, let me know.. I am able to help out.

Are you matching up a two stage stat to this furnace?

How many BTU was the old one, and new is?
 
I have acutally seen homes in south Florida (HOT CLIMATE) that had natural gas. The clothes dryer and the hot water heater(hot water for the taps) were gas. They are located in the garages and the extra heat generated is not a concern. Stoves are electric (gas is WAYYYYY too hot to cook with in hot and hot/humid climates). Here is the strange part. Heating tends to be electric coil resistance heating. Here is the logic. For the 5 to 10 days PER YEAR heat is needed, the cost (dollars and cents) of adding a true gas furnace is not worth it. Of course if I had my way I'd be sure to insist home-buidliders had to install (i.e. must intall ) a heat-pump or a gas furnace instead. (GO GREEN!)

The good thing aobut electical uses in hot climates is that it tends to be steadier year-round which results in fewer spikes in cost, such we see in my area with expensive eletricty. All that electrical generating equipment needed in summer sits idle all winter.
 
RJ is having a geothermal heat pump installed with a household hot water loop. Lots of digging in the front yard for four ground loops.

The school in my hometown has either hot water or steam heat. Boiler with radiators in some classrooms, floor pipes in others (I remember the floors being warm). The air conditioning (which was added long after the original construction) did not include forced-air heat. Of course, being that I haven't been in the school for some years, I don't know if the heating system has since been changed.
 
If you look at a world map, you'll see that Europe is considerably further north than the United States. If you drew a line across the globe Chicago is on the same latitude as Rome. This could explain why you have more radiation type heat over there.
 
There is also the thought that warm-air systems pressurize the house and can force air into or out of the space beig heated, reducing overall efficieny.

Today's in-floor radiant systms claim greater efficiencies for (lack of) this and other reasons.
 
If the installers knew anything about what they were doing when the system was installed, there is no net pressure on the house at all since the intake can only suck in so much air compared to the exhaust blowing back into the rooms.

That said.....that ASSumes that you got a COMPETENT installer when the system was designed. I think we all know what that means in today's day and age....
 
Air, water, electricity and people take the path of least re

Yes agreed, but simply closing a door in a room when there is no "return" vent in it can cause such a situation.

One of the ways to reduce "draftiness" is to put a return in every room, rather than have one large centrally-located return-air vent.
 
An alternative to a return vent in each room (which is not possible in a slab foundation house) is to make the gaps under the doors bigger. This house was actually designed well in that regard, every door is 1.5" off the floor to allow plenty of airflow out of the room. Not a single door in this house has any suction on it when you close off a room. Can't say the same for the rest of the houses in the area....

Of course the downfall to the design of this house is the horrendous job they did ducting! There's so many restrictions, angles, and kinks in the ductwork that one AC contractor suggested the unit is working at less than half-capacity due to the airflow loss! One of my projects for this fall is to reduct this entire house......properly!
 
I' see if I can answer the questions since the new furnace is in

same air conditioning but may have to replace it at some time

The blower went out and with the age of the furnace it seemed the right thing to do

Yes it is 2 stage with a 2 stage blower

No 2 stage stat just a plain stat with 4 buttons
100000 btu not sure what the old is
 
100k furnace? How many sq ft is the home?

I would suggest upgrading the t-stat to a two stage tstat, that way you get longer run time with better comfort.

Not a good place to put that style of humidifier.
 
I believe they have installed your humidifier on the wrong duct. It should have been placed above the furnace where the heated air would "dry off" the humidifier pad.
 
Actually either duct will do in most cases. This to me looks like the type that sucks air in via a bypass duct (supply to return or return to supply) pulls it over the humidification pad and then admits the air into the return air duct.

Although this type doesn't (appear to)hold any water in a reservoir, it does depend on running water to spray the top of the humidification pad. Not sure if uses more water than a tradtional drum-wheel convered by absorbent material that turns in a reservoir.

Perhaps the most interesting humidifer I have ever known to exist is the Honeywell brand that boils water to create steam. Never seen it in use, though.

http://yourhome.honeywell.com/Consu...rs/Professionally-Installed/Steam/Default.htm
 
The 2 April Aire humidifiers we had put in the new house are on the return duct side with a vent connected from the output side. This way the heat blows thru the humidifier and air goes down to the blower. The humidifier is hooked up to the hot water supply for more moisture output. They work very well. Mine are not fan forced. That was the next step up and I didn't want to deal with the noise of the fan. It looks like the one bpeter has the fan built into it, that would be the reason for the noise.
Jon
 

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