
Originally Posted by
Gemini
Do all these HE furnaces have motherboards on them. I have heard if something goes wrong with the motherboard that it is very expensive to fix.
My brother is a trained gas fitter and got involved very early on in home efficiency and works in Ottawa for the Federal Government setting standards for energy efficency of appliances, furnaces and wood stoves amount other things.
He found that the original gas efficency standards set in the 1980's assumed that regular gas furnaces were 60% efficency and manufacturers touted that their mid-efficency furnaces were 80 to 90% efficency. That means you could realize a 1/3rd reduction in your gas bills. Many people complained that they only found a 10% reduction but this was caused by 3 factors.
First, the gas usage costs are only part of your bill so the fixed costs see no change.
Second, further testing of old furnaces with improved testing methods found many old furnaces to be up to 70% efficent, not the 60% baseline
Third, many new mid-efficency units when tested had lower efficiencies than advertised. The difference between the old and new was as much as half the spread.
Therefore the payback is far longer and with cheap gas prices, even longer again.
I agree with the computer board issue.
My parents 1,400sqft bungalow home had a 1965 FlameMaster furnace that she had regularly checked by the gas company. They were told that the new furnaces were not worth the cost so she kept hers until they found a cracked in the exchanger.
She bought a new Lennox mid-efficiency furnace in 2001. Her gas bills only marginally improved.
A few years later the furnace konked out because of a fried $700 board
In the next three years the furnace ate two more boards for a total of $2,100 in parts and about $450 in service.
Shortly afterwards she sold the house so I do not know the further history.
Suffice to say, any improvement and cost savings in efficiency were gobbled up with the high price of maintain the furnace.
The old one in 36 years only needed new filters and was still on the original v-belt.
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