Rite Tech Services

Last heating season, we had a total of 634 service calls for furnaces only. This does not include boilers and electric air handlers. I tallied up the service call problems and here are the top 5 results. It may help you to prevent some of these service calls.

1) Dirty flame sensor: cleaning of a dirty flame sensor should be part of any yearly maintenance service. They seldom go bad. When they do go bad, it's because of a cracked based or broken terminal which is insanely rare.

2) DIRTY AIR FILTER: A dirty air filter can/will cause the furnace to trip on high limit. On many furnaces, it will cause the furnace to "lock out" on safety after a certain number of trips on high limit, requiring the furnace to be manually reset. A dirty air filter can wreak havoc on any system and cause un-imaginable damage to other components.

3) Broken ignitor: The ignitor is the source of ignition that ignites the gas to provide heat to your home. The most common types of ignitors in our area are silicone carbide ignitors. These go bad over time which is one of the many reasons I only install Rheem/Ruud furnaces because they don't use this type of ignitor. They are the only manufacture that uses a direct spark ignition (metal rods instead of a silicone carbide element) which is super reliable. Less than a 0.02% failure rate over the life of the furnace.

4) Broken draft inducer motor: The draft inducer motor is responsible for inducing air into the burners for the combustion process. Sometimes, a foreign object gets stuck in the flue pipe or chimney, hindering the operation of the draft inducer motor. Most times, they just go bad. Some manufactures are worse than others. Carrier seems to build the poorest draft inducer motors than all the other manufactures. Followed by Goodman being 2nd worse.

5) Dirty evaporator coil: a dirty evaporator acts like a dirty filter. It doesn't allow air to be exchanged in the heat exchanger area. Keep it clean by assuring that you are using the correct filters and replacing/cleaning them periodically.

PSA:

Don't forget to replace your furnace filter!

Not only does it save on energy costs, but it also prolongs the life of your equipment. A dirty filter is like a blocked artery and nobody wants that. 😁