Re: Modern Chinese Architecture

On Oct 20, 3:30 am, PaPaPeng <PaPaP...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Thu, 18 Oct 2007 15:47:59 GMT, PaPaPeng <PaPaP...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
(and I have a dead furnace to fix soon.)

REPORT 1: On Fri, 19 Oct 2007 07:55:09 GMT, PaPaPeng

<PaPaP...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Then I checked the electric box and as Edwin Pawlowski said in this
thread, voltage is low. It's not enough, only 14volts... why?
I've no clue, because I don't have much knowledge of the topic.

I had the same problem for a week now, pilot light on but no flame.
Then after some heroic fiddling around I have flame but have to turn
it off by hand, that is turn the regulator control from gas ON to
PILOT to shut off the main burners. As luck would have it the fall
weather turned really nice after an early near freeze. Therefore I
was no longer under the gun to fix it immediately. If I needed heat I
just turn it on long enough to warm up. I'm mostly at home all day
and night so there's no problem of anything (water pipes) freezing up.

I'll go straight to the things you can check out. In my case the
final problem was that the insulation for 24Vac wire leads to the
upstairs thermostat had baked hard and cracked. 25 years next to the
hot burner section of the furnace does that. It shorted taking out
the old style mercury switch thermostat. I'll have to replace that.
These are no longer available, mercury is a harzardous material under
current regulations I shall get a non programmable electronic
thermostat. I hate the programmable type as I can never remember how
to reset them for daylight saving time for example.

1. Go check all your wires and replace any that seem less than prime
condition Check that the 24Vac transormer and measure the voltages to
ensure they are all there. Measure the voltage output yourself. The
14V reported by your service guy doesn't sound right. The label on
your regulator should specify this (24Vac). If so replace with a 24
volt unit.

2. In case your thermostat is shot go to the furnace regulator and
disconnect one of the two thermostat wires on the regulator terminal
assigned to the thermostat. Then jumper the disconnected terminal to
the transformer (ie close the circuit without passing through the
thermostat.) If the burners fire up you have a bad thermostat.
Replace.

Correction. Do this jumper test first as this is easy to do.

3. Give the gas regulator a good thump with a rubber mallet. This
may loosen a stuck valve if that is the cause of your problem. That's
what the service technician did. It didn't solve my problem but
that's something you can do yourself and check it out.

4. Call your gas company emergency service to check out your furnace.
I was so freaked out by the horror servicemen from hell stories (eg
yours) that I resisted calling one. My gas company ATCO Gas of Canada
has a wonderful 24 hour emergency service. They came for all my three
calls (long story) within 3 hours.

4:1 The first call was when I lost my hot water heater flame too after
having shut off the gas supply to work on the furnace. The darn heat
regulator switch wouldn't turn far enough for me to reset ON the
safety shut off. All it required was to pop off the swich cover and
turn the switch stem by hand. He had too many calls and wouldn't work
on my furnace. No charge.

4:2 I couldn't for the life of me budge the gas regulator with a big
wrench to unscrew and replace it. I dared not use more force as the
burner manifold was already starting to twist and I dreaded breaking
anything. So I made another service call. Voltage checks OK. Good
thump didn't loosen stuck valve. Said I would have to replace the
regulator. I was too muddled to take up his offer to do the job then
and there. (I found out in 4:3 that it would have cost me only around
$5 more than I paid for a new regulator) I told him my problem with
uninstalling the regulator. He did it for me. I'll buy the new unit
and install it myself. No charge.

4.3 Bought a new regulator $183 incl tax and installed it. No main
burner flame. Voltages checked out OK. I had already spent enough
effort and time to have lost track of my trouble shooting steps and
options. Called ATCO Emergency Service. Guy came. Spotted crappy
thermostat wires. Did the jumper thingy. Saw burn marks on
thermostat dial. Problem solved. 30 minutes. No charge.

No high pressure sales from any of the three service guys to buy
unasked for equipment.

=================================================
From your post there won't be much youcan do besides the electrical
checks and the big thump. At least you will be satisfied that if its
a regulator problem swapping in a new regulator is the only fix a HVAC
guy can legally do. Phone up your gas company's emergency service and
find out what services they provide. The three different guys I had
were the most pleasant and helpful guys I have come across. They
didn't bat an eye when I told him my attempts at repairs and my intent
to replace the regulator myself. This gave me confirmation that what I
did was not some dumbfool thing.

Their emergency service is to restore gas service and simple fixes for
home gas fueled equipment - furnaces, water heaters, fireplaces. If
your installation needed major work requiring a tradesman to correct
that's not his job and he'll advise you.
================================================

I went to the appliance parts store to get a replacement regulator
before attempting to do any fancier repairs. My gas regulator model
is found inhttp://www.amresupply.com/category_view/H/HK,21,3 model
identified as SKU V800A1161.

The parts supplier can only sell the complete factory assembled unit,
no sub assemblies. By law he cannot sell any unit that has been
disassembled and reassembled. Once installed (used) he cannot take it
back for a refund. The service technician says the same thing. He
can only check the voltages and connections or change a whole
regulator. He cannot open up the regulator to do repairs. He doesn't
even know how the parts inside work though like me he must have opened
up a scrapped one to self educate. I shall write this up in due
course on what's inside and decide for yourself if you want give parts
repairs a shot.

Actually its quite simple. On the bottom of the regulator are four
long screws. Undo them, the cover plate (has smaller parts) and the
bottom half assembly should come loose (jiggle it) to expose a
teeter-totter assembly. The rubber valve at one end of this assembly
covers a gas orifice. Mine was slightly stuck and popped open when I
took off the bottom assembly. Had I not been alert I would have
likely missed noticing the stickiness. Not that it matters since
loosening it is the idea. The other subassemblies of the regulator
are very simple, non moving and built like a tank. They won't wear
out. There's nothing to repair. Messing with them will likely
introduce problems that were not there originally. All parts are
keyed to prevent incorrect reassembly.

If you ever do major work like I shut off the main gas supply and the
electrical power to the furnace before working on it. Shutting the
gas off for an extended period causes the safety shutoff at the
regulator next to the gas meter to set. Very little gas flows into
the gasline. The dinnerplate sized gas regulator has a center stem
(like a mushroom stem) Unscrew the thimble shaped cap at the tip. It
will reveal a metal stem. Pull on it and it will feel like popping a
suction cup. This resets the safety and lets the gas flow into the
line again.

REPORT 2:

On Fri, 19 Oct 2007 07:55:09 GMT, PaPaPeng <PaPaP...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

No high pressure sales from any of the three service guys to buy
unasked for equipment.

My game plan was if the estimate from a repair guy exceeded $500 I
would toss out the existing furnace and install one of those high
efficiency ones myself. Mine looks new (well maintained) but its
already 28 years old thereabouts. When the heat exchanger tubes give
out, as they must some day not too far into the future, they will no
longer be replaceable . By law the stores are not allowed to to stock
them as replacement parts or sell any. Same with that $183 regulator.
If faulty, replace only, no repairs.

Now if you HVAC guys can say this nicely, that your hands are tied by
law (be prepared to show printed copy to customer) and give a best
effort to do the simple fixes first, then perhaps you will get a much
less hostile reaction from your customers. Explain what you did in
repairs and why they didn't work. Gas fitting is not brain surgery
that only HVAC guys can understand. Explain the problem solving
procedures so that the customer knows they were something he could or
could not have done. We all want to save a few bucks and this
knowledge will satisfy the homeowner that its better to call you for
fixes he'd realise as beyond his abilities.

Then give them the "bad news" a $3000 replacement or some equally
shocking figure. Give them the name of your supplier so that they can
check on prices. And also the opportunity to select a particular
model. The customer expects to pay you something extra and reasonable
as a markup for you to order and deliver the hardware for them. And
to get rid of the old one. You charge service fees accordingly. The
dollar amount won't be pleasant. But an honest breakdown of the costs
that the customer can check on avoids a lot of unwarranted suspicions
and bad impressions.

I went to a major appliance parts supplier store and they had a number
of furnaces on display including the high efficiency ones. The panels
had been removed so it was easy for me to make a close inspection of
its assembly modules and installation requirements. To install a high
efficiency furnace is a lot easier than to service one. Specified PVC
ducting for the air intake and burner exhaust. The gas connection and
the electrical connection. That's it.

The new furnaces are shorter than the old gas furnaces. A transition
plenum will be needed to connect the shorter) new furnace to the
existing hot air plenum. My intended adaptation will be to instead
make a steel stand to raise the furnace to the existing plenum. That
way the bottom of the furnace will be off the floor and free from any
dampness or standing water. My existing furnace is resting on spare
aluminium bath door tracks and its free from rust and grime.

I chatted with the store personnel and they didn't bat an eye on my
intent to do the installation myself. In fact they gave a lot of
pointers on things I should do, such as resizing the hot water heater
exhaust vent (to a 4 inch liner) as my existing stack will be too
large. I found the same information in the installation manual. But
I still appreciated the information as it gives me the right
information to make my installation plans in the meantime.

The basic high efficiency furnace model is $1300. I can budget for
that.

REPORT 3:

On Fri, 19 Oct 2007 05:02:02 -0700, Justintime

<justintime4...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
The guy I trust the most said 60,000 btu but I had others that
recommended 90,000. What are the implications of undersizing/
oversizing. Is a manual J calc absolutely necessary or is a trained
eye who is familiar with the neighborhood construction able to tell
from experience.
Any feedback is appreciated.

Look at the labels inside your current furnace. There should be a BTU
rating somewhere. A close BTU match for your new furnace is what you
atre looking for.

I just posted this in the follow up to a "no burner flame" problem in
this newsgroup. Go to a major HVAC parts supplier in your city. Ask
all the questions you have and also get a pricing for the equipment
they charge everyone. Take a good look at their display model and get
a good idea of the work involved. The dispaly model I inspected had
an installation manual. Read that. That's all the required
installation work the installer can do. Anything more or less can be
a code violation.

I don't know enough to tell if one manufacturer has >$400 worth of
technology over another. If you look inside to inspect how the
furnace is constructed its hard to discern where one manufacturer
could have make significant design differences to warrant that price
premium. I'd go with the lower priced one.

REPORT 4:

On Fri, 19 Oct 2007 09:55:04 -0700, pawlowsk...@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:

As for the water heater, I don't know what kind it is. I don't think
you can vent it through the same PVC, even if it's a power-vent type, and
if it's an ordinary heater it will need to use the chimney, not PVC.
Is the contractor you are using, who recommended the liner, the one
you "trust the most", as mentioned below?

Should the high efficiency furnace be installed then the PVC pipe
intake and exhaust for this furnace must be entirely separate runs and
nowhere near the hot metal flues. I am convinced about the high
efficiency claim because the waste gas coming out at the furnace
plenum is cool enough to put one's hands around them. In the old
style furnaces that will be too hot to touch and that's waste heat
going up the flue. In fact keep the PVC piping as far away from the
current exhaust's stack on the roof to avoid the PVC intake sucking in
poisonous exhaust gasses. My preference will be to run the PVC
through a side wall to reduce the run length and the convenience of
just making two holes through the floor joist instead of running them
through the first floor, the ceiling and roof. And I will have to do
this in a way that the PVC pipes won't intrude into the decor of the
house insides, keep a respectable distance from the hot water exhaust
flue........ too much of a hassle all round.

My hot water heater's 4 inch flue is connected into the main 6 1/2
inch flue for the furnace. This is made of galvanized steel *** and
too hot to touch when the burners fire up. The now disconnected
from the old "no longer there" furnace 6 1/2 inch flue will certainly
be too large to vent just the heater waste. It will likely risk
having hot water heater exhaust gas blown back into the basement (or
the rising hot exhaust may drive a convection current up the flue thus
drawing useful heated air from the basement??). The installation
manual recommendation is to run the 4 inch flue all the way up through
the roof as a liner inside the 6 1/2 inch pipe. That way you don't
need to do any major work cutting through though the ceiling, roof,
flashing, etc. You cannot run the PVC piping up the same 6 1/2 flue
as the hot 4 inch flue will melt the PVC pipe. I have a high and very
steep roof and the run is equivalent to two floor lengths. It worth
to me the $250 asked for the labor and materials. The material cost
is minimal. The other contractors may have included this in their
quote without identifying it as a separate item. This modification
should be mandatory. It would be a negligent for a installer to omit
it and force the homeowner to correect the omission at a later date.

As for BTU calculations it takes only a grade 8 qualification to enter
a Trade Apprenticeship program. Doing math is not a strong skill. I
can understand their reluctance to provide the math. The current
furnace should give a strong feel as to whether its undersized or
oversized. Go from there.

====================================

That was an excigting way to spend a week. No heat. Near freezing
nights. Working on gas that if I made a booboo may well blow up the
house and get me killed. But now if my furnace acts up again I can
fix anything. If it needs replacement, I think the present one is
good for at least another 10 years, I also know exactly what to do
and maybe be still physically healthy enough to do it myself by then.

Now I have that rear deck to build before snowfall.

I wonder how many people within SCC read through all these
instructions.

For the do-it-yourselfer, if you didn't do it right, you gonna be dead
of carbon monoxide in the morning.

For the rest of us, we call the repairman and pay him to do the job
right.

.