Furnace Repair in Norristown, PA
Furnaces here run from October through April. If yours quits, tell us what it's doing and a licensed contractor who covers Montgomery County will get in touch.
Tell us about the job
It takes about a minute.
Norristown furnaces run long hours in real cold
Your furnace has to run October through April here, seven months out of the year. On winter nights averaging 25°F, the burner is cycling on and off most of the night to keep up. Every one of those starts puts wear on the igniter, and a worn igniter is the reason a furnace won't light at all.
Most homes in this area heat with gas, so when the power goes out, the furnace goes down with it even though gas keeps flowing. The area has recorded 35 winter storms and 351 damaging wind events over the past ten years, and across Pennsylvania, 15% of households lost power for 24 hours or more in 2024. A furnace that was working fine before the outage may not restart on its own once the power comes back.
- 7 months
- October through April, your furnace is on duty
- 25°F
- the average winter night it heats against
- 52%
- of homes here heat with gas, so most furnaces here burn gas
- 35 winter storms
- in ten years, the nights a failure hurts most
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
A new furnace would cut about $130 a year off heating for a typical Montgomery County home.
Estimates for a typical Montgomery County home, compared with an older unit built to the previous federal minimum, from EIA household energy data, Pennsylvania fuel prices and NOAA climate normals. Your home will differ.
Repair makes sense when one part has failed and the heat exchanger is sound.
Replacement makes sense when the heat exchanger is cracked or the furnace keeps needing parts.
Pennsylvania requires contractors to register with the state.
That registration puts the business on file with the state and nothing more. Nobody tested the contractor's gas work or checked their furnace repairs before handing it out. Pennsylvania also keeps this uniform. No city or town in Montgomery County can layer on its own HVAC license, so the registration is the only state-level record that exists here.
For a furnace repair, the part that matters most is the gas connection. A mistake there is what turns a repair dangerous. Registration does not test for that and does not cover it. In Montgomery County, where more than half of homes heat with gas, that gap sits on nearly every furnace repair job. The registration confirms the business exists. It says nothing about the gas work itself.
Source: Pennsylvania General Assembly
- Why won't my furnace turn on?
- Most often the thermostat isn't calling for heat the way it should, or power isn't reaching the furnace. Check that the thermostat is set below room temperature and has fresh batteries if it uses them. Next check the furnace switch, which looks like a light switch near the unit, and the breaker at your panel. If those are fine, the igniter or a safety switch inside the furnace may have failed, and that's a job for a contractor to diagnose.
- Why is my furnace blowing cold air?
- A furnace blowing cold air usually means the burners aren't lighting even though the blower is running. That points to a bad igniter, a clogged flame sensor, or no gas reaching the burners. It can also happen right when the furnace starts a cycle, since the blower kicks on before the air has had time to warm. If cold air keeps coming the whole time it runs, don't wait on it. Nights here average 25°F through the winter, and a furnace that won't heat needs a contractor's attention soon.
- Why won't my furnace pilot light stay lit?
- A pilot light that won't stay lit is almost always a thermocouple problem. The thermocouple sits in the pilot flame and signals the gas valve to stay open. Once it wears out or sits out of position, the valve reads no flame and shuts the gas off, even with the pilot burning right in front of you. A draft blowing out the pilot or a dirty pilot orifice can cause the same thing. A contractor can test the thermocouple and replace it, which usually settles the problem for good.