Furnace Repair in Philadelphia, PA
Furnaces here run from October through April. If yours quits, tell us what it's doing and a licensed contractor who covers Philadelphia County will get in touch.
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Seven months of heat wear on a Philadelphia furnace
From October through April your furnace is the thing standing between your house and a 27°F night. That is seven months of the burner lighting and shutting off, over and over, every day. Each start puts wear on the igniter and the flame sensor, and one of those two is usually why a furnace stops lighting.
Most homes here heat with gas, so when the power blinks off in a storm, the furnace goes down with it and needs the power back to relight on its own. Philadelphia County sees its share of winter storms and wind, and with 15% of Pennsylvania households losing power for a full day or more last year, a furnace that will not restart after an outage is a problem worth checking before the next cold night.
- 7 months
- October through April, your furnace is on duty
- 27°F
- the average winter night it heats against
- 70%
- of homes here heat with gas, so most furnaces here burn gas
- 15 winter storms
- in ten years, the nights a failure hurts most
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
A new furnace would cut about $120 a year off heating for a typical Philadelphia County home.
Estimates for a typical Philadelphia 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 this contractor's gas work before handing them that number, and the state keeps no record of what they know, only that they exist and are on the list.
Pennsylvania also does not let cities or towns set their own HVAC licensing rules, so there is no local license standing in for the state one either. On a furnace repair, the gas connection is the part that matters most, and no license here, state or local, is what stands behind that work. In Philadelphia County, 69.6% of homes heat with gas, which is the reason that connection is worth getting right.
Source: Pennsylvania General Assembly
- Why won't my furnace turn on?
- Start with the thermostat. Check that it's set to heat and the temperature you want is a few degrees above the room, since a dead battery or a bumped setting will stop the call for heat before it reaches the furnace. If the thermostat looks fine, check the switch on the furnace itself and the breaker it runs on. A furnace that still won't respond after that usually has a failed igniter, a flame sensor that needs cleaning, or a safety switch that's tripped, and a contractor will need to open it up to tell which.
- Why is my furnace blowing cold air?
- Most often the furnace is running the blower without a flame, so air moves through the vents but nothing is heating it. This happens when the igniter has failed, the gas valve isn't opening, or a safety switch has shut off the burner while leaving the fan running. A dirty filter can also cause the furnace to overheat and shut the burner down as a safety measure while the blower keeps going. Homes here need heat from October through April, so it's worth getting looked at rather than waiting it out.
- Why won't my furnace pilot light stay lit?
- The most common cause is a worn thermocouple, the small sensor that tells the gas valve a flame is present. When it wears out, it reads no flame even when the pilot is lit and shuts the gas off. A draft blowing across the pilot or a clogged pilot orifice can cause the same problem. Newer furnaces don't use a standing pilot at all, they use an electronic igniter, so if yours does, the fix will be different and a contractor can tell you which system you have.