High Efficiency Furnace Problems

[Bultaco]

We have a 5 year old Keeprite, high efficiency heating furnace that incorporates a Honeywell SV9541 Smartvalve 'under the hood'.

For three or four days now, we've awakened to under-65 degree temperatures in the house in spite of the fact that the programmable thermostat was calling for a 71 degree "Wakeup" temp.

When I take the front cover off the furnace, there is a small green light flashing on the Honeywell valve. It flashes twice, then is off for a couple of seconds.......and repeats this pattern non-stop.

There is a small slider switch on this valve that, if I slide it to the "other" position, the furnace fan comes on high temporarily. Once when I did this, the burner actually kicked in....I returned the switch to 'normal', closed the panel and things were good all day.

Yesterday, (after waking to no heat) I turned off all power to the furnace (at the main breaker), then back ON...and THAT, for some reason caused the burner to kick on. I had removed the door first, though, and saw that the Honeywell gizmo WAS doing it's two flash display.

In both cases, once the burner has fired and the furnace appears to be running normally, the green light goes into a "heartbeat-like" mode: thumpa, thumpa, thumpa; never really off.....just a bit brighter every second or so.

So here's the big question: is that double flash on...off that the light signals when the furnace ISN'T running some kind of error code.....saying it's pooched/broken/in need of replacement/adjustment/cleaning???

Thanks for any tips/tricks/advice. Michael

------------------------------------- Mike

[Eric in North TX]

Like a car that cranks but won't start, it is waiting for something. You apparently supplied it when you messed the switch. Has it worked better since you reset the computer by turning off the power? I had a similar problem with my Carrier, the service co never could figure it out, I finally diagnosed it as a dead spot in the little blower in front of the fire box. Too bad it was out of warranty by then.

[Peter]

Ain't Google wonderful. I googled "Honeywell SV9541" and the first hit provided useful information. Look at this link:

At the bottom of the page you will find a list of literature to download. The second item, instructions to install the SV9540, is probably worth your time. I know the instructions are for the 9540, but realize that Honeywell has put it at the bottom of their page for the

9541, so the same instructions probably pertain. Starting on page 16 of the pdf, there are charts describing how to interpret the troubleshooting LEDs. There are different charts depending upon which other equipment is being connected to the valve. You didn't specify, so there's no way to know which if any of the charts might match your circumstances.

Friendly thought for the day: This process took me about 1 minute to research on the web. If you have difficulty with technical stuff to the degree that you did not try to do this web research yourself, you might want to reconsider if you want to mess with the gas supply hardware yourself. A mistake could cost you your house or even worse!

[bultaco]

Thanks for your support, Steve and Eric.

(Not sure where that Stormin Mormon guy is coming from??..but he sounds like he?s got issues.)

My furnace has been running OK for the last several hours; it seems to not like being off for the time between the last call for heat (I have the sleep time set for 11:00 PM on the thermo) and the morning call for heat (Wake 7:30). I guess it doesn?t like being out of action that long or something.

I'm thinking I'll keep Googling to try to find a reference to that flashing light. Got a feeling it's trying to tell me something. (anybody know about Honeywell 'error codes'?) Mike

------------------------------------- Mike

[Tony Hwang]

Hi, First thing you should do is to get the meaning of trouble code. The code chart is usually stuck on inside the cover of furnace or if you have manual it is there. Two blinks means what? When it acts up you should turn the furnace power off to reset the control logic, then turn the power back on and read the trouble code.

[Roy]

om...

=3D=3D So what can one do when your only high-speed ISP does not support "NEWSGROUPS"?...or only a few selected ones? I have to use a web-based interface like google. =3D=3D

[Bob Villa]

Amen, brother!

[ransley]

.com...

I got here through google, I see the real problem is spam, not questions

[clare]

Not true. There are more than 77,000 news groups active at this point in time. Many ISPs carry only a small portion of those. (Eternal September carries only roughly 55000) Vast majority don't cary any Binary groups, for instance. Many only carry "local" groups - not carrying those based outside the country or catering to outside the country (french, japanese, german, etc) They only subscribe to the groups their clients want to subscribe too, and those that will not get them into trouble either with their subscribers, their national governments, or morals "police"