Furnace stopped working - looking for suggestions

[Jim Sullivan]

We woke up this morning to discover that the furnace hasn't come on and, after some investigation, I'm unable to determine why, so I thought I ask the experts in this group to provide whatever insight they have.

Furnace is approximately 7 years old, manufactured by Payne (Model PG8, manufactured in 1998 according to the serial number). Thermostat is a Honeywell Programmable. Problem was noticed when we realized that the thermostat was not showing any information and had no power to it.

What I've done:

Checked circuit breaker to Furnace. No circuit breakers in the panel were blown and resetting the circuit breaker didn't change anything. I don't have anything to check the power line to the furnace, other than a multi-meter and I'm reluctant to use that to test for 120 VAC.

I pulled the cover off the thermostat and checked for the presence of 24 VAC between the Red wire and the Common wire (blue wire). No indication of any power.

Checked where the wire goes from the furnace to the thermostat, looking for

24 VAC between the Common wire and the Red wire. No indication of power.

Pulled the main cover off the furnace and after taping the blower door switch down, checked for 24 VAC on the control module. No indication of power.

Check the 3amp fuse on the control module board. Looked good and multi-meter confirmed this.

At this point I'm at a loss with what to do next. My guess is that the control module is blown or the transformer is not working. Can anyone suggest anything else I could do before Monday, when I'll hopefully have a heating guy come out?

Thanks!

jim sullivan

[m Ransley]

Did you pay your gas bill. You dont know if 120 is going to the furnace?

[Bob]

See if you have 120 volts on the primary side (going into) of the transformer. If so, see if you have 24 volts on the secondary side (coming out) of the transformer.

[Jim Sullivan]

Snip!

Problem solved! In investigating the no power problem, I discovered that in the power box, therehad been a short as some point in the past, probably recent.

I was appalled by the quality of the electrical work inside the furnace. It seems that this is a replacement furnace (done before I became the homeowner) and when they installed it, the didn't bother doing the electrical right. The original electrical wire was too short for the new furnace, so they just used wirenuts to splice a new section to the old section to make it long enough. This splice is not protected in any way and when I took the wirenuts off, I could see that they wires hand't been twisted together at all. So no real mechanical connection to keep the wires together, just the wirenut. But there was power to that point. Follow the new splice into the power junction box and discover lots of soot, melted plastic for the wirenuts and the hot wires all burnt and such.

It seems that the hot wire somehow shorted to the frame, causing a small fire that burned the wires and eventually caused the wirenut to melt, causing the wires to separate and the power to the furnace to be disconnected.

I cleaned up the wires, re-did the wiring and we've now got heat in the house!

Thanks to Bob for his suggestion to check the 24 VAC output, it caused me to think harder about the power situation.

jim sullivan

[Bob]

I'm glad you got it fixed, however if the wire nut was inside a junction box, I think that's perfectly legal.

[Red Neckerson]

Woke up this morning the house was cold Checked the furnace she wasn't burnin' Went out and hopped in my old Ford Hit the engine but she ain't turnin' We've given each other some hard lessons lately But we ain't learnin' We're the same sad story that's a fact One step up and two steps back

Bird on a wire outside my motel room But he ain't singin' Girl in white outside a church in June But the church bells they ain't ringin' I'm sittin' here in this bar tonight But all I'm thinkin' is I'm the same old story same old act One step up and two steps back

It's the same thing night on night Who's wrong baby who's right Another fight and I slam the door on Another battle in our dirty little war When I look at myself I don't see The man I wanted to be Somewhere along the line I slipped off track I'm caught movin' one step up and two steps back

There's a girl across the bar I get the message she's sendin' Mmm she ain't lookin' too married And me well honey I'm pretending Last night I dreamed I held you in my arms The music was never-ending We danced as the evening sky faded to black One step up and two steps back

[Bob]

Have you tried alt.arts.poetry?