Hi, I am considering 98% AFUE modulating furnace to replace over 18 year old Carrier mid-efficiency furnace. Please, anyone has experience with this York furnace? One more question, is OK mating it to Carrier a/c unit? TIA
I have an Affinity 93% furnace. It is a lot better than the 30 year old one that it replaced. The biggest problem I have with it is that the blower is noisy. It runs noisy and it is noisy starting up. Starting up it makes a kind of a squawking noise, then just general blower noise. I could wish that it was quieter, particularly since the closet is right next to my bedroom.
Bill
Belt drive? I'd check the tension and maybe put on some belt dressing to eliminate the startup noise. I'd also check to see if it can run at a slower speed and still do a proper job for you.
Not likely a belt drive in a 93% AFUE furnace.
For Tony's question, don't have any experience with York. But I wonder how much more the 98% modulating furnace costs than one a step down, say 94%. I'd wonder about the increasing complexity, more things to go wrong, cost, etc vs a little improvement in efficiency. In particular I don't see the need for an infinitely variable moduating furnace. It would seem two stage gets you most of what you're gonna get anyway. I guess if you're not paying anything much for it and you're not worried that it may be more complex than a simpler system to diagnose, fix, etc. then maybe it's OK. I went through that analysis couple years ago and went with 2 stage, 94%.
Hi, I am thinking the same way after looking around and talking to my BIL (commercial HVAC engineer) Off the bat Carrier performance series 2 stage with ECM blower is a grand less to begin with. When we did the manual J, my need is 98,000 btu so I am going for 100K btu with little room to spare. Litle lesser cost, another 500.00 or so is Goodman.
I settled on the 2 stage non condensing furnace when I replaced mine back in August 2003. It has the "variable speed" DC blower and 2 speed inductor fan.
The furnace guy I got it from went over the numbers with me, and the difference between the condensing and non-condensing furnace, in my house, given the amount of gas used over the previous years with the
30 year old original furnace, would take about 20 years to pay for in fuel savings, and that is assuming no problems with the technology. His SWAG was the new condensing furnace would be requiring repairs in 20 years costing more than the fuel savings, while the non condensing furnace should still be running in 25 years.Within 2 years the inductor fan was noisy. It was not the motor, but the hub of the blower wheel was loose on the "web" of the squirrel cage.Squealed like crazy, particularly when starting up on high. A new unit was a few hundred dollars and not in stock, so I brazed the joint between the hub and the web and it has been silent ever since.
The fuel savings between the old and new furnace were modest at best
- and the better efficiency of the DC blower meant a bit more heat was required from the gas burner - so our gas bill did not change AT ALL - but the electricity cost was reduced significantly (our blower runs on low 24/7 - even without heat or A/C running)
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