If you had doubts about your furnace at the end of the last winter season, you need to schedule maintenance sooner rather than later. You don’t want to turn your furnace on for the first time in the fall only to find out that it has something major wrong and you cannot get your home warm.
If you think you may need furnace repair, prioritize the service well before heating season so that you have peace of mind that your furnace is in the best possible condition for the fall and winter seasons. You can keep reading to learn more about the ways that you can tell that your furnace needs to be checked out by an expert technician.
Lack of Heat
If it seems like your furnace was not keeping up with your heating needs toward the end of the season, that’s a red flag. Your furnace should provide consistent heat over its entire lifespan. You shouldn’t have to set the thermostat higher and higher to keep your home comfortable. If you do, something may be wrong inside of the unit that is preventing it from heating your home adequately. A maintenance appointment can get your furnace back to working at its best.
Unusual Sounds
Your furnace will make some sounds as a part of regular operation. However, those sounds should never be particularly loud or startling. When your furnace is operating to heat your home, you can pay attention to the sounds you hear so you are familiar with what’s normal and what is not.
If you begin to hear any persistent clicking, knocking, or rumbling, give our team a call to check your furnace out. It’s always better to stay ahead of problems and fix them before they have a chance to spread further in the system. Otherwise, you might be left with an even more expensive repair bill and a more complicated problem.
Bad Odors
Some people think that a furnace producing bad odors is completely normal, but it isn’t. The only time you might smell an odor coming from your furnace is when you first turn it on for the fall and winter seasons. After your furnace sits unused over the spring and summer it may produce a stale or musty odor for the first 15-20 minutes that it’s on.
Outside of that timeframe, unusual odors are a sign that something is wrong. It’s possible that you have mold or mildew growing somewhere in the system. If you have a gas furnace, an unusual odor could mean something is going wrong with the combustion process that needs to be fixed.
Heater Staying On
It’s also a problem if your heater turns on and stays on for too long. Your furnace should cycle on and off to heat your home at regular intervals. If it is staying on for too long or turns on and off frequently, something is probably wrong with the igniter.
Your heater may not be producing enough heat, or a safety function is forcing it to switch off before a heating cycle is complete because something is wrong. You may be tempted to let your furnace continue running if your home is so comfortable, but this is just adding undo wear and tear that will shorten its lifespan.
Thank you for choosing Ace Hardware Home Services. Call us today to schedule an appointment for air conditioning service.