Poor Furnace

It's a little funny to say we were fortunate (in my opinion it was a huge blessing) to have our furnace go out this week. Why is that a good thing? Because this week the temperatures were above freezing. If it happened last week we would probably have some pipe damage to go along with the poor busted furnace.

It started in the evening, when I felt a bit cold, so I turned the thermostat up four degrees. I heard the furnace start making noise and thought nothing of it until Dan pointed out that the furnace kept just starting to make noise and blowing some cold air around and then turned off. Over and over again. We were a bit nervous about a problem with the gas, so I kept sneaking upstairs after we turned the furnace off and the thermostat down, but I didn't smell anything funny.

So, the next day I called and got an appointment for 2:00 in the afternoon. I enjoyed the warmth of the car heater and the warmth at work. Then I bundled up, headed home, and sat in the cold until the fellow showed up. He started up the furnace, waited for it, and then told me the igniter was broken. So, hooray, it could easily be replaced!

I then quized him all about my heater (yeah, getting my money's worth or something). I found out how the furnace works, including some of the safety mechanisms built into the furnace control board. And now I know what the igniter is. It's that thing that glows white hot an then lights the gas.