Great night for the furnace to quit...

[quarryshark]

Its 6 degrees out now and our stupid furnace dies. Try and find a repairperson on a Sunday night.
I guess the kids will go to grandma's house and I'll try to kick up the gas fireplace for the first time in 6 years.
This will sure put the aquarium heaters to the test.

 

[alarmguy66]

Makes me glad both the 180 and the 20 are in a room with a wood stove. Wouldnt be the first time ive used wood heat to keep the aquariums warm.

Might want to wrap the aquariums with blankets, as silly as that sounds. It will help. Newspaper taped to the outside will help as well.

Good luck

 

[QTOFFER]

I wish I could e-mail some heat to you, quarryshark. If you insulate the tanks with a blanket, it should take the strain off the heaters.

 

[reefrunner69]

Good luck...we'll be sending warm thoughts.

 

[lando]

Bummer Kut. Might want to throw a blanket over the tank to insulate it a bit. You can also float jugs of warm water in your sump to help things out. Why not send the kids to Grandmas and you and the wife have a little private party curled up by the fire? Stay warm...Lando

 

[loganj]

What a drag. I went through that last year...my gas furnace quit about this time. Secondary heat exchanger sooted up due to a broken vent line (dog got under the house). Have you ever noticed that most of the problems in my life are somehow related to my darn dogs!? Took me a couple of weeks to get the needed parts and get it repaired. I found, during that time, that I couldn't heat this big, old, leaky house with just the wood stove. Wish I was close enough to come check it out for you...I know it's impossible to get someone out on a Sunday night.

 

[quarryshark]

I have replaced the blower motor and circuit board on this thing more than once. Its some kind of switch on the board, it keeps clicking but won't start up. I think its time for replacement.
Got the gas fireplace going, the family room is toasty (more than I can say for the rest of the house) and the kids are already curled up snoozing, they spend the day sled riding so they are wiped out. As for my tank, it is in the basement (should stay OK down there) with 2 heater, the UV cranked and I put the glass covers back on. It should be Ok.
I may not be on the computer too long, the temp is the office (upstairs) is already down to 48 degrees.
Hey, the pioneers did this all winter long, I think we can handle a night or 2.
Thanks for the support and allowing me to vent a bit.

 

[William]

Be careful that your fireplace has propper venting, don't want any unpleasent and dangerous gasses hitting you while you sleep.

 

[quarryshark]

Thanks William and thats a good point. Its a gas fireplace with an electric motor for venting. I alreast checked the vent outside, it is clear and doing its job. We also have 2 good CO2 detectors and I've placed them both in the room.

 

[TomK2]

Could have been worse. You could have been away, and come home to water pouring down your driveway from all the freeze broken pipes in the house. This just happened to me. Pipe on 2nd floor burst, water cascaded downhill to the main floor, basement and garage. It was the Ice river in the driveway that tipped off a neighbor. Major damage to three levels. Wonder what my insurance premiums will be next year.

 

[alrmc4]

good luck quarry are you sure that the pilot didn't just blow out sometimes a down draft can do that.

 

[fishfreek]

Tis a good time to be an Heating guy huh. I had my furnace fixed a few weeks ago. The berrings on my blower had gone bad. Apparently they had been going bad for a while and it just got t o a point where the blower shaft was litrally banging around in the berring housings. My best guess is the berrings where going out when we purchased the home back in 2001. Took 4 years to really get to a point where I realized something bad was going on.

Now the darn thing runs so quite I hardly can hear its running. Before it would almost wake you up when it kicked in.

 

[quarryshark]

This furnace is only 10 years old and it has been more problem that its worth. Our builder put it in, wish I would have known how bad it was gonna be.
I may just go ahead and replace it...get a good one like a Trane.
So far not too bad for the fish, the temp dropped about 3 degrees down to 76. If its not fixed today, I'll stop and get another heater on the way home.

 

[Menagerie]

Hope you all stay toasty! My fingers are crossed that you can get it fixed today (makes it hard to type, but oh well).

 

[An t-iasg]

Glad to hear you and the fish are ok! I think it's a good idea to put another aquarium heater in the tanks for now. Also the new furnace is a good idea too! We got a new furnace/AC a few years ago and it's wonderful. If you do get a new furnace installed, you'll be without heat for 4-6 hours (at least we were) while they take out the old unit and put in the new one, so it would be good to have a few spare aquarium heaters on hand just in case the water temp starts to drop too much.

 

[TankGirl]

TomK2 - that's terrible! Can you still live in the house or are you out for the time being?

Kurt - hope you have some heat soon, but I am glad you have the gas fire. Our temp was 6F this morning and our power went out, so fortunately I married a boy scout and he had the propane stove out to boil water for coffee, had the fire roaring and split wood ready, and the kerosene heater for the rest of the house. Fortunately the power came back on in about 2 hours, so my tanks did not cool down too much - that was my greatest worry. Today was the coldest day of the winter season so far, but by Wed it is supposed to be in the 50s.

 

[quarryshark]

Kurt - hope you have some heat soon, but I am glad you have the gas fire. Our temp was 6F this morning and our power went out, so fortunately I married a boy scout and he had the propane stove out to boil water for coffee, had the fire roaring and split wood ready, and the kerosene heater for the rest of the house. Fortunately the power came back on in about 2 hours, so my tanks did not cool down too much - that was my greatest worry. Today was the coldest day of the winter season so far, but by Wed it is supposed to be in the 50s.

Glad to hear you are OK. Looks like some of us are taking a step back to more primative ways of home heating.
We just got it repaired so it is working, but the heat exchange is shot so we need to replace the furnace ASAP. I don't want a ticking time bomb in my house. The exchange was leaking fluid which shorted out the circuit board. Its also leaking a bit of CO2. I think the kids will stay at grandma's till this is done.
We have narrowed it down to a trane or a carrier. The company that fixed it already gave us a run down on the trane, the carrier rep is coming over this afternoon. Either way we are gonna have to dish out about $3500. There goes my March Vegas trip.
Not going to do this again, want to get a good unit that allows me to sleep at night.

 

[TomK2]

TomK2 - that's terrible! Can you still live in the house or are you out for the time being?

I had just moved out of the house but haven't sold it yet (job relocation). I live close enough to check on it twice a week, but I skipped checking on it over the christmas week. The Monday after Christmas was when the furnace malfunction and leaks were discovered when a realtor brought a client over to see the house. A neighbor had seen the ice river, didn't know my new number, and left a message at the realtors office (but it was christmas, so no one got the message).The client was coming back for a third look, and was going to put in an offer. Something about sloshing around the carpet gave them second thoughts, no sale. But hey, they should have it fixed back up in a week or two, and at least I didn't have to live in the mess (this is where I take a deep breath and convince myself to focus on the positive )

 

[quarryshark]

But hey, they should have it fixed back up in a week or two, and at least I didn't have to live in the mess (this is where I take a deep breath and convince myself to focus on the positive )

Boy thats for sure. Sorry for all your trouble. That was one of our concerns last night, we let the water trickle in the upstairs bathrooms all night.
My wife just called and told me the heat just went out again....sigh