Preparing your furnace for winter

Preparing your home for winter.

One of the major issues people have is that first cold day and they turn their furnace on and the furnace doesn’t work. They frantically call their mechanical contractor and he informs them that it will take them till tomorrow to get there because of all the no-heat calls that they have received. Once they come and repair the furnace then you are stuck with a large emergency repair bill.

There is an easy way to avoid this problem, schedule your mechanical contractor to come and do your maintenance and start up the month before the weather starts to turn cold. This way when the weather turns cold your furnace will be guaranteed to work the first try and you can avoid that costly emergency service bill. Maintenance bills are far cheaper and can be done at your and your contractor’s schedule.

With scheduling your furnace maintenance for around August or September you can schedule them in advance, you can also have your mechanical contractor call you every August to set up the appointment taking the burden off of you. You get a furnace that works well and when you need it too and your mechanical contractor gets a flexible schedule to work with you.

A lot of money can be saved by maintenance, parts can be replaced when they are worn instead of after they brake and cause damage to surrounding parts.

There are things you should do yourself before your mechanical contractor comes;

• Cut the grass and weeds away from the intake and the exhaust of the furnace.

• If you have an HRV do the same cutting and debris removal for it as well.

• Remove any debris that you see in the vents, they are usually easy to remove and re-install.

• You should also replace or clean your furnace filters as well. Dirty or damaged filters can cause a lot of damage to the furnace and also hurt performance by restricting airflow.

• There are filters in your HRV system as well that you should be replaced or cleaned of all dust and debris like pet hair.

• You can also go around and vacuum out all the vents and cold air returns so that you don’t have to worry about dust being thrown in the air when they furnace is fired up for the first time.

• You should check that you do not have furniture or other things blocking the air vents or the cold air returns, this can put undue stress on the furnace as it starves it for air.

• If you live in the country you should make sure that your furnace oil or propane tanks have been topped up, this is always easier to do when there isn’t any snow on the ground.

Remember it’s always cheaper to do it before you need it then after.

Rob Abbott
Operations Manager
Village Builders Inc.