Last week, Travis and I were lounging on the couch a little too late, probably finishing a show we shouldn’t have started on a work night, when there was a loud sustained whine/groan combo that came from the basement. I immediately perked up, saying, “What the heck is that?” Travis’ reply was, “It’s probably nothing.” To which I said, “Nothing never sounded so loud before.” I started walking downstairs and yelled back up, “It’s coming from the furnace,” before I even made it to the basement. That was hard for Travis to ignore, so he roused himself and followed me to the basement.

Once we were in front of the furnace, we flipped the switch to turn it off. It was gloriously quiet. For better or for worse, this house has two furnaces. They are both original to the house, circa 1988. They are Lennox Pulse furnaces, which were the first version of the high efficiency variety. Actually, the exact furnace was in our first house, which we bought in 1993. Of course, that furnace has probably been replaced by now. But not us. We like living on the edge, with two old giants cranking out the heat, rolling the dice each day in the winter. And these behemoths are loud, although that has never bothered me. In fact, I take comfort in hearing the heat kick on in the winter. 

So, we took the front cover off the furnace to investigate. Not seeing any obvious issues (what exactly we expected to see, I have no idea), we held the safety button down (that must be for other people) and flipped the switch back on. Sure enough, the loud noise started right back up. Even to the untrained eye, it was easy to notice that the fan was not spinning. After much debate, Travis decided to hand spin the fan and see if it would keep spinning then. Much to my surprise, this worked. If we could get it to work with the cover back on, we had a temporary fix that might hold us to morning. If you have ever had to pay emergency prices to have a furnace looked at, you know why that is important. Who am I kidding? We wouldn’t have paid emergency prices anyway. We still had one working furnace, and it was barely getting below freezing that night. After a couple failed attempts to spin and get the cover back on to turn the furnace on, we got one that worked. Since we took the closet door off the area where the furnace hides, it was imperative to get the cover back on, or the cat might decide to investigate. So we couldn’t just put tape on the button and leave it open for the night. I made sure to switch the thermostat setting from auto for the fan to on, and we went to bed. 

Around 2:30 am, the noise started again. We did the same trick (well, Travis did) and went back to sleep. At 3:30 the noise was back. This time, we reasoned that we could coast until the next day. Our house zones are split in an odd way, with the north side of the house (three floors of bedrooms) on one furnace and the south side of the house (two floors of living space) on the broken furnace. We placed a box fan in the hall to move heat towards our little old dog, who sleeps in the living room, and went back to sleep. 

At 5am, I woke up and started looking at reviews of HVAC companies. I couldn’t exactly text my friends for recommendations at that hour. I found a place, called, and made an appointment for 12:30. Meanwhile, Travis woke up, went downstairs and said that he is removing the motor to take it to a local shop and see what they can do. Keep in mind, Travis’ nurse practitioner, Megan, is on maternity leave, so he is working insanely long days, and has no breaks in the day. I am not sure how he was going to take anything anywhere. Besides, he laid next to me and listened to me make an appointment. How would they assess a furnace with NO motor? We went back and forth for a while, until I won. Well, I won mostly because he discovered that the old furnace doesn’t have a quick disconnect for the electrical, so he would have to cut all the wires, and that seemed like a bit much on a work morning, even for him. But we got to start our morning with a colorful exchange, which is always a great way to go to work.

Because the morning was already going so well, I had the long repeated talk with Travis that he can’t do every repair all the time. Sometimes, his amazing, real job must take precedence. Someday, when he has endless time, he can tinker with every appliance to his heart’s content. But today, we needed heat, and he needed to go to work. I think my final words were, “I am going to have this company come look at the furnace, then I am going to replace both furnaces, and you are going to pay for it. So, you better go to work.”

So, I left work a half day early, met with the HVAC guy, and overpaid for a replacement motor. He also did an estimate for replacing the two antique furnaces. We are getting a couple more replacement estimates. We could rework the duct work and get one LARGE zone furnace, but then when it goes down, we have no back up plan, so I’m not sure I want to pay more for that option. Apparently, zone furnaces did not exist in the 80s, so if you wanted zones, you put in two furnaces. We were too busy spraying our bangs straight up in the air to notice. 

To add to the expenses, our old Acura finally died, since our repair guy can’t get a replacement transmission for a 2004 Acura TSX 6 speed manual. We got a solid 220,000 miles out of that old car. Also, the long awaited new boat lift that was covid delayed for three years finally came in. I am not sure where all this money is coming from, but we will manage. 

So stay warm on this blustery February day. The wind is strong, but the temps aren’t bad, so we are furnace safe for today. Have a great week everyone.