Toasty

So after being without heat for 12 days, we finally have heat again. It was nice waking up yesterday and being toasty warm, instead of snuggling back into bed and not wanting to have that first toe hit the ground and thinking "brrr!"

We ended up getting a Lennox SLP98V furnace, which has an efficiency rating of 98%, hopefully will save us money in comparison to our old AirCo 8300 Furnace which was mid-efficient. Only time will tell!

In the meantime, we're a little scared of our coming electricity bill for the last month.

We are noticing that this one is quieter than our old furnace, and it also seems to warm up more slowly instead of just blowing hot right from when it turns on, it seems to "warm up" for lack of a better way to explain.

Brr... Part, Two

$100 Gamble.... FAIL

After a quick trip to Edmonton to pick up this beauty and getting it home.....She may look the same, but this furnace is older than our current broken one (aka the parts aren't the same). To the Buy and Sell with you.

We are currently heating the house with 3-4 spaceheaters. The good news is, the house is holding in heat surprisingly well even with the temperatures to -3c overnight. I'm guessing this is due to all Roxul currently inhabiting the basement, Jo's room, our room and bathroom.... oh and me baking in the oven every night?

The other good news is, we can keep our house cooler and still be okay. We have sweaters and fuzzy socks. No one has gotten chilled yet (except me, but this is easily a thin blood issue) and I just hop into the shower and blast it and no one gets hurt.

The bad news:

Today

• 7°C
•  
•  

Mon

• 6°C
• -3°C
•  

Tue

• 4°C
• -3°C
•  

Wed

• 5°C
• -10°C
•  

Thu

• 5°C
• -3°C
•  

Fri

• 6°C
• -6°C
•  

Sat

• 11°C
• -2°C

Ughness....-10c on Wednesday night is coming and she's coming fast.

We're furiously reading over reviews of furnaces and trying to get our ducks into a row, may have to bite the bullet and buy a new furnace.

Brr...

Sometimes things happen when you least expect it, and sometimes things happen when you have your fingers crossed that they won't.

On Tuesday morning we awoke to a chillier than usual house - not cold but not exactly beach weather either (although some people in my family would tell you it's always beach weather - this is not true). We realized our vents were blowing air, but not warm air - just air.

Enter our furnace that is older than I am - an AirCo 8300 Turbo. We knew when we purchased the Hobo-Chic that this furnace wasn't going to last for the long-term but we have been endeavouring to keep it running as long as we can, because let's face it - new furnaces aren't exactly cheap & honestly they don't make things like they used to.

We called up the local heating guys (there is about 6 companies in our town). 3 came to see the unit, only 1 was willing to even consider fixing it - 1 wanted to sell us a new unit, 1 couldn't get the parts. Not very good odds. 

What we learnt:
1. Our furnace is older than us.

2. Our furnace is wired in series, therefore if one thing didn't work, nothing would.

3. The vent fan was toast (we think).

After thinking about it for a while and being frustrated, I called up my intrepid Dad who usually offers sage advice especially in the area of mechanical frustration  and generally has a good hold of common sense. His sage advice was to look the guys in the eye and tell them we can't afford a new furnace and to fix it.

So the places we can go from here:
(1) Buy a new furnace - have one quote for approx $5,000

(2) Buy a new part & put it in- approx $441 (and on the hook for the part even if it doesn't work)
(3) Buy the similar unit off Kijiji for about $100 with ALL the parts and pay labour rate/try it out

Right now we're leaning towards #3 which requires a city trip but is the most economical option. 

So what "surprise" have you had lately that you had to fix?