BRR!! Broken Furnace???

Hi all. Random question for you - has anyone ever had their furnace break? I am not sure if mine is broken or not. It's still running, but I have it set on auto, and it should be heating the house up to 71. Well it's only 65 in here! I cranked the temp to 75 to see if I could over-compensate and make it warmer, but it's not budging. Started yesterday it was like 67, and then overnight it got to 64! Granted it is six below zero outside and I have big windows...

Do you guys think my furnace might be broken, or is it just too cold outside to heat the house up? I thought if the furnace was busted it would just shut off but I don't know. Help! I don't want to waste a ton of $$ on a guy to come check it if I don't have to.

yep we had a gas furnace and it kept shutting off, there was a hole in the tubes and it would blow air and blow out the pilot, we had to keep lighting the pilot.


Is the furnace actually running?? It might be that your furnace is too small to keep up with the size of your house

Is it a heat pump or gas?

Yep it's running all right! it'll run for about 5 mins, then shut off for 5, then kick in again. Usually when it shuts off though it's because it's heated the house to the temp we've got it set on. Not sure why it's doing it now.

Guess I'll have to have it checked in case there's something up w/ the tubing like the situation you mentioned. Could be that it's too small but I've lived here w/ the same furnace for 3 years and this has never happened. Maybe it's just never been this cold!

It's gas heat.

Take a thermometer and place it over the vent. If it's working correctly and it's a HEAT PUMP, the temp should read between 98 degrees and 100 degrees. If it's GAS and it's working correctly the temp should read between 110 and 115 degrees. It's pretty darn cold wherever you are!! Bless your heart

Thanks for the advice! I'll check the temp and guess I will have to call someone if it's not hot enough. Yeah, It's dern cold here (in Chicago) that's for sure... the high today is 4!! ACK!

We own a heating and air business. If you have any questions you can pm me and maybe DH can suggest a thing or two to try before you call someone out. Good luck!

You are the best! Thank you so much!!

Originally Posted by smedley12 You are the best! Thank you so much!!

LOL.....I'm not the best.....DH is! But, thanks

We have a gas furnace. It's been in the negatives with the wind chill here. Our house is very cold and isn't heating up right either. I think it's just way too cold for it to heat up normal. Right now our thermostat is reading 5 degrees colder than what we have it set at. I think it's just this really cold weather.

It's 1 degree here right now with -16 wind chill.

Well, its cold here too. I don't think its going to make it up to 0 today. I've had to turn out heat up as well and it still seems chilly. Those 40 mile an hour winds really make it alot worse.

I sure hope you get your furnace working.

I have a gas furnace and I had a guy out this week to check it because it was doing the same thing.
He told me that everything was working properly....It cost $89 for that!

So of course I go to take the temp of the air coming out of the air vent and my digital thermometer won't register. LOL! Anyway, I can tell it's not in the 100 degree area at all because it doesn't even feel that warm to my hand. It's 63 in here now! I'm making a phone call, and I hope they don't charge me $89 to tell me everything's OK!

When DS came home from Christmas from college for 5 weeks, he and DD would wake up in the morning and tell me how cold they were. DD had to get up for school at 5:30, so I thought she just did'nt like getting out of the bed with the down comforter. DS INSISTED it was freezing upstairs. Well, the puter is upstairs and when I am on it in the daytime, not cold at all.

I ignored DS and DD complaints. Finally DH and I were upstairs watching the big TV and coolish/tepid air was coming out of the vent that night. I manually "uped" the thermometer to 78, and no improvement.

Called the HVAC guy the next day. He came out, was broken and fixed it. He said that I didnt feel cold in the daytime cause all the warm air from downstairs was rising to the bonus room. At night the kids sleep with their doors shut, so they WERE freezing.

I felt kina bad then, cause one morning DD said she had to sleep in her pea coat!!

Have it checked out.. (dont want to tell you how much it cost)