Ha, now that I’ve got your attention….
I’m still getting the MIL’s house ready to sell…..the agent suggested having the furnace serviced….I said no, let the new owners inspect & service, but got overruled….
Sure enough, the kid from the HVAC Co. comes in, shines a flashlight up the heat exchanger, says “you’ve got cracks, it’s gotta go”
Now, this same Co. showed up at my SIL’s house a few years back, shined a borescope up the exchanger, then did the “sit down little lady, do you have kids?, they might die in their sleep tonight” song & dance….turns out it needed cleaning, $50.00 & good for another winter cycle….
So…short of taking the thing apart, how can I be sure I need a new one….Insist on a CO meter reading?
The whole thing bugs me, because if we put a new one in, it’ll be the cheapest 80% we can find; I think it makes more sense to negotiate with a willing buyer, i.e. we’ll pay part of the cost, you get to choose if you want better than 80%…the agent just wants his sale & commission
BTW, though the agent says any home inspector would have flagged the furnace, he hasn’t seen it, probably wouldn’t know what he was looking at if he had, & though I have no intention of selling a dangerous, undisclosed condition to anyone, the house has CO detectors, & he’s kidding himself if he thinks most inspectors around here would have rejected the furnace…they’d have noted it’s age (about 8 years), & most likely stopped there…
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"Now, this same Co. showed up at my SIL's house a few years back, shined a borescope up the exchanger, then did the "sit down little lady, do you have kids?, they might die in their sleep tonight" song & dance....turns out it needed cleaning, $50.00 & good for another winter cycle...."
And yet you called them again?!?!!?
Do you have even worse stories about the competition??
Rich Beckman
Another day, another tool.
Reimburse the buyer for the cost of a one-year "Home Warrenty" In Maryland, they run about four hundred bucks and cover the furnace only if purchased by the buyer.
Home Warantee won't cover this.They are designed for failure AFTER the warantee is bought.Now they might not find out, but if they do it doesn't cover pre-exisiting conditons.
Haven't been reading the small print, now have we?
Happened to me. The seller bought the darn waranty, and I found a cracked exchanger. The warranty company gave me a full $350 towards the $5,000 cost of a new furnace.
The warranties are nothing but a marketing gimmick. Scams I tell you!
Thats why I said for the buyer to get the warranty. My boiler had been converted from coal to oil. It would barely start up and not keep going for more than a day. The warranty company did not inspect nor ask for an inspection. When I called for service, they would send out a company in vbain to resurrect the old beast. After the first fifty dollar co-pay on my part, it was up to them to fix it.Well, after a few calls, the service company convinced the warranty folks to pay for the replacement. Which, as per the small print, they paid 3 grand twords. Even let me pick my own guys and not have to go with theirs.Also had a hot-water heater that was nearly rusted through. When I called for service on that, they just went ahead and replaced it.Overall, I was very happy with the money and service from the warranty. They even paid to rewire half of the first floor when the knob and tube gave out. Even I was not expecting that.Now I am not so sure that they were happy with me, but I was with them.
There are a couple of techniques that various HX-crack-experts have formulated over the years. You may Google on that to see if there is a test you can do yourself with the info you have.
However, AFAIK, it's usually pretty simple to pull a HX and put in a new one. Many furnace manufacturers have had crack issues in the past (the famous Drum, etc.), and the remedies I've read described a new HX, not a new furnace, being put in. So rather than buying a whole new furnace outright, I'd hire a different company to take the HX out, inspect it, and replace it if it is defective.
Testing for CO is not the right option, IMHO. For one, it is unlikely that you be sure that the conditions you have during the time of test are the same all the time, i.e. no possibility of backdrafting via a kitchen fan, bathroom exhaust, etc. If the HX has a crack, it needs to be replaced, period.
Have you stuck your head in there and looked? If the kid from the HVAC company was able to determine it was cracked just by looking at it, you should be able to see them as well.
I know what a lot of you think about HVAC-Talk,LOL, but this is a good link about HX inspections.
http://hvac-talk.com/vbb/showthread.php?threadid=73546