2 Reasons To Hire A Heating Contractor To Install Your New Furnace

When the time comes for a new furnace, many ambitious homeowners consider trying to save money by installing this equipment themselves. This often leads to frustration, mistakes, and costly damages. If the time has come for a new heating unit in your home, read on. This article will present two compelling reasons to hire a heating contractor to install your new furnace.

1. Newer furnaces are often incompatible with existing ductwork.

One result of advances in heater technology is that newer units are often considerably smaller than those they replace--after all, the average lifespan of a home furnace is between 16 and 20 years, and a lot can change in that amount of time. And while the smaller size of new furnaces is undoubtedly a good thing, it can also make it difficult to integrate the new heater with your existing ductwork.

You see, a crucial part of any heater is the component known as the plenum. This metal box sits atop your furnace and is responsible for bridging the gap between the heater and the main heating duct. Unfortunately, there are no standards for plenum sizes, and chances are the plenum on your new furnace will not be the right height or width to integrate with the main heating duct.

This problem is usually solved by having a custom plenum constructed by a sheet-metal fabricator. For the average home owner, though, finding someone to make this part will likely be a long and arduous process.

Heating contractors, on the other hand, deal with this type of problem all the time. Most experienced contractors will have a fabricator they send work to on a regular basis. This means that the new part can be manufactured with a minimum of delay.

2. Installing piping is a difficult and potentially hazardous task.

Part of installing a furnace is correctly installing both the exhaust and the incoming combustion-air inlet piping. This is not a task to take lightly. Even small deviations from the manufacturer's recommendations can lead to an incorrectly working furnace. You must be prepared to take into account such details as:

  • the length of the different stretches of piping
  • the amount of turns
  • the slope of the piping at different places

Not only can an error in one of these calculations lead to a non-functional furnace, but it can also put you and your family in jeopardy. Because furnace exhaust gases contain life-threatening carbon monoxide, a mistake when installing the exhaust piping could prove deadly.

Bottom Line

Installing a new furnace is not a task for curious amateurs. Not only is the work physically demanding, but it involves a specific set of knowledge that takes years to learn. Though you may find yourself balking at the cost, in the end, hiring a heating contractor, like Copper Valley Mechanical Contractors Ltd, is worth every penny.


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