Heating & Cooling

Your Home Inspector will apprise you of the age of your heating and cooling systems whenever possible.  Components of most heating and air conditioning systems have a design life from 10 to 20 years, however poor maintenance practices may significantly decrease that life expectancy

Furnaces are central heating systems in that the heat is generated in one location and then distributed through the house.

With the exception of electric furnaces, all furnaces have three major components: a heat exchanger, a burner, and a blower.

The heat exchanger is the most critical component of a furnace. It separates the air which is being heated from the burning fuel. While the configuration of heat exchangers varies, a heat exchanger can be thought of as a metal box inside another metal box. The interior box has fuel burning in it. The heat from the burning fuel warms the interior box. Air is then passed through the outer box where it picks up heat from the hot walls of the inner box. In this way, the burning fuel never comes in direct contact with the house air. This is called an indirect fired heating system.