Furnace Repair in Elkhart, IN
Furnaces here run from October through May. If yours quits, tell us what it's doing and a licensed contractor who covers Elkhart County will get in touch.
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Elkhart County asks a lot of a furnace
Your furnace works eight months a year here, October through May. On winter nights averaging 20°F, it is cycling on and off for hours at a stretch to hold the house steady. Every one of those cycles puts a load on the igniter and the burner, and over years that wear catches up with the parts that start it.
Most homes here heat with gas, so when the furnace stops lighting, there is no backup warming the house while you wait. Storms are part of the picture too. Elkhart County has seen 17 winter storms and 117 damaging wind events over the past ten years, and outages that follow can shut a furnace down even when nothing inside it is broken. When the power comes back, most furnaces restart on their own, but if yours does not, that points to a problem worth having a contractor look at.
- 8 months
- October through May, your furnace is on duty
- 20°F
- the average winter night it heats against
- 81%
- of homes here heat with gas, so most furnaces here burn gas
- 17 winter storms
- in ten years, the nights a failure hurts most
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
A new furnace would cut about $120 a year off heating for a typical Elkhart County home.
Estimates for a typical Elkhart County home, compared with an older unit built to the previous federal minimum, from EIA household energy data, Indiana fuel prices and NOAA climate normals. Your home will differ.
Repair makes sense when one part has failed and the heat exchanger is sound.
Replacement makes sense when the heat exchanger is cracked or the furnace keeps needing parts.
In Indiana, HVAC licensing for homes is left to the counties and cities.
Whether your furnace repair needs a licensed contractor comes down to Elkhart County's own rule, not a state one. Some Indiana counties and cities run their own licensing programs, testing contractors and keeping records on file. Others require nothing at all. Indiana never set a statewide standard, so there is no state license number behind this work and no state board that tested the contractor.
80.6 percent of homes in Elkhart County heat with gas, and a bad connection at the gas line is the dangerous part of a furnace repair. Whatever check exists on that work here comes from Elkhart County or its cities, not from the state of Indiana.
Sources: Indiana Department of Workforce Development · State of Indiana
- Why won't my furnace turn on?
- Most often it's the thermostat, a tripped breaker, or the switch on the furnace or nearby wall that got bumped off. Check the thermostat is set to heat and above room temperature first, since that's the easiest thing to rule out. If the breaker keeps tripping when you reset it, or the switch is on and the furnace still won't respond, something inside needs a contractor's attention. With winter lows here averaging 20°F, this isn't one to leave for later.
- Why is my furnace blowing cold air?
- A furnace blows cold air for a few seconds at the start of every cycle while it warms up, and that's normal. If it keeps blowing cold or the air never warms, the burners may not be lighting, or the furnace could be stuck running the fan without heating. Air filters clogged with dust can also cause this by starving the system of airflow. A contractor can check the burners and the ignition system to find which one it is.
- Why won't my furnace pilot light stay lit?
- This usually means the thermocouple has worn out and can no longer sense the flame to keep the gas valve open. A draft blowing across the pilot, or a dirty pilot orifice, can also cause it to go out. Relighting it yourself may work for a night, but if it keeps happening, the thermocouple or the pilot assembly needs replacing. Since gas heats 80.6% of homes in this area, it's worth getting this fixed rather than relighting it all winter.