Furnace Repair in Hammond, IN
Furnaces here run from October through May. If yours quits, tell us what it's doing and a licensed contractor who covers Lake County will get in touch.
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Eight months of Hammond winters wear a furnace down
Your furnace has to carry the house from October through May here, eight months of the year. December through February, nights average 20°F, and on those nights the burner is cycling on and off for hours at a time. Every one of those cycles puts load on the igniter and the flame sensor, and over enough winters those parts wear out. When the igniter finally fails, the furnace won't light at all, and you will notice cold air coming from the vents or no air moving at all.
Lake County has seen 11 winter storms and 121 damaging wind events over the past ten years. Wind can push exhaust back down the flue or blow out a pilot light on an older unit, and the power blips that come with winter storms can trip a furnace's control board. Most gas furnaces relight on their own once power is back, but if yours doesn't, that points to a problem worth having checked.
- 8 months
- October through May, your furnace is on duty
- 20°F
- the average winter night it heats against
- 86%
- of homes here heat with gas, so most furnaces here burn gas
- 11 winter storms
- in ten years, the nights a failure hurts most
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
A new furnace would cut about $110 a year off heating for a typical Lake County home.
Estimates for a typical Lake 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.
Indiana leaves this to local government, so what applies to a furnace repair in Lake County depends on whether Lake County or the city the house sits in has its own licensing ordinance. Where a local government has one, the contractor has to meet whatever that office requires and is on file with them. Where it does not, there is no local record either, and the state has none to fall back on.
A furnace repair is gas work, and the part that matters most is the gas connection itself. That is the piece a bad repair gets wrong, and in most places it is the local building or gas inspector who checks it, not a state licensing board, since Indiana does not run one. With most homes in Lake County heating with gas, that inspection is the check that stands in for the license this state does not issue.
Sources: Indiana Department of Workforce Development · State of Indiana
- Why won't my furnace turn on?
- Start with the thermostat. Make sure it's set to heat and the setting is above room temperature, since a battery that's died or a schedule that got changed will stop the call for heat before it starts. Check your breaker panel too, since a tripped breaker will shut the whole system down. If power and the thermostat both check out, the igniter or a safety switch inside the furnace may be the problem, and that needs a contractor to look at it.
- Why is my furnace blowing cold air?
- Most of the time this means the blower is running but the burners haven't lit. A dirty flame sensor is a common reason for that, since it tells the furnace to shut off the gas if it doesn't sense a flame quickly enough, even when the igniter is working fine. A clogged filter can also cause this by starving the burners of air. If the air stays cold for more than a few minutes, turn the system off and have a contractor check it, since running it that way can crack the heat exchanger.
- Why won't my furnace pilot light stay lit?
- A weak or dirty thermocouple is the usual cause. That's the small sensor that sits in the pilot flame and tells the gas valve the flame is really there. When it's coated with soot or worn out, it reads the flame as out even when it's lit, and the valve shuts the gas off. A draft blowing across the pilot can also blow it out. If relighting it doesn't hold, the thermocouple needs to be cleaned or replaced by a contractor.