RCM
Furnaces
York Affinity Series Furnace
York Latitude/LX Series Furnace
We
also maintain and service every brand.
Furnaces and Efficiency (Your Gas
Bill)
Most older furnaces are
called natural draft because they depend on heat to cause a draft up
the chimney. These units also have pilot lights and were considered to
be around 80% efficient when new. The heat exchangers in these units
lose their heat transfer capabilities and efficiency falls to about
60% after 15 years of age. This is due to the design/material of the
heat exchanger which begins to rust after just a few years. The simple
nature of these older furnaces make them reliable so most people are
reluctant to replace them. The average furnace today is about 80%
efficient. This means for every dollar you spend on heating your home,
20 cents goes up your chimney in the form of unusable heat and is
wasted. This is considered to be a mid-efficiency furnace. These
furnaces began to appear around 1990 and are considered draft induced
because there is a small blower that draws air through the furnace and
then pumps it up the chimney. The heat dissipation in this design is
much more stable and so it remains closer to 80% efficiency for most
of its expected service life of around 15 to 20 years. In the past
several years people have been becoming aware the high efficiency
heating and air conditioning equipment entering the market. The high
efficiency furnace is a furnace with two heat exchangers, one or more
levels of heat, and multiple fan speeds. The newest are now available
with variable speed fans which drastically reduce electricity
consumption while reducing noise and greatly increasing comfort. The
average high efficiency furnace is 90% efficient but ours are as high
as 98% efficiency. The result is evident in a simple comparison.
Compare an old furnace to a high efficiency one. First you must
understand that since a more efficient furnace does not need to be the
same size as an old one because it turns more potential heat into the
home instead of up the chimney. A 2300 square foot home built in 1990
came with a 150,000 BTU natural draft furnace which is around 70%
efficient. (Most people in the industry will agree this is closer to
60% efficiency.) The amount of heat entering the home is about 105,000
BTU. A home this size needs 80,000 to 90,000 BTU of usable heat to
properly heat it. Most homes are built with slightly larger than
needed furnaces and smaller than needed air conditioners. We install a
100,000 BTU furnace that is 98% efficient and it delivers 98,000 BTU
of usable heat into the home. The end result is instead of expelling
45,000 BTU of heat up your chimney, you only loose 2,000 BTU. You have
just reduced your energy cost by over 35%! This is a conservative
estimate.
New
Lenox, IL 60451
