Hello:

Appearently I do not have good luck with being able to heat a house.
This is the second house I have had that I have heating problems with


In March of this year we replaced our really drafty wooden double
pained windows. We installed 3 pane shucos with lowE and argon.
Besides not being able to open we replaced them since they leaked and
in the winter the house still had a chill.

Now here is the problem.............

(0) We have a natural gas lennox for heat.

(1) We have made no other changes to the house other than windows.

(2) Gas usage has doubled for same month last year.

(3) Electric has also doubled since I have been using a space heater in
living room to stay warm and to prevent heat from turning on.

(4) I have been documenting how often the heat turns on and off. When
it turns on it usually stays ON between 5-10 minutes regardless of the
time of day. However the cycle time (from Off to On) changes
considerably. During the day it is about every 10 minutes, then it
slowly decreases to every 5 minutes and then it becomes every 1 minute.


(5) Between around 10 am to about 6 pm it is every 10 minutes cycle
time. From about 9 pm till about 8 am it is a 1 minute cycle time. All
other times are about 5 minutes.

(6) Last year during winter I payed attention to how often it cycled on
and off it was always around a 10 minute cycle time. I remember since I
had heating problems in my previous house.

(7) We had heating company come out this week and they found no
problems. They checked the temperature between the in and out and the
difference was 45 degrees. For this unit the range is supposed to be
35-65 degrees.

Any suggestions on what may be causing this? I have an appt for next
tuesday for another tech to come out to do some more extensive
troubleshooting.

* note: the cycle times i mentioned in (4 and 5) is a range. I do not
mean to say there are only 3 cycle times, but these are the most
prevelant.

wrote:
Hello:

Appearently I do not have good luck with being able to heat a house.
This is the second house I have had that I have heating problems with


In March of this year we replaced our really drafty wooden double
pained windows. We installed 3 pane shucos with lowE and argon.
Besides not being able to open we replaced them since they leaked and
in the winter the house still had a chill.

Now here is the problem.............

(0) We have a natural gas lennox for heat.

(1) We have made no other changes to the house other than windows.

(2) Gas usage has doubled for same month last year.

What were the heating degree days last year vs this year? How are you
measuring gas usage, the billed cost or measured amount of gas??


(3) Electric has also doubled since I have been using a space heater
in living room to stay warm and to prevent heat from turning on.

(4) I have been documenting how often the heat turns on and off. When
it turns on it usually stays ON between 5-10 minutes regardless of the
time of day. However the cycle time (from Off to On) changes
considerably. During the day it is about every 10 minutes, then it
slowly decreases to every 5 minutes and then it becomes every 1
minute.


(5) Between around 10 am to about 6 pm it is every 10 minutes cycle
time. From about 9 pm till about 8 am it is a 1 minute cycle time. All
other times are about 5 minutes.

(6) Last year during winter I payed attention to how often it cycled
on and off it was always around a 10 minute cycle time. I remember
since I had heating problems in my previous house.

(7) We had heating company come out this week and they found no
problems. They checked the temperature between the in and out and the
difference was 45 degrees. For this unit the range is supposed to be
35-65 degrees.

Any suggestions on what may be causing this? I have an appt for next
tuesday for another tech to come out to do some more extensive
troubleshooting.

* note: the cycle times i mentioned in (4 and 5) is a range. I do not
mean to say there are only 3 cycle times, but these are the most
prevelant.

--
Joseph Meehan

Dia duit

wrote:

Hello:

Appearently I do not have good luck with being able to heat a house.
This is the second house I have had that I have heating problems with


In March of this year we replaced our really drafty wooden double
pained windows. We installed 3 pane shucos with lowE and argon.
Besides not being able to open we replaced them since they leaked and
in the winter the house still had a chill.

Now here is the problem.............

(0) We have a natural gas lennox for heat.

(1) We have made no other changes to the house other than windows.

(2) Gas usage has doubled for same month last year.

(3) Electric has also doubled since I have been using a space heater in
living room to stay warm and to prevent heat from turning on.

(4) I have been documenting how often the heat turns on and off. When
it turns on it usually stays ON between 5-10 minutes regardless of the
time of day. However the cycle time (from Off to On) changes
considerably. During the day it is about every 10 minutes, then it
slowly decreases to every 5 minutes and then it becomes every 1 minute.


(5) Between around 10 am to about 6 pm it is every 10 minutes cycle
time. From about 9 pm till about 8 am it is a 1 minute cycle time. All
other times are about 5 minutes.

(6) Last year during winter I payed attention to how often it cycled on
and off it was always around a 10 minute cycle time. I remember since I
had heating problems in my previous house.

(7) We had heating company come out this week and they found no
problems. They checked the temperature between the in and out and the
difference was 45 degrees. For this unit the range is supposed to be
35-65 degrees.

Any suggestions on what may be causing this? I have an appt for next
tuesday for another tech to come out to do some more extensive
troubleshooting.

* note: the cycle times i mentioned in (4 and 5) is a range. I do not
mean to say there are only 3 cycle times, but these are the most
prevelant.

Hi,
What kind of insulation do you have on your house? Walls, ceiling,
basement walls, etc. and is walls 2x4 or 2x6 construction?
IMO, first thing you do is energy assesment of your house ie. let expert
come out and go about your house to see where the heat loss(leak) is
occuring. Where I live it costs 150.00 to do thorough job with a written
report. Local gas company does this service. Or you can take a IR
picture of your house which will show the area of heat loss.
Tony

What were the heating degree days last year vs this year?
I have not yet checked that but I plan on it hopefully this weekend.
However I do know that last year even in the coldest day of the year my
system
never cycled on 1 minute after it turned off.

Yesterday the high was 45 and the low was 31.


How are you measuring gas usage, the billed cost or measured amount of gas??
Measured amount of gas.

Not sure on wall insulation or construction.
House is entirely brick with a dining room addition which is not brick.
The attic insulation includes some sort of recycled newspaper with it.
So this would be good to replace.

But the attic insulation was the same last year as this year.

Is there a particular name which I could search for which does this
energy audit?
I checked with my gas and electric about 3 yrs ago and they do NOT
offer this sort of service.
I know in Florida my moms electric company did do this sort of thing,
but where I live the utilities do not.

Check the basics first. Start with your thermostat. See if it is
working correctly. It could be the reason why your furnace is cycling
a lot. There is usually a heat anticipator setting which controls the
cycling of the furnace. The higher the setting, the longer the cycle
will be.
What kind of heat do you have, hot water baseboard or forced hot air?

Do heat loss calc....

Here is my house heat loss:
Floor 45%
Walls 36%
Roof 3%
Glass 16%
Doors ~0.4%

What would my savings be if I replace standard windows with LowE?

Probably $1 - 2 on every $100 spent on heating....

Before replacing windows see if savings are there...


Also price of gas of our GasCo went up 36%....

Last november heating degree days were 369 @Indy
This november: 493

Your bill doubled? Possible...

What about water heater, cooking, laundry and bath use are they the
same, and water heater temp and efficiency, you flushed it and checked
the flame and it is burning good. What is R value of new windows vs old,
Usualy it is very little going from a dual pane Low E argon to triple
pane apx 1.5R or equal to 1/2 " fiberglass insulation. What is attic R
value or thickness. Was furnace cleaned. We had a record cold December
so far here in the midwest.

I have forced hot air. I plan on buying a cheapo thermostat this
weekend to see if that changes anything.

I have a Honeywell (square shaped) T86 programmable. (I am not 100% on
the model since honeywell support site is not responding).

If I can find the right model and instructions I will see if the cycle
rate can be changed. but as mentioned I will get a cheapo and try that
out to rule out thermostat.

I dont know the old R value but they are original windows when the
house was built in the 60s. So i suspect it did not have lowE or argon,
but probably just air.

As far as water heater and such I will check the gas usage for last
year and this year in non-winter months to see if maybe that is where
the extra gas is going (but as i said the heater is cycling fast so i
am sure that is where the extra therms are going). However that is a
good suggestion to check the other gas appliances as well.

attic R have no idea. i believe it is same insulation from when house
was built in 60s. I have not had the furnace cleaned but I had it
inspected last year and this year. I believe the tech from the heating
company will open the system up more to check for blockages and such.

Definitely usage doubled.. But of course they also raised cost from
$0.88 to $1.26. So bill is also almost double.
I am only look at thermal units consumed and not cost.

wrote:
I have forced hot air. I plan on buying a cheapo thermostat this
weekend to see if that changes anything.

You also might want to try ( if you can) increasing the run time of
your fan after the burners shut off. On my Trane, it was factory set at
I think a minute or so. I was able to flick some dip switches on the
control board so that the fan remains on for 2 1/2 minutes after the
burners shut off. Doing this lets the fan blow some warm air a little
longer.
Again, I don't know if you can do this on your Lennox. Check the
operating manual or the schematic.

Your present thermostat likely has a setting for swing or an
anticipator, but cycling may be the furnace itself, you havnt had it
cleaned or serviced so do that first.

You say your bill doubled in price well sure your gas is up 43% and its
a cold December, and you never cleaned your furnace or had it serviced.
Look at your attic and measure it and figure 3.5R per inch. It depends
on where you live but R 35 is not optimal in the midwest R 50-60 is, I
have alot more than that.

"Christian Fox" wrote in message

Have you done the obvious and compared the weather from last year to this
year? If it's
a lot colder this year, you're going to see higher utility bills. You
can't compare
months and assume they're going to be the same from year to year.

The easy way is to track degree days. Our newspaper has them listed on the
weather page. Here in CT, it seems very cold, but we are still behind
"average" for the year, but we are ahead of last year. Our perception of
how cold it is is often thrown off by a very cold spell and we may forget
the very mild time. The thermometer is more true.
--
Ed
http://pages.cthome.net/edhome/

Try setting the thermostat anticipator setting for a system that uses
hot water radiators since that will cause it to cycle on and off less
often. I also wonder if you have a vent near your thermostat.

Check for a dripping water heater relief valve. It will increase water
bill as well as gas bill.

Check for an open fireplace flue.

Make sure all rooms have returns or leave interior doors between rooms
open as much as possible to provide a return path for the air.

Is it more comfortable and less drafty with the new windows? If so,
then something else is causing your problem. Have someone do a blower
door test on your house.

Stretch.

I have just replaced the thermostat with a new honeywell CT31 to see if
it makes a difference.
Thus far the last 20 minutes the system is cycling on and off about
every 2 minutes.
It is 42 degrees out right now.

You mentioned to change the anticipator setting. This model has
something
some adjustment which I assume is what you mean. I set it to 0.4.
Are you recommending I change it 0.8?

Is this the temperature drop at which it turns on or when it turns off?

gas/oil furnace 0.4
electric furnace 0.3
high effic. furnace 0.8
hot water 0.8
gas/oil steam system 1.2

Nov 1-Nov 30 2004
http://www.wunderground.com/history/...q_statename=NA

Temperature Max Avg Min
Max Temperature 74 °F / 23 °C 59 °F / 14 °C 47 °F / 8 °C
Mean Temperature 60 °F / 15 °C 49 °F / 9 °C 37 °F / 2 °C
Min Temperature 52 °F / 11 °C 38 °F / 3 °C 23 °F / -5 °C
Degree Days Max Avg Min Sum
Heating Degree Days (base 65) 28 16 5 492
Cooling Degree Days (base 65) 0 0 0 0
Growing Degree Days (base 50) 10 2 0 63


Nov 1-Nov 30 2005
http://www.wunderground.com/history/...q_statename=NA

Temperature Max Avg Min
Max Temperature 77 °F / 25 °C 60 °F / 15 °C 34 °F / 1 °C
Mean Temperature 63 °F / 17 °C 48 °F / 9 °C 27 °F / -2 °C
Min Temperature 51 °F / 10 °C 36 °F / 2 °C 19 °F / -7 °C
Degree Days Max Avg Min Sum
Heating Degree Days (base 65) 38 17 2 506
Cooling Degree Days (base 65) 0 0 0 0
Growing Degree Days (base 50) 12 3 0 96

This does not seem right as everybody I know who installs new windows sees a
reduction in their heating requirements.

Are you looking at the amount of gas used or just the cost? Rates have gone
up.

Also I don't know if this would have anything to do with it, but perhaps
installing the new windows sealed your house tight so no air can get in. Is
there a vent by the furnace so it can get air? Is the vent open?

Then around here (Oregon), last winter was mild. This winter it has been
quite cold. So last year, 40's/50's was common. This year it has been
colder - in the 20's for several days now with highs in the 30's. My
neighbor has not changed anything and her bill has gone up quite a bit from
last year.

Ask your neighbors if their bills have gone up as well.

Overall if you want to reduce your heating and electric costs, read the info
at the following site. You can get "Energy Star" appliances, a 98% high
efficency furnace, add insulation, seal air leaks, etc...
http://www.energystar.gov

I changed the setting from 0.4 to 0.8 and left it there for about 1
hour.
It appeared to stay on much longer but it still went from on about 1-2
minutes after it turned off.

wrote:
I changed the setting from 0.4 to 0.8 and left it there for about 1
hour.
It appeared to stay on much longer but it still went from on about 1-2
minutes after it turned off.

It does seem odd that your house would cool off fast enough for the
heat to come on 2 minutes after it shuts off!

Have you plugged the hole in the wall behind the thermostat where the
wires come through? Maybe with the new windows the air infiltration is
greater through that hole now & the cold air is cooling the thermostat
causing faster cycling times.

MikeB

"Bert" wrote in message
oups.com...
:
: wrote:
: I changed the setting from 0.4 to 0.8 and left it there for
about 1
: hour.
: It appeared to stay on much longer but it still went from on
about 1-2
: minutes after it turned off.
:
: It does seem odd that your house would cool off fast enough for
the
: heat to come on 2 minutes after it shuts off!
:
: Have you plugged the hole in the wall behind the thermostat
where the
: wires come through? Maybe with the new windows the air
infiltration is
: greater through that hole now & the cold air is cooling the
thermostat
: causing faster cycling times.
:
: MikeB
:

Good Grief Charlie Brown!
The fan coming on for a minute or so after the furnace has
fired is NORMAL operation, whether it happened last year or not!
IFF it was the thermostat calling for heat, this suggestion
could be valid, but, out of curiousity I just pulled up the whole
thread and read it thru: in amongst all the misinformation not a
single poster has noted that the post-burn fan operation is a
normal event.
It's easy enough to get rid of IFF one knows what the various
sensors do and when, but I'm suggesting that no one who has
posted here (with a couple of exceptions, I think, because of the
awkward direction of the thread), has any REAL idea what they're
talking about.
The post-burn runtime is simply because the fan cooled the
compartment where the sensor is, the residual heat buildup then
took over, it came back on for a minute to push out the last
little bit of heat, and then turned off.
You CAN maladjust these things so that the furnace runs too
long or not long enough, resulting in the fan going off while the
air is still hot (wasting fuel), or the fan stays on so long it
ends up blowing cool air before it turns off, or, ideally, the
air temp coming out of the blower us just right when it turns off
and then comes back on for a short time to shake out the last few
drops of heat that are left but aren't too cool to use yet.

I refuse to detail how to do any of that, because the resetting
of the anticipator from a .4 to .8 is already enough to have
goofed up the overall balance - further fiddling can only make
things worse. There ARE valid ways to set up the anticipator,
and in fact, they were detailed on the packaging or papers with
the newly purchased thermostat. This little detail was neglected
by everyone and near as I can recall, no one suggested checking
what the last thermostat was set for, which, apparently is a
perfectly good thermostat.

In checking over the headers of these posts, I also suspect that
should actually be CROCKydile, and I also
respectfully submit that many of you have just been hooked on a
troll line. A mental comparison, without any real work involved,
says to me that this is an imposter and has posted here under
several other names in the recent past. Hasn't AnyONE NOTICED a
similarity to any of this kind of post?

Good grief Charlie Brown! g

Have fun mates!

You've actually posted the only sane response in several of the
last ones I've read on this thread, mostly out of curiousity.
Just for grins, I'm pasting here the response I made much deeper
in one of the side strings:
Good Grief Charlie Brown!
The fan coming on for a minute or so after the furnace has
fired is NORMAL operation, whether it happened last year or not!
IFF it was the thermostat calling for heat, this suggestion
could be valid, but, out of curiousity I just pulled up the whole
thread and read it thru: in amongst all the misinformation not a
single poster has noted that the post-burn fan operation is a
normal event.
It's easy enough to get rid of IFF one knows what the various
sensors do and when, but I'm suggesting that no one who has
posted here (with a couple of exceptions, I think, because of the
awkward direction of the thread), has any REAL idea what they're
talking about.
The post-burn runtime is simply because the fan cooled the
compartment where the sensor is, the residual heat buildup then
took over, it came back on for a minute to push out the last
little bit of heat, and then turned off.
You CAN maladjust these things so that the furnace runs too
long or not long enough, resulting in the fan going off while the
air is still hot (wasting fuel), or the fan stays on so long it
ends up blowing cool air before it turns off, or, ideally, the
air temp coming out of the blower us just right when it turns off
and then comes back on for a short time to shake out the last few
drops of heat that are left but aren't too cool to use yet.

I refuse to detail how to do any of that, because the resetting
of the anticipator from a .4 to .8 is already enough to have
goofed up the overall balance - further fiddling can only make
things worse. There ARE valid ways to set up the anticipator,
and in fact, they were detailed on the packaging or papers with
the newly purchased thermostat. This little detail was neglected
by everyone and near as I can recall, no one suggested checking
what the last thermostat was set for, which, apparently is a
perfectly good thermostat.

In checking over the headers of these posts, I also suspect that
should actually be CROCKydile, and I also
respectfully submit that many of you have just been hooked on a
troll line. A mental comparison, without any real work involved,
says to me that this is an imposter and has posted here under
several other names in the recent past. Hasn't AnyONE NOTICED a
similarity to any of this kind of post and some of the others?

Good grief, Charlie Brown! Oh well, it's entertaining if
nothing else, but it encourages them.

Pop


"Bill" wrote in message
...
: This does not seem right as everybody I know who installs new
windows sees a
: reduction in their heating requirements.
:
: Are you looking at the amount of gas used or just the cost?
Rates have gone
: up.
:
: Also I don't know if this would have anything to do with it,
but perhaps
: installing the new windows sealed your house tight so no air
can get in. Is
: there a vent by the furnace so it can get air? Is the vent
open?
:
: Then around here (Oregon), last winter was mild. This winter it
has been
: quite cold. So last year, 40's/50's was common. This year it
has been
: colder - in the 20's for several days now with highs in the
30's. My
: neighbor has not changed anything and her bill has gone up
quite a bit from
: last year.
:
: Ask your neighbors if their bills have gone up as well.
:
: Overall if you want to reduce your heating and electric costs,
read the info
: at the following site. You can get "Energy Star" appliances, a
98% high
: efficency furnace, add insulation, seal air leaks, etc...
: http://www.energystar.gov
:
:
:

Something is not right. Regardless of how much gas you used last year,
your furnace should not come on every 2 minutes. Another factor to
consider is where your T-stat is located, which can cause it to cycle
on and off quickly if there are big changes in room temperature.

Christian Fox wrote:

In article .com,
says...

Any suggestions on what may be causing this?


Have you done the obvious and compared the weather from last year to this year? If it's
a lot colder this year, you're going to see higher utility bills. You can't compare
months and assume they're going to be the same from year to year.

The number of days between meter reads can also vary according to the
convenience of the utility.

--
The e-mail address in our reply-to line is reversed in an attempt to
minimize spam. Our true address is of the form .

I may be using the term cycling different than it is used in the
industry.

This is what I hear and see and what i call a cycle. At no point does
the fan turn off and then back on during this cycle.

(a) click click click to light the pilot
(b) then I hear a large gas flame and burning of gas.
(c) then I hear the fan turn on // turns on only once and stays on
until (e)
(d) then i see the gas turn off
(e) then i hear the fan turn off.
(f) then either 1, 5, or 10 min interval later this cycle repeats with
the click click click (step a).

I think Charlie Brown you are a nutball!!!
As you notice in my first post i said i had heating problems with my
last house also.
So yes I am crockydile in the last post. This is no troll of any sort
or to waste anyones time.
If you had indeed read the post you would have noticed i temporarily
replaced the thermostat and changed that anticapator. The original is
back on and untouched.

I am having a problem and looking for suggestions on how to determine
the cause of the problem since
it is becoming expensive.

It appears to me you are trolling to start arguments and take this
thread off course. Please go home charlie brown.

Of course getting the thing cleaned by a pro and checked out doesnt
enter your mind, for all you know it got a yellow flame and squirrels
running the squirrel cage. Gee how about the attic, heat rises you know,
nothing like optimal R, not local code R value. Troll or not , you are
missing it.

Thanks to everyones input. The system checks out fine. Tech says it is
an air flow problem. He also plugged hole behind thermostat. He
suggests two things get a new thermostat with a different differential
(one you can set). The one I have has a half degree differential and
cannot be changed. Second is replace flex tubing ducts that run into
dining room with non flex duct.

So I suspect with the new windows the air flow has changed and is
causing the problem.

Edwin Pawlowski wrote:
"Christian Fox" wrote in message

Have you done the obvious and compared the weather from last year to this
year? If it's
a lot colder this year, you're going to see higher utility bills. You
can't compare
months and assume they're going to be the same from year to year.

The easy way is to track degree days. Our newspaper has them listed on the
weather page.

Here's a website with history of heating & cooling degree days for
several cities:

http://www.aepcustomer.com/weather/weatherData.htm

wrote in message
oups.com...
Thanks to everyones input. The system checks out fine. Tech says it is
an air flow problem. He also plugged hole behind thermostat. He
suggests two things get a new thermostat with a different differential
(one you can set). The one I have has a half degree differential and
cannot be changed. Second is replace flex tubing ducts that run into
dining room with non flex duct.

I am wondering how replacing the flex duct would help. Most of the flex
duct I have ever seen or installed has a plastic spiral wound duct inside an
insulated cover for heating and cooling. The only flex duct that I have
ever used for exhaust fans is the metal uninsulated type. This is usually 4
inches and way to small to run for heating and cooling. Depending on the
situation this could get quite expensive to replace and insulate.

Seems an odd fix, to me. Especially the t-stat.



So I suspect with the new windows the air flow has changed and is
causing the problem.