On Sun, 27 May 2012 09:19:30 -0700 (PDT), "
wrote:

On May 27, 10:58Â*am, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
On Sun, 27 May 2012 08:34:31 -0500, Bill Gill
wrote:

TIA
I have an Affinity 93% furnace. Â*It is a lot better than the 30 year old
one that it replaced. Â*The biggest problem I have with it is that the
blower is noisy. Â*It runs noisy and it is noisy starting up. Â*Starting
up it makes a kind of a squawking noise, then just general blower noise.
I could wish that it was quieter, particularly since the closet is
right next to my bedroom.

Bill

Belt drive? Â*I'd check the tension and maybe put on some belt dressing
to eliminate the startup noise. Â*I'd also check to see if it can run
at a slower speed and still do a proper job for you.

Not likely a belt drive in a 93% AFUE furnace.

For Tony's question, don't have any experience with York.
But I wonder how much more the 98% modulating furnace
costs than one a step down, say 94%. I'd wonder about
the increasing complexity, more things to go wrong, cost,
etc vs a little improvement in efficiency. In particular I
don't see the need for an infinitely variable moduating
furnace. It would seem two stage gets you most of what
you're gonna get anyway. I guess if you're not paying
anything much for it and you're not worried that it may be
more complex than a simpler system to diagnose, fix,
etc. then maybe it's OK. I went through that analysis
couple years ago and went with 2 stage, 94%.
I settled on the 2 stage non condensing furnace when I replaced mine
back in August 2003. It has the "variable speed" DC blower and 2 speed
inductor fan.

The furnace guy I got it from went over the numbers with me, and the
difference between the condensing and non-condensing furnace, in my
house, given the amount of gas used over the previous years with the
30 year old original furnace, would take about 20 years to pay for in
fuel savings, and that is assuming no problems with the technology.
His SWAG was the new condensing furnace would be requiring repairs in
20 years costing more than the fuel savings, while the non condensing
furnace should still be running in 25 years.

Within 2 years the inductor fan was noisy. It was not the motor, but
the hub of the blower wheel was loose on the "web" of the squirrel
cage.Squealed like crazy, particularly when starting up on high. A
new unit was a few hundred dollars and not in stock, so I brazed the
joint between the hub and the web and it has been silent ever since.

The fuel savings between the old and new furnace were modest at best
- and the better efficiency of the DC blower meant a bit more heat was
required from the gas burner - so our gas bill did not change AT ALL -
but the electricity cost was reduced significantly (our blower runs on
low 24/7 - even without heat or A/C running)