What a dork.

Please provide links to those "bi-weekly reports of joe homeowner
burning down his house, killing his kids, getting electrocuted,
suffocating on gas/exhaust fumes - etc...". I've been lurking in
alt.hvac for YEARS and I recall only one such post, and it was later
invalidated.

Servicing residential HVAC equipment isn't rocket science. This stuff
is less complicated that the typical car nowadays.

You had a bunch of these *competent* techs work on your furnace and as
you admit they didn't know what they were doing. Frankly, I'll take my
chances with my own capabilities.