When you have a central furnace in your house, you expect it to deliver warmth to all the rooms (except the basement, garage, and a few other spots that aren’t part of the living space). So when you run your furnace this winter and start to hear from family members that their rooms are too cold, or you notice chilly spots where you expect cozy warmth, something is wrong. Something that may require heating repair in Greenville, SC.
Before we go into some of the reasons that your furnace isn’t delivering even heating, we need to ask a big question…
Is this a new furnace?
If this is a recently installed furnace going through its first winter, then the problem may be that the furnace was incorrectly sized when installed. A furnace must receive accurate sizing so it’s powerful enough to heat a house without wasting energy.
If an amateur installed your furnace, they may have put in an undersized one that can’t handle the heating needs of your home. The only solution to an undersized furnace is to have it replaced—and have experienced technicians do the job!
Now that we’ve got past that important consideration, let’s look at some other causes of uneven heating from a furnace:
Dirty Furnace Filter
This is a common problem and the good news is that you can easily fix it on your own. When the furnace filter becomes too congested with dust and debris, which will take 1–3 months, it will limit the amount of air the blower fan can push through the furnace to receive heat. Put in a clean filter and see if this improves the heating in your house.
Blower Fan Trouble
The blower fan is responsible for pushing air into the furnace to be heated and then into the ventilation system to reach the rooms. A faulty blower fan will not be able to send as much heated air to the various rooms, resulting in uneven comfort.
Faulty Thermostat
The thermostat for your house might have a malfunction that causes it to shut the furnace off too early, before it reaches its temperature goal. When this occurs, the furnace won’t have enough time to distribute heat to all the rooms, leaving the more distant rooms colder.
Leaky Air Ducts
The furnace may be working fine and sending out enough heated air. But leaks in the ducts are letting some of that air escape before it reaches the rooms. This requires scheduling duct testing and then duct sealing to restore the ducts to airtight condition.
Short-Cycling
This is when the furnace continues to cut short its heating cycle and then turns back on again a short time later, repeating the process over and over. This is not only harmful to the furnace, but it also doesn’t allow it enough time to evenly heat the house.
Dying Furnace
Finally, uneven heating is often a warning sign that an old furnace is starting to fail. If your gas furnace is more than 15 years old, uneven heating is a good reason to look into a replacement.