I added the American Standard air conditioner to this system over 3 years ago, at that time the customer elected not to replace the furnace. But RHEEM furnaces never let me down and now its time to replacement it, the repair bills where getting to high.
Older RHEEM unit
Lucky for the customer we now have the American Standard 95% Variable Speed 2 Stage gas furnace. But as you can see the newer 2000cfm units are a little wider than the older coils. So I had to make a small transition under the unit. Because we felt the system really needed a better filter system we added the Honeywell 4″ f100 filter system.
New American Standard 95% 2 stage variable speed
Now the customer has a matching system with an American Standard air conditioner, indoor coil and gas furnace.
Heating And Cooling Skagit County
Need a Heat Pump, Air Conditioner, Furnace, Boiler or Tankless Water Heater? We install them all over Skagit county including Mount Vernon WA, Burlington WA, Anacortes, Sedro Woolley, La Conner, Stanwood WA, and on Camano Is.
One of my big concerns when changing out furnaces is duct and grille sizes, mainly the return air. I find most return ducting to be about 1 size to small and the grilles about 1/3 less in size than they should be. Now considering the new variable speed blowers that are in the new furnaces we could potentially have air flow noise issues. If your installing a 2 stage variable your not going to see high blower speeds until high fire. Its at high fire I get concerned.
Existing RHEEM 80%
In this situation the ducting was a little small but within the limits of the system, it was the return grille and can in their hallway that concerned me. So After replacing their RHEEM 80% to an American Standard 95% Variable 2 Stage and adding a Honeywell 4″ pleated filter system I replaced their stamped faced 14 x 18 #1050 grille to an recessed 20 x 20 #905.
American Standard 95% Variable 2 Stage
Now the new furnace I installed can breath allot easier and their existing return air flow noise drastically decreased.
Heating And Cooling Skagit County
Need a Heat Pump, Air Conditioner, Furnace, Boiler or Tankless Water Heater? We install them all over Skagit county including Mount Vernon WA, Burlington WA, Anacortes, Sedro Woolley, La Conner, Stanwood WA, and on Camano Is.
There are certain types of projects that really appeal to me, these projects generally have the biggest impact or affect for the customer and are usually the most challenging. This project was for the Church Of Christ in Mount Vernon, their oil furnace was from 1951 and it was a monster. Time for a upgrade!
Existing Oil Furnace
The furnace was located in the basement in a room about 9′ by 9′ and it consumed most of that room. I had to stand back out of the room just to take a good picture(above). One of the biggest challenges with small community Church’s is the furnace sizing. A lot of small Church’s only get occupied say 1 to 2 times per week and the rest of the time the furnace generally stays off. So you have to consider raising the temperature say from 50 degrees to 70 degrees just for a few hours, and within a short period of time. And of coarse keeping the noise level down. Perfect for the American Standard 95% 2 Stage Variable.
New American Standard 95% 2 stage Variable
One of the complaints from the church was the down stairs is always cold, and even though they had damper controls to help with this issue it never seemed to work correctly, therefore they abandoned that part of the system and went to space heaters. The American Standard 95% Variable 2 Stage furnace with a Honeywell 4″ pleated filter system (above) was installed to deal with just the down stairs, fortunately the existing duct work was zoned to do just that. As you can see the foot print is much smaller than the oil furnace.
Attic Ducting.
Now for upstairs I decided to move the furnace location to the attic, as you can see in the picture above there was plenty of room. This of coarse required some duct modifications.
New American Standard 95% 2 stage Variable
The new American Standard 95% Variable 2 stage furnace and Honeywell 4″ Filter installed like a dream. I had to convert some of the ducting to return while keeping the rest supply air. I also installed a Heat Pump, seeing how they wanted air conditioning I convinced them a Heat Pump is the way to go for added cost savings. As you can see I installed an emergency drain pan under the unit just in case we have a leak. The LP tank you see is for temporary back up heat until we get gas to the building.
New American Standard Heat Pump
Here is the new American Standard Heat Pump, funny how they always seem to match the building color. The refer pipe had to be installed on the exterior of the building and travel up to the attic, so we used a gutter pipe to conceal this piping. Works very well.
New Honeywell Thermostats
And to control the 2 furnaces we installed 1 Honeywell VisionIAQ and a 1 Honeywell VisionPRO 8000. Both the thermostats where located in the mechanical room and both where installed with remote sensors in the occupied spaces. By using remote sensors no unauthorized fingers can adjust the temperature.
Need a Heat Pump, Air Conditioner, Furnace, Boiler or Tankless Water Heater? I install them all over Skagit county including Mount Vernon WA, Burlington WA, Anacortes, Sedro Woolley, La Conner, Stanwood WA, and on Camano Is.
This 80% Rheem was ready for the recycle bin, the customer needed the furnace to be reliable because of their trips away from the home during the winters and this older Rheem was not cutting it. I am surprised it made it this long to tell you the truth.
Older Rheem 80%
The Rheem above was having board issues causing erratic behavior. No sense in throwing good money into a bad piece of equipment.
New American Standard 95% 2 Stage Variable Speed.
Not only is the newer American Standard 95% 2 stage variable speed furnace a quieter piece of equipment, it is a lot more efficient over the Rheem 80%. Now my customer can feel secure in knowing they have a reliable furnace and save some money.
New custom 4″ filter rack
Seeing how there was no access for a Honeywell 4″ pleated filter system because of the venting directly in front of the return ducting, I custom made a 4″ filter frame that is accessible from the side of the unit.
Need a Heat Pump, Air Conditioner, Furnace, Boiler or Tankless Water Heater? I install them all over Skagit county including Mount Vernon WA, Burlington WA, Anacortes, Sedro Woolley, La Conner, Stanwood WA, and on Camano Is.
Yet another Rheem 80% being replaced with an American Standard 95%. This unit was getting to costly to repair so the owner decided it was time for a new furnace, good choice. I hate seeing good money being spent on bad equipment.
Older Rheem 80% Furnace Location
It was early and cold when we arrived and I had forgotten to snap a “before” picture before we started, but got a picture just after the unit was removed. What reminded me was seeing the poor seal job the previous installer did on the take offs in the base can.
Existing Base Can.
As the picture shows above, there are gaps around the takeoffs and no sealant used, meaning a lot of hot air escaping into the crawl space. Id say about 50% of the base cans look like this when you pull the furnace. VERY wasteful.
New American Standard 95% Variable 2-stage
And above we have the new American Standard 95% Variable Speed 2 Stage gas furnace installed with a new Honeywell F100 4″ Filter bank On top of it. And yes we sealed the takeoffs before setting the new furnace.
Alpine Heating And Cooling
Need a Heat Pump, Air Conditioner, Furnace, Boiler or Tankless Water Heater? Or a complete heating system? We install them and all over Skagit county including Mount Vernon WA, Burlington WA, Anacortes, Sedro Woolley, La Conner, Stanwood WA, and on Camano Is.
Changing a 80% gas furnace out and replacing it with an American Standard 80% can not get any easier … unless you really enjoy adding the Honeywell F100 4″ Pleated filter bank on to the system, then it takes a little longer.
Older Payne unit
Here you see the older Payne 80% gas furnace. This particular age and model are prone to heat exchanger cracks and should be shut down immediately if found.
New American Standard 80%
If you look under the new furnace in the picture above you will see a new piece ducting. This duct is called a base can transition, this transition allows a wider furnace to be installed on a smaller can, some of the older brands where not as wide. And you will also notice the new Honeywell F100 4″ filter bank added above the new furnace.
Alpine Heating And Cooling
Need a Heat Pump, Air Conditioner, Furnace, Boiler or Tankless Water Heater? Or a complete heating system? We install them and all over Skagit county including Mount Vernon WA, Burlington WA, Anacortes, Sedro Woolley, La Conner, Stanwood WA, and on Camano Is.
I installed this Coleman TG9S 95% about 1 year ago, looking at the unit you would think I installed it yesterday. The reason I stopped by was the customer was complaining of odor coming from a return grille. It turned out after checking out the equipment the the filter was ready to be changed.
95% Coleman TG9S
Now in the picture above you will notice the Honeywell F100 4″ pleated filter is located below the furnace not above. Thats because the configuration of this furnace is called a Upflow, most furnaces you see in western Washington are of a Downflow configuration type.
Alpine Heating And Cooling
Need a Heat Pump, Air Conditioner, Furnace, Boiler or Tankless Water Heater? Or a complete heating system? We install them and all over Skagit county including Mount Vernon WA, Burlington WA, Anacortes, Sedro Woolley, La Conner, Stanwood WA, and on Camano Is.
Coleman makes the most economical 95% furnace on the market today…. here I swapped out a Carrier 80%. On this particular install I ran into a unattached return ducting at the ceiling. Drawing in air from the garage is not only a unsafe situation, it can be a costly one.
Older Carrier
What I really hate about the spec market furnaces is the lack of consideration for the filtering. Above you can see the straight duct above the furnace that holds the filters. The customer has to reach through the furnace and up into the ducting to change his filters. How many times do people get cut doing this?
New Coleman TG9S 95%
Now above you see the new Coleman TG9S 95% furnace and you see the new Honeywell F100 4″ filter bank. All the customer has to do is pull the door open and remove his filter. NO CUTS. And he has to do it less often because the 4″ pleat has 4 times the surface area of a standard 1″.
Alpine Heating And Cooling
Need a Heat Pump, Air Conditioner, Furnace, Boiler or Tankless Water Heater? Or a complete heating system? We install them and all over Skagit county including Mount Vernon WA, Burlington WA, Anacortes, Sedro Woolley, La Conner, Stanwood WA, and on Camano Is.