There are a variety of factors to consider when you are looking at purchasing a new furnace for your home.
Brand
One of the first things people consider when purchasing a furnace for their home is the brand. But this is actually one of the least important factors.
In our opinion, as long as you are dealing with one of the major brands, like Lennox, Carrier, Goodman, etc. – you are going to be fine! The key is, you just want the brand to be supported in the area. For instance, if the furnace were to break down in five or ten years’ time, you just need to have access to available parts, or more specifically, whatever company is repairing the furnace must be able to access the parts readily.
To think that some furnaces break down and some don’t is a bit of a stretch. The truth is, there’s probably a 10% variance between the best and the worst furnace in terms of likelihood of breakdown.
Noise level
Another factor people consider when purchasing a new furnace for their home is the noise level. This more specifically relates to the technology that you are installing vs. the brand of furnace. So, if you are looking for something quieter, you want to make sure you are putting in something high-efficiency, as it’s a different technology compared to what a mid-efficiency or low-efficiency is. High-efficiency takes all the potential sound and traps it in the furnace and sometimes transfers that sound outside.
Size of the new equipment being installed
Another factor that homeowner should not be worried about, but still you should be aware of – how the decisions are made – is the size of the new equipment being installed. You can’t rely on things online for the most part, because depending on the average winter temperature in your area, it will greatly impact what equipment gets installed. Sizing is based on the ‘winter design temperature’ for your area. Roughly meaning, what is the coldest it will ever get in your area? It needs to be able to heat at that temperature. So, the vast majority of the time, the maximum potential of the furnace is not needed and will never be used.
It is much more common for contractors to oversize a piece of equipment than to undersize it. And oversizing can lead to all sorts of negative effects, like prematurely wearing the furnace out, noise issues because the fan is too big and a variety of other factors.
One sub-category of the sizing issue is, there are two different things to size on the furnace: “the gas-sizing” and “the fan-sizing”. If you overdo the fan-sizing that will lead to problems, but if you underdo the fan-sizing, there won’t be enough air to push to the furthest parts of your home.
As a quick rule of thumb, I would suggest under-sizing on the gas, from what you think it is, and oversizing on the air flow. One of the best ways that we can do it is just to contact our sizing department and free of charge we will walk you through how we size the equipment.
