Originally Posted By: rrazo
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Looking for any thoughts on this. I searched this board area and didn’t see a similar situation. Up here in great North Dakota, its that time of year for the Utility Company to scare folks into buying a new furnace it seems. I Inspected a home the other day that had an old General Electric gas furnace. This thing has seen its better days, but it seemed to run fine to me. I recommend that the furnace be checked out and service by an HVAC professional. The Utility Company came in a couple days later and stated to the owner that there were holes behind the inspection plate, and that the furnace needed to be repleced. They shut down the furnace and were nice enough to provide all the literature and quote on a new system. The owner wanted me to pay for the Utility Company inspection, based on something the Utility Company guy said to the owner. Do you believe that! I talked with the Utility company and they told me the heat exchanger was cracked. They inspected with mirror and light, but no carbon monoxide test was done. Anyway, I got my hands on the heat exchanger, took it to a friend at an HVAC company that only inspects heat exchangers with video. Guess what? No cracks. When I talked to the Utility Company about this they fell back on the two holes behind the inspection plate. It was unsafe because potentially soot or air could flow through these holes cauding carbon monoxide spread throughout the home. They also stated that sheet metal could not be repaired or replaced. These were holes the size on a nickel, onw in the top left corner and one in the top right corner. Is this sound Utility Company logic? Or are they feeding me a bunch of crap?
