I just came back from a call in the Hatzic area of Mission, which was I had thought was just a simple furnace tune up. This was a Ruud brand furnace, and I’ve worked on quite a few. One of the more common problems with these is that they have a plastic housing on their draft inducer. Over time, this plastic becomes brittle. Hairline cracks are not uncommon, but very serious. When cracked, the inducer’s fan pushes the products of combustion (exhaust gas) through the crack and into the home.
It’s also not uncommon for the exhaust to contain carbon monoxide, an invisible odourless chemical that disrupts the body’s ability to absorb oxygen. People get sick or die due to overexposure, usually in their sleep.
This inducer was not only cracked, but fully broken. Sometime during the lifetime of this furnace, a technician cracked open this housing and, for a reason beyond my comprehension, decided to put it back together with tape. Worse – he/she didn’t tell the customer.
Astoundingly, upon closer inspection, I found that a second type of tape had been used as well. This told me that another technician noticed the problem, but also decided it wasn’t important enough to tell the customer, and added some tape of his/her own.
This is the kind of thing over which licenced gasfitters would lose their licences. There’s no excuse for this, and I suspect that this was the work of some handyman who has no qualifications and no business touching a gas appliance. These “technicians” are everywhere, and one can usually find them by shopping around for the lowest price. When it comes to trades, only those who have gone to school and earned a ticket in the trade have the knowledge to preform this work safely and to code. Finding the cheapest person to do the job will almost invariably yield substandard work.
Please watch the attached video to see why using a reputable tradesperson is so important!
