Furnace Installation in Moline, IL
A new furnace here will run from October through May every year. Tell us about the house, and a licensed contractor who covers Rock Island County will get in touch.
Tell us about the job
It takes about a minute.
Eight months of heat, and nights near 18°F
Moline needs a furnace running from October through May. On winter nights that average 18°F, the burner is on for long stretches to keep the house warm.
Most homes here heat with gas, and any new non-weatherized gas furnace has to reach at least 80 percent AFUE, a floor set by federal rule since November 2015. Power matters too. Across Illinois, 16 percent of households went at least 24 hours without power in 2024, and this area has recorded 23 winter storms and 87 damaging wind events over the past ten years. A furnace that comes back on by itself once power returns is worth asking about.
- 8 months
- October through May, your furnace is on duty
- 18°F
- the average winter night it heats against
- 78%
- of homes here heat with gas, so most furnaces here burn gas
- 80% AFUE
- the federal minimum any new unit must meet
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
A high-efficiency gas furnace would save about $120 a year to run in Rock Island County compared with a gas furnace.
Estimates for a typical Rock Island County home, from EIA household energy data, Illinois fuel prices and NOAA climate normals. Your home will differ.
In Illinois, HVAC licensing for homes is left to the cities and towns.
Illinois leaves HVAC licensing to the cities and towns, and that includes Rock Island County. There is no county license either, so whatever rule applies comes from the city the house sits in, and it can differ from one town to the next.
For a furnace install, most cities and counties require a permit from the local building office, with an inspection once the work is done. That inspection is where a gas connection gets checked, which matters here since most homes in Rock Island County heat with gas.
Source: Illinois General Assembly
- What size furnace does my house need?
- There is no answer to that without a room by room heat loss calculation on your actual house. Square footage alone does not tell you enough, because insulation, window count, ceiling height, and how much sun a wall gets all change the number. A contractor will run what is called a Manual J calculation to size it correctly. Getting this wrong matters here too. An oversized furnace short cycles and wears out early, and an undersized one will struggle on the 18°F nights this area sees all winter.
- How do I know it's time to replace my furnace?
- Watch for a few signs together, not just one. Rising repair calls, uneven heat between rooms, a furnace that runs longer than it used to, or a yellow flame instead of blue all point toward the end of its life. Age matters too. Furnaces here run October through May, eight months a year, so the wear adds up faster than in places with a short winter. If yours is old enough that parts are getting hard to find, or a repair would cost a large share of what a new unit runs, replacement is usually the better call. A contractor can look at the actual unit and tell you which side of that line you're on.
- Is a high-efficiency furnace worth it?
- It depends on how much you heat and how long you plan to stay in the house. With heat needed eight months of the year here, and winter nights averaging 18°F, a furnace works harder and longer than it would in a milder climate, so higher efficiency has more time to pay off. Since 2015, federal rules already require non-weatherized gas furnaces to hit at least 80 percent AFUE, so the real choice is usually between that baseline and a high-efficiency model rated higher still. A contractor can walk you through the actual models and their ratings for your situation.