Furnace Repair in Aurora, IL
Furnaces here run from October through May. If yours quits, tell us what it's doing and a licensed contractor who covers Kane County will get in touch.
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Eight months of heat, and nights that drop past zero
Aurora needs its furnace running from October through May. That is eight months where a night in the teens, or colder, is normal for December through February, when the average low sits at 18°F. A furnace built to cycle through a short winter is not built for this. Here it fires and shuts off, over and over, for the better part of the year.
Most homes here heat with gas, so the burner and igniter are doing that work night after night. All that cycling wears on the parts that start the flame. An igniter that has done this for years can fail without warning, and the furnace won't light at all. Add in the storms, Kane County has seen 19 of them over the past decade along with 190 damaging wind events, and the power behind that furnace is not always guaranteed either.
- 8 months
- October through May, your furnace is on duty
- 18°F
- the average winter night it heats against
- 86%
- of homes here heat with gas, so most furnaces here burn gas
- 19 winter storms
- in ten years, the nights a failure hurts most
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
A new furnace would cut about $150 a year off heating for a typical Kane County home.
Estimates for a typical Kane County home, compared with an older unit built to the previous federal minimum, from EIA household energy data, Illinois fuel prices and NOAA climate normals. Your home will differ.
Repair makes sense when one part has failed and the heat exchanger is sound.
Replacement makes sense when the heat exchanger is cracked or the furnace keeps needing parts.
In Illinois, HVAC licensing for homes is left to the cities and towns.
Illinois has no state license for HVAC contractors. Whether a rule applies to your furnace repair depends on the city or township where the house sits, not the county. Some Illinois towns license this work and some do not, and there is no state test or state record behind any of it.
A furnace repair means opening a gas line, and that connection has to be sealed correctly. Where no local license applies, that is the part of the job carrying the most real risk, and it falls to whoever is doing the work to get it right. In Kane County, 86.1 percent of homes heat with gas, so a furnace burning gas is the normal case, not the exception.
Source: Illinois General Assembly
- Why won't my furnace turn on?
- Most of the time the thermostat isn't calling for heat the way it should, or power isn't reaching the furnace. Check that the thermostat is set above room temperature and has fresh batteries if it takes them. Next check the furnace switch, which looks like a light switch near the unit, and the breaker it runs on. If those are fine, the igniter may have failed or the flame sensor may be dirty, and a contractor will need to check it.
- Why is my furnace blowing cold air?
- If the air coming out feels cold but the furnace is running, the burners may not be lighting even though the blower is. A dirty flame sensor is a common reason for this, since it shuts the gas off as a safety measure when it can't detect a flame. It can also mean the igniter is failing partway through the cycle. Either way the furnace needs a contractor to look at the ignition system.
- Why won't my furnace pilot light stay lit?
- A pilot light that keeps going out is usually a sign the thermocouple has worn out. The thermocouple is a small sensor that sits in the pilot flame and tells the gas valve it's safe to stay open. When it fails, the valve shuts the gas off even though the pilot is lit. This is a common repair and a contractor can replace the thermocouple directly.