Furnace stops before house warms up

This past week I changed out an old hot air furnace in a rental unit that made me question why the tenant did not go to the owner and offer to pay more rent in exchange for getting the furnace changed out sooner. If you are a renter that is paying the gas bill, then you need to think about this.
The hot air furnace was at least 60 years old. It had been coal fired furnace that was converted to gas many decades ago. The pilot light of this beast was more of a torch than a pilot light. When the thermostat called for heat the flame roared for 15 minutes before the exterior blower unit that was added when the furnace was converted to gas, started up to move air through the furnace and into the house.

As I was starting up the new unit, which took up less than 1/3 of the space of the old beast, the renter came and sat down on the basement steps looking on in amazement. How would that little thing make enough heat for the house? A few minutes later those questions were put to rest very quickly.

After starting the new furnace and burning off the oil that always smokes up the house a bit on a new startup the new little unit had the house warm as toast and was shutting down. Wow, that took less time than the old beast took to just warm up!

The renter related to me how that the old furnace cost over one hundred dollars a month just to run the pilot over the summer months. The wintertime heating bills were many times higher than that. The difference between the bills of the old unit and the bills that will be coming now will be unbelievable. A savings of 40-50% is not at all out of the question.

Now, if you are renting and are paying the bill to feed an old monster of a heating system, I suggest that you make a proposal to your landlord. Offer to pay a bit more rent in exchange for a new heating system. Not only will you decrease your gas bills enough to pay some extra rent and still come out ahead, but you will have the peace of mind that you have a safer heating system under the roof that you also live under.