Cold weather puts a stress on your furnace; businesses boom

FLINT (WJRT) -

(12/12/13) - Our recent cold snap can put a lot of stress on your furnace.

That's what one Linden man found out the hard way this week.

ABC12 News went inside that man's home and it was pretty cold in there. He's been without heat since Wednesday.

When John Maniak left his home Wednesday, he had heat inside. When he came back several hours later, "No heat," he said. "We got home maybe 10 and the temperature was maybe 50, maybe 45 degrees in the house and believe me it was chilly trying to sleep through the night, so we had the electrical blankets going."

The stress on furnaces is keeping Mid-Michigan heating and cooling companies busy.

Neil Castle, a Service Tech with Holland Heating and Cooling, says his company is averaging about 30 phone calls a day.

"Majority of it is 5, 6-year-old furnaces haven't been maintenance and 15 to 20-year-old furnaces have been repair parts," he said.

At Maniak's home, the boiler shut off. Although repair work is being done now, the homeowner doesn't want to relive another cold night like he did Wednesday.

"It's very frustrating when we walked in the door we were expecting 70 degrees and instead we got 45 degrees inside the home on one of the coldest days this winter, so that wasn't too pleasant," he said.

See more here:
Cold weather puts a stress on your furnace; businesses boom