Repairs and Mods – Furnace edition

Last week I came back from an event on a 14* night and walked into a cold house. Brrrr! The furnace had failed to light while I was away and the heat inside slowly flowed to the great outdoors. It failed a dozen more times to light while I was standing over it shouting encouraging slogans! After a couple hours I gave up on the idea of it working and I went and bought a second electric heater to keep us warm through the night. I kept the fresh tank from freezing by circulating the water through the water heater and back to the fresh

The next morning I woke and dove into the great YouTube looking for answers. Sure enough, people have made videos about this.

Seems the issue was cat fur on the sail switch that kept it from closing and telling the gas valve to make some hotness.

I cleaned the fur off the sail switch and all the other bits and parts inside the furnace box then put it back together. Now it makes toasty, toasty hotness!