The Furnace Failures We See Most in Richmond
- Furnace clicks but never lights - failed hot-surface igniter or a gas valve problem; the igniter is one of the most common and fastest heating repairs there is
- Lights, runs a minute, shuts down - textbook dirty or failing flame sensor; a sensor cleaning or swap usually has heat back the same visit
- Blower runs but the air is cold - ignition failure upstream, or on electric furnaces a burned-out heating element or sequencer
- Short cycling - often a clogged filter overheating the furnace and tripping the limit switch; sometimes the switch itself
- Loud boom on startup - delayed ignition from dirty burners; worth fixing promptly, it stresses the heat exchanger
- Thermostat dead or unresponsive - sometimes the thermostat, sometimes a blown control-board fuse telling you something shorted
A Straight Word on Heat Exchangers and Carbon Monoxide
A cracked heat exchanger can put combustion gases, including carbon monoxide, into your air supply. It is also the most over-diagnosed problem in this trade, used to scare people into replacements they do not need. Our position: if a crack is suspected, you see the evidence - camera footage or the crack itself - before anyone says the word replacement. And every gas-heated home in Richmond should have a working CO detector on every sleeping floor regardless of who services the furnace.
Gas, Electric, and Richmond’s Mixed Housing Stock
The metro heats every way imaginable: natural gas furnaces across the city and inner counties, electric furnaces and heat pumps in the all-electric subdivisions, and the occasional boiler in Northside and Fan houses that never left hot-water heat. We repair gas and electric furnaces and the forced-air systems attached to them. If your heat is a heat pump - common across Henrico and Chesterfield - the heat pump repair page covers what fails there, and the phone number is the same either way.
What Heating Repairs Cost
Igniters and flame sensors are the inexpensive end - commonly $150 to $350 installed. Blower motors and inducer motors typically run $350 to $700. Control boards vary with the furnace brand. Heat exchanger and gas valve work is where repair-versus-replace gets discussed honestly, with the furnace’s age on the table. As always: the full price is quoted before any work starts.
Same-Day Heating Repair Across the Metro
Richmond, Henrico, Chesterfield, and Hanover - no-heat calls move to the front of the day in winter, the same way no-cool calls do in July. Call (804) 361-4250
.