Hmmm, what wwu123 said makes sense. Just seems kind of crazy that the furnace blower would suck up so much electricity. In regards to how old the furnace is, I have no clue. It was installed by the previous owner. Based on what I can find, I would guess it's at least 15 years old. I have not had the unit service or checked by an HVAC pro. (What do they do when they service it? Is it like a car where belts/wearable parts are replaced?) As part of an experiment, I did not turn on the heat at all yesterday. (was 52 degrees inside the house when I woke up this morning! I can do this since my wife is traveling for work and she won't complain to me about the lack of heat in the house.) I'm waiting for our "smart meter" to update PGE so I can check the energy usage for yesterday. If the usage stays flat, then it means the furnace/blower uses an obscene amount of power! If there is a spike, then someone is stealing power from me since there would be nothing turned on that wasn't already on during the day already) FYI: my peak usage of power was on Saturday 8-10pm at 2.23kWh. (can someone tell me what 1kWh is equivalent to?) Thanks!

HVAC is not my trade. The pros hopefully will weigh in on this one as well as the amateurs. The cooler air will actually have less moisture. Only more cooling in the ducts would cause condensation in the ducts. Your idea is so complex as to be unworkable. The systems I have seen have both sets of coils in the air handler plenum. The plenum heating coils get heat only when the circulating pump runs-- and that pump is controlled by the room thermostat.

Installed new blower motor (4 Speed) in a Payne Furnace. Works fine with the connection of the white wire to white wire, black to black. I also have a red wire connected to the printed circut board at a location marked low. I was about to connect this to the red wire on the motor, but found with a volt meter that when the fan is running on high (black wire) the red wire as well as the yellow and orange wires ,different speeds, all show approx 150 volts coming from them. i am reluctant to connect the red wire to the circut board in fear of frying the board. Any info. out there

I wish it were that simple Mike & Tiger. There is no AC brand that is more reliable than another. So many factors go into play here that it would be impossible to come to any 'realistic' conclusion. I see break downs of every single brand, 1yr old, 2yr old, 5yr old, 10yr old doesn't matter. I will tell you I mostly sell Goodman and ICP branded equipment. There is nothing wrong with either of these brands. Goodman is made in America, ICP is made in Mexico. It is what it is. Part of my decision is part availability, the other part is distributors who often challenge warranty claims and give me nothing but hassles to claim warranty parts. If someone requests one brand over another I do what I can to get them what they want. If I have a distributor that doesn't give me any grief with warranty claims or as in the case of Trane --- exclusivity when their product isn't any more special than anything else and they have proprietary parts on most parts of the unit... so when that unit breaks I am putting my customer down to wait on parts. Who wants to pay a premium for equipment only to be with out AC because the parts house is closed when the unit breaks down? Parts houses are only open around 8-5 and sometimes of the year 8-12 on Saturday. You want to pay a premium for equipment only to have to wait around for parts when the unit breaks? (it will break) Go to this thread... I posted toward the bottom showing reviews of most major brands (links within the post) Major Brand AC Consumer Reviews I track breakdowns of equipment I have installed. I typically pay more attention to serious break downs like leaking coils, compressor failure etc. Because these types of failures cost me money to my bottom line. Since I started my own Company (2008) I have not had a single compressor failure on any Condenser that I have 'originally' installed. I have had roughly 6 coils fail within the warranty period of the coil. I would say in terms of percentages probably around 3% of the equipment I've put in. (I do all the work myself, no subs, no installers.) National average for this figure is likely 25-35% or worse... because when I worked for national HVAC company anytime this figure hit above 25% at that company we were scolded to slow down and do more thorough job. I've used multiple brands thru the years, but switched to Goodman and ICP because of better part availability, easier warranty returns with nothing really preventing me in terms of "exclusivity" nonsense. With that said... nothing is perfect when it comes to HVAC.