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Heating & Air Conditioning

Furnace Venting Question

13 years ago

I am building a new house in Minnesota and noticed that 2 White PVC pipe, I suspect 2" Pipe are vented from my Furnace out the side of my house. I noticed that they extend out about 1' and that the ends are open.

I asked the builder if there was some type of cover that goes over the pipe, he said the Heating guy said it was against code to put any thing over the pipe.

I wonder how bugs and even birds won't fly into these pipes, not to mention some rain.

Can I put a 45 degree pipe bent downward and some type of wire mesh over the end?

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Comments (3)

paul52446m
13 years ago
Any kind of screening could frost up in the cold weather.
I usually take the intake pipe , cut it off close to the house and put a 90 degree ell down. You need to get the exhaust out away from the house so it will not get blow en
back in to the intake. So i let the exhaust go lot about 12"
an cut it off at a 45 degree from top to bottom. I don't often get any birds, or leaves in the pipes. Paul
minnesotaguy28
Original Author
13 years ago
Thanks Paul, I would feel better doing that. I haven't looked, but the 2 pipes are only about 1 foot away from each other and are at the same length, I also have a HRV.
It doesn't make much sense to me if one is a intake and one is a exhaust, it would just suck the exhaust air back into the intake being that they are so close to each other

They also enter the Furnace roughly 1 foot away if that tells you anything.
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Curliegirlie1189 The statement about placing the unit within the structure was not directed at you... I was highlighting a discussion from another thread unrelated to this one. So I realize this was likely not your decision. With that said, that information doesn't hurt you for future reference. I'm not playing around with anything: It's hard to ascertain what someone is doing from a forum board in which a lot of DIY's come to garner information for this or that. I can't count the number of times this occurs. I can only guess based on statistics of others who have come here before you. Conclusions many times are drawn from the topic of the post - the header of the post. You state you are looking to cover up sound related issues, by sound proofing. In other words let's ignore why the sounds are there and just cover them up. Air noise most of the time relates to design of the system. Improper designs will produce more noise. This is most likely due to high static pressure being placed on your system when it runs. Design related problems can be a challenge to over come. I am not there... so with the information you have provided I can only guess. Guessing never leads to anything good. Combustion air is important which is why I posted the warning about it. The last thing you want is a quiet system that kills you in your sleep or makes you really sick.
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paul52446m
13 years ago
If you do like i said in my last post, you should be fine.
This way you don't get water in the intake and its ok to get water in the exhaust because it goes back to your drain.
When they first started 90+ units they put screens in them,
but in the cold area like i am in they would frost up so we can't use the screens. I am in northern Mi. and it can get down to -20 degrees. Paul

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