Natural gas furnaces need sufficient space and airflow to work properly.

Your furnace can shut down if it doesn’t have enough room. It also makes it hard for our professionals to perform furnace repair.

Annual furnace maintenance is crucial to keep your system operating well. A routinely serviced furnace may heat more efficiently, which could reduce your energy bills.

Related: How Does Furnace Maintenance Impact the Energy Efficiency of Your Home?

Maintenance often helps us discover problems before they become expensive. This could help lessen future repair costs and potentially extend the life of your system.

So how much room should your furnace really have?

How Much Space Does My Furnace Need?

If you’re remodeling your basement or sealing off your furnace room, you should consult manufacturer instructions and Ellsworth statutes for clearance guidelines.

As a general recommendation, your system should be 30 inches away from furnace room walls on all sides. This allows our service experts to conveniently replace it.

You also need to ensure the area has ample airflow and ventilation, especially if you have an older furnace with a metal flue.

Related: Furnace Service or Furnace Replacement: What to Consider

This type of furnace needs combustion air from the surrounding location. If there’s insufficient air, dangerous gas fumes and toxic carbon monoxide could back draft into your home.

If your furnace is placed in a little room with a gas water heater, you may need to add extra openings. This could include a fully louvered door or vents in the walls.

You don’t need to consider airflow and ventilation as much if you have a newer, high-efficiency furnace with PVC piping. Your furnace uses one pipe as an exhaust vent and the other to pull in air.

Keep Combustible Materials Away from Your Furnace

Although furnace rooms are often also used for laundry and storage space, you should keep yours free of items that could be fire hazards.

This includes:

  • Clotheslines
  • Cleaning or laundry products
  • Gasoline, paint or paint thinner
  • Rags and papers
  • Wood scraps and sawdust
  • Used filters

If you have a cat, put your litter box elsewhere. Cat urine contains ammonia, which could corrode your furnace’s heat exchanger. Plus, the furnace could circulate the unpleasant odors all over your home.

You should also routinely vacuum by your furnace to prevent dust from developing.

Related: Is it Time for Furnace Service or Replacement?

Request Expert Furnace Service

Whether you need furnace replacement or regular maintenance in Ellsworth, Walter's-Eaton's Electric, Plumbing, Heating & AC can expertly meet your needs. Our highly trained technicians can fix any HVAC model or brand.

Call us at 715-318-6728 or use our online scheduler to request an appointment now.