Hi.... Please help me prep for the service crew that is going to look at my old Armstrong Furnace (and then try to sell me a new one instead of repair the one I have). I want to repair this baby since we will be doing extensive energy-audit type stuff next year and will then by a new one that will go in a different location. So making do with the one we have is prefered.
I'll skip the details and just say that the flue works fine and is pretty well sealed with red RTV, the return ducting and plenum are all sealed, and the flame jumps around when the blower comes on.... so we think we have a leaking heat exchnager (HE).
The heat exchanger seems to have an outter ring. I think combustion gas flows from the inner chamber through the rectangular connection to the outter ring, and I suspect the weld on this area may have cracked (because I might have unintentionally applied torque when disconnecting the bugger from the old flue).
In this pic, I removed the outter panel, and a round cover on the inner heat shield. The bolted hatch is the outter surface of the heat exhchanger's outter ring. I think if I remove that, we'll be able to inspect/repair damage to the rectangular connector between the rings.
(My fingers are behind the heat shield... in other words, my fingers are where the blower forces cold air over the outter surface of the outter ring of the heat exchanger).
QUESTIONS:
Visual inspection looks good otherwise, and I know you can't rely on that, but does anyone know of the common problem spots on these old furnaces?
Is that an asbestos gasket under the bolted access hatch? How do you remove it and what do you replace it with?
What's the white stuff in the middle pics.... I mean, where it looks like some liquid back in time was blown ((up)) the surface of the heat exchanger? There's also sort of a white triangle on the rectangular connector thing. Does that suggest leaking?
Thanks for suggestions
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