Our New Programmable Thermostat, the upgrade, the story...

One of the best money saving devices around the Heywood household over the past 35 years has been the finger. The one used to keep the thermostat for the furnace down to the "sweater level." Here in Moroni the policy has been to keep it at 60 degrees at night and also while no one but me is home, 65 during the "occupied" hours, and 70 or so if we had company. Well, about three or so years ago the furnace started doing two things that disrupted the above policy and often called for the breakout of more than just a sweater. The way a properly working furnace operates is when the thermostat "calls" for heat , the furnace fires up, heats the "firebox" and soon after the blower kicks on and sends the heat throughout the house with the "fire" staying on until the house warms to the temperature set on the thermostat. The first problem ours had was the "fire" would shut off the instant the blower would kick on, and after a minute or so the blower would shut off and the cycle would start again. And again. And again. Until the desired temp was reached - taking much longer to warm the place than it should. The second thing it was doing was deciding on its own when it was going to fire up - which was not always when we needed it to fire up. At these times adjusting the thermostat would have no effect. We learned that sometimes the furnace could be "kick started" into action by flipping off the breaker and turning it back on. Well, the HVAC guy came out and said the circuit board in the furnace was bad and needed to be replaced and that would fix our problem. But the part alone was $238. Ouch. So we put up with it. After all, it was saving money every time it did not come on - and you can always put on another sweater. With some research I became convinced that once we got the furnace fixed, a programmable thermostat would be a real moola saver. We decided to replace the thermostat before replacing the circuit board in the furnace. We did. That was about a two minute job. And can you believe it the furnace now works perfectly. Years of putting up with it and two minutes fixes it - and without forking over the $238. So I now keep the old thermostat around just so when I walk by it I can flip it off.