Repaired at the dealership... with a happy ending
A couple of weeks ago while camping at the Colorado River {Buckskin Mountain SP} my furnace unexpectedly just quit. It is a beast at 35,000 BTU's and for 7 years has performed flawlessly but one morning it just would not run{???}
I checked the fuse {first} and it was fine, then checked the operation of the thermostat. I could feel/hear the click when setting the temperature and it ran the AC just fine so I eliminated that as the problem. Next, I went outside and opened up the cover and checked all of the wiring, nothing loose, even turned the off/on switch on and off a couple of times hoping maybe a reset might help...zilch... arrrg.
Some research online convinced me that any further efforts on my part were way over my pay grade. Decided to bite the bullet and make an appointment with La Mesa RV {where we purchased the rig 5.5 years ago}. Arrived at 0800 and they went straight to work {at $149 per hour... Ouch!}.
I went over and spoke with Luis their tech giving him a little bit of history and he suspected it was a bad control board. He pulled the entire furnace and found no electrical or LP gremlins. Fortunately, they had a replacement board in stock {although I admit to cringing at the thought of what it would cost} and while I watched he quickly removed the old board, installed the new one and poof, it fired right up and ran perfectly.
He buttoned everything up replacing the wire connectors in the process for good measure. I thanked him profusely and spent a few minutes sharing my good thoughts with his Service Manager.
I rolled out 1 hour and 45 minutes after arriving, was just charged for one hour of labor - I'm guessing it was actually closer to 1.5. The new control board was $118.99 so with tax, shop supplies and labor I was out the door for $291.06. Yes, I am one seriously happy camper! :B
Here is a shot of the old control board:
I checked the fuse {first} and it was fine, then checked the operation of the thermostat. I could feel/hear the click when setting the temperature and it ran the AC just fine so I eliminated that as the problem. Next, I went outside and opened up the cover and checked all of the wiring, nothing loose, even turned the off/on switch on and off a couple of times hoping maybe a reset might help...zilch... arrrg.
Some research online convinced me that any further efforts on my part were way over my pay grade. Decided to bite the bullet and make an appointment with La Mesa RV {where we purchased the rig 5.5 years ago}. Arrived at 0800 and they went straight to work {at $149 per hour... Ouch!}.
I went over and spoke with Luis their tech giving him a little bit of history and he suspected it was a bad control board. He pulled the entire furnace and found no electrical or LP gremlins. Fortunately, they had a replacement board in stock {although I admit to cringing at the thought of what it would cost} and while I watched he quickly removed the old board, installed the new one and poof, it fired right up and ran perfectly.
He buttoned everything up replacing the wire connectors in the process for good measure. I thanked him profusely and spent a few minutes sharing my good thoughts with his Service Manager.
I rolled out 1 hour and 45 minutes after arriving, was just charged for one hour of labor - I'm guessing it was actually closer to 1.5. The new control board was $118.99 so with tax, shop supplies and labor I was out the door for $291.06. Yes, I am one seriously happy camper! :B
Here is a shot of the old control board:
