Syracuse and the surrounding Onondaga County area
Furnace Replacement and Installation in Syracuse
Put a new gas furnace in with the size worked out from your house and the venting work priced before you sign, not discovered when the crew is already in the basement.
Furnace Replacement quote
Tell us the house rather than the model number: how it is heated now, what else is connected to the chimney, and roughly how old the furnace is. We will put you in front of a licensed, insured contractor who does the arithmetic before quoting a size.
Would you rather talk it through? Call (315) 640-3590, answered 24/7.
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- One credit per customer per property, on your first booked job.
- Valid through December 31, 2026.
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What comes out, what goes in, and where the exhaust goes next
Furnace replacement is the removal of an existing forced air furnace and the installation of a new one, together with everything the new appliance changes around it: the gas connection, the flue or vent route, the condensate drain on a condensing model, the electrical supply, the plenum connections at the cabinet and the thermostat. Two decisions carry the whole job. The first is the size, which section M1401.3 of the Residential Code of New York State says is arrived at by selecting equipment under ACCA Manual S from a load calculated under ACCA Manual J, and which in practice is frequently copied off the nameplate of the unit being carried out. The second is where the exhaust goes. Oak Ridge National Laboratory records that a condensing furnace cannot use the vent the old furnace used, so a new route has to be built, and that a gas water heater which shared the old chimney is left on a flue whose cross section was sized for two appliances.
- Gas furnace removal and replacement in a forced air house
- Heating load calculation and equipment selection before a size is agreed
- Condensing furnace installation with a new sidewall or vertical vent route
- Mid efficiency replacement where the existing chimney stays in use
- Liner sizing where a water heater is left alone on the flue
- Gas piping, condensate drain and the electrical connection at the appliance
- Supply plenum and return air changes where the new cabinet is a different size
- Combustion air supply for the room the appliance sits in
- Thermostat replacement and control wiring
- Permit application and the municipal inspection where the town asks for one
- Disconnection, removal and disposal of the old appliance
What separates a cheap furnace quote from a complete one
Two quotes for the same furnace can be thousands apart and both be honest, because a furnace replacement is an appliance plus everything the appliance changes around it. These are the things that move the number.
The calculated heating load, not the old nameplate
NYSERDA tells contractors to run their own calculation rather than match the outgoing unit, for two reasons: the house may have been insulated, air sealed or reglazed since, and many of the furnaces being removed were oversized when they went in. Copying the nameplate copies somebody else's error forward another twenty winters.
Whether the new furnace is a condensing model
Oak Ridge National Laboratory states that the existing chimney or Type B vent cannot serve a condensing furnace directly, and sets the options out as a new sidewall route, a new vertical route, or reusing the old chimney as a chase. It records that all of them cost more than a like for like swap, which is why two honest quotes on the same house can differ.
What else is connected to the chimney
Where a gas water heater shared the flue, removing the furnace leaves it on a chimney built for two appliances. The remedy is usually a liner sized for the single appliance, and section M1801.3 of the Residential Code of New York State puts duties on a chimney at the moment an appliance is disconnected from it.
Where the new vent can terminate
New York sets the bottom of a vent terminal at not less than 12 inches above finished ground. The Syracuse snowfall normal is 123.8 inches a year, so the minimum height and the height that will still be clear in February are not the same number, and the time to choose is at the quote.
The age of the house and how heat was put into it
The median year a house was built in the city of Syracuse is 1948, and 43.1 percent of city housing units date from 1939 or earlier. Heat in a house that old was usually added rather than designed in, so the ducts, the flue and the appliance were not planned together.
Which municipality the address sits in
Liverpool names replacement furnaces, boilers and central air on its own permit list. Camillus and Baldwinsville have adopted the optional like for like replacement exemption. Clay publishes no list at all. The answer changes across a town line, not across a county.
The equipment size against a city mechanical license class
The City of Syracuse Board of Mechanical Examiners caps what each license class may install: a Class C Residential license covers furnaces up to 200 MBH input, a Class B Limited license up to 500 MBH. In the city a homeowner can ask which class the contractor holds and the answer means something specific.
Anything else changing in the same basement
Section 27-54(h) of the City of Syracuse Property Conservation Code requires the equipment and its enclosure to have air enough to replenish what complete combustion consumes. If the basement is being finished or a powerful kitchen exhaust is going in, the air supply should be designed once for the finished house.
Ask about the chimney before you compare prices
It is the line item that most often explains the gap between two bids on the same house, and it takes one question to find out whether yours has one.
From the load calculation to the final inspection
Establish what is actually down there
Fuel, the existing vent arrangement, what else is on the chimney, the duct layout, and where the gas and electric arrive. This is a survey of a purchase, not a diagnosis: if the furnace has simply stopped, get it looked at first, because a replacement decided on the coldest night is decided without numbers.
Calculate the load
NYSERDA describes the work: ceiling heights, wall, window, roof and floor areas, insulation values, which way each window faces, and a blower door test for air tightness. If the visit is a walk to the basement and back, no calculation is happening, whatever the quote later says.
Select the furnace against that number
Manual S selection from the calculated load, worked to a design temperature for this location. Section 27-54(a)(2) of the City of Syracuse Property Conservation Code judges heating capability against an outside temperature of minus ten degrees Fahrenheit, and that assumption belongs on the worksheet you are shown.
Settle the venting and the chimney before anything is signed
Where the new vent runs, how high above grade it terminates, and what happens to any appliance left on the old flue. The Department of Energy's furnace replacement checklist treats telling the homeowner about an orphaned water heater as part of the job rather than as an upsell.
Paperwork, then a date
The permit where the municipality requires one, and in DeWitt a signed estimate before the application can even be started. October is when the first freeze usually arrives and it can land anywhere in that month, so quotes in late summer and work in early fall is the comfortable order.
Installation
Old appliance out, new cabinet set and connected to the plenums, gas, condensate and power made off, the vent route built, the liner fitted where one is needed, and the thermostat wired.
Commissioning, inspection and handover
The appliance is started and checked, the municipal inspection happens where a permit was pulled, and you should finish holding the load calculation, the equipment submittal and the permit paperwork.
What furnace replacement looks like
When a new furnace is the job, and when it is not
When you may not need this at all
- If the furnace is twelve or fifteen years old and still heating the house, this is a maintenance conversation rather than a replacement one. Age alone is a weak argument: the Energy Information Administration puts 31.1 percent of main heating equipment in this census division at twenty years or older, and most of it is working.
- If the heat comes from radiators or baseboard rather than from vents, the appliance is a boiler and the job is a different one.
- If the complaint is that some rooms never get warm while the thermostat is satisfied, a new furnace may not answer it. NYSERDA describes an oversized system pushing air past the thermostat before it mixes into the room, which produces that exact symptom.
- If the system has stopped outright, have it diagnosed before you shop. That is a repair visit and this is not it.
- Onondaga County Department of Social Services administers a HEAP benefit that can go toward repairing or replacing a primary heating system. It has its own conditions and its own season and it closes when the funding is exhausted, so the county is the place to ask, early in the year rather than during a cold snap.
What is out of scope
- Diagnosing why an existing furnace is not working, which is a repair visit rather than a purchase.
- Chimney rebuilding, masonry repair or work above the roof line beyond what the new venting needs.
- Duct design and duct alterations past the plenum connections at the appliance, which is separate work.
- Water heater replacement, although what happens to its venting is part of this conversation.
- Asbestos found on old duct wrap or pipe insulation, which is a separately licensed trade.
- Advice on anybody's tax position, which belongs with a tax preparer.
Towns where we arrange furnace replacement
- Furnace Replacement in Syracuse
- Furnace Replacement in North Syracuse
- Furnace Replacement in East Syracuse
- Furnace Replacement in Liverpool
- Furnace Replacement in Cicero
- Furnace Replacement in Clay
- Furnace Replacement in Salina
- Furnace Replacement in DeWitt
- Furnace Replacement in Manlius
- Furnace Replacement in Fayetteville
- Furnace Replacement in Camillus
- Furnace Replacement in Baldwinsville
- Furnace Replacement in Marcellus
- Furnace Replacement in Skaneateles
- Furnace Replacement in Solvay
What homeowners ask before signing a furnace quote
How do I know what size furnace I need?
From a calculation of your house. Section M1401.3 of the Residential Code of New York State says equipment is sized under ACCA Manual S from loads calculated under ACCA Manual J, and the energy code repeats it at R403.7 where it is marked Mandatory. Ask on the telephone, before anyone visits, whether a load calculation will be done and whether you will be given the worksheet.
Is a bigger furnace a safety margin?
No, and this is the thing most often backwards. NYSERDA states that impacts on comfort and energy use begin once a system is sized at 120 percent of the building load and that severe impacts can begin above 150 percent. An oversized furnace satisfies the thermostat quickly, shuts off, starts again, heats unevenly and wears its own components faster.
One quote has a liner in it and the other does not. Which is wrong?
Probably neither, and that is the problem. If your gas water heater shares the chimney with the furnace, a condensing replacement vents out the wall and leaves the water heater on a flue sized for two appliances. Oak Ridge National Laboratory describes the remedy as a liner sized for the single appliance or a powered draft inducer, and says plainly that both add cost. Ask both contractors what happens to the chimney.
Do I need a permit to replace a furnace?
It depends which municipality you are in. 19 NYCRR 1203.3 lets a local program exempt a replacement that does not alter the equipment's listing or depart from its original specifications, and Camillus and Baldwinsville have taken that exemption while Liverpool names furnace replacement on its permit list. Note how narrow the wording is: swapping an older atmospheric furnace for a sealed combustion condensing one changes the listing.
Is New York going to stop me putting in another gas furnace?
Not in an existing house. New York Energy Law section 11-104 reaches new buildings and says in terms that the prohibition does not apply to buildings existing before it took effect, including their repair, alteration and addition. The Assembly's own explainer of the All Electric Buildings Act puts it as plainly as anyone could: existing gas appliances can also be replaced with new gas appliances.
Should the air conditioning be done at the same time?
It is worth asking, because the cooling coil sits in the furnace's airstream and the cabinet is open on the day the furnace is changed. It is a separate purchase with its own load calculation, and it is a reasonable answer to say not yet. What is worth knowing is that EPA's listing for the current refrigerants is for new equipment only, and it defines new equipment as a complete new circuit, so a proposal to change only the outdoor unit is one to question.
Send us the house, not the nameplate
How it is heated now, what shares the flue, and what the rooms do in January. That is where a furnace quote worth comparing starts.