I recently replaced the inducer motor and wheel on my 15 yr old Payne furnace due to very loud and annoying operation. The new motor made a huge difference... runs much smoother and quieter. But the other morning I awoke to a cold house and realized the furnace was locked out. The code read that there was a lack of flame being sensed. After resetting, cleaning the flame rod, and watching it operate, the burners will light for an instant, but go out immediately. Almost like there is too much air flow to allow ignition. (reminds me of trying to light a torch on a windy day) After the third try, it did finally ignite and appear to run normally. Any ideas?
1 Answer
First off, I am going to assume you replace the inducer motor and wheel with the proper replacement. They are sized exactly to provide enough flow through the heat exchanger while maintaining a negative pressure in the vent pipe. That said, you are having a problem with flame proving. You cleaned the flame sensor but unless you have extremely dirty gas it is almost never dirty enough to cause a problem. Make sure the white wire is connected all the way from the flame sensor to the circuit board. If you have a multi meter with micro amps you could unplug the white wire at the flame sensor and plug a lead into each wire in series. You should get about 4-5 micro amps with the furnace running. If you don’t, it is either a bad ground or a bad circuit board. Usually a bad circuit board but I have seen all sorts of grounding problems from no ground to the furnace to a bad house ground allowing too much voltage into the ground circuit. I have also seen Payne (Carrier, Bryant, Day and Night) furnaces work for 15 years with a bad ground and then stop working. Once the ground was fixed the furnace continued working fine.
