How old is your furnace?

Knowing the age of your furnace, air conditioner, and appliance can be helpful when you consider maintenance and repairs. If an item is near, at, or past its expected useful lifespan, you may want to plan for replacement instead of repair. But how do you know how old it is?

If you had the item installed, hopefully you have the original receipt and invoice. Did you register it on the manufacturer’s website? If so, you may be able to access the records there. You can also often determine the item’s date of manufacture from the dataplate. The dataplate is the information sticker showing the item’s model and serial number. Sometimes, but not always, the dataplate will show the actual date of manufacture. If that date is not clearly shown, you may be able to determine the age using the model and serial numbers.

Here’s an example using a furnace …

1. Find the dataplate on the item. On a furnace, it may be either on the outside of the unit, or you may need to remove the maintenance panel to see it (if you don’t feel comfortable doing that, ask your technician to record the information and take a picture of the dataplate at your next maintenance appointment).
2. Record the manufacturer, along with the model and serial numbers. It’s good to record these, along with a photo of the dataplate, for insurance purposes.
3. Go to https://www.building-center.org.
4. Click “HVAC INDEX” for Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning items. There is a separate button for Water Heaters.
5. Scroll down the list and select the correct manufacturer.
6. Look through the options to find a serial number that matches the format of yours.

In this example, the manufacturer is Amana, the Model Number is GUIC045FA30, and the Serial Number is 0304138400. The Building Center website shows this is Style 1, with the first two digits indicating the year of manufacture and the second two digits indicating the month. So this particular furnace was manufactured in April (04) of 2003. 

Building Center website works well for HVAC and Water Heater units. It does not cover other items such as kitchen appliances. For those, use Appliance411; the format is a little different but it generally works the same.

It can be a little tricky to find the dataplates at times. On a water heater it’s usually easily visible on the side of the unit. On an outside condensing unit (air conditioner), it’s usually on a side or corner of the unit (hopefully it hasn’t faded due to weather). On kitchen appliances, it’s often visible when the door is open, on the edge of the door or the unit.

For information about possible recalls on equipment and appliances, read about RecallChek here . For approximate lifespans of items in your home, go to the Resources page and scroll down to the Life Expectancy Chart.

As always, please feel free contact Tim Howell at Milepost Home Inspection with any questions about your house. Call/text 832-986-1942, email inspector@mileposthome.com, or use the Contact page.