Cruise Control: Your Home’s Key to Big Energy Savings

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2-stage-furnace

Cruise Control

The cruise control we’re used to seeing in our cars has been around for over 60 years. It’s a handy little feature that’s great for long drives on the freeway. Pick a speed that is ideal for you and your car will maintain that speed. Rain or shine. Up hill or down. There’s even a resume button we can press if we have to disengage the cruise control for some reason.

Cruise control is more than just a luxury. It improves your car’s fuel efficiency and saves you money.

And we all like saving money.

Did you know that furnaces have cruise control too? 

Cruise control is fuel efficient because your car is in control of how hard it works to maintain the set speed. So it doesn’t work as hard on that small incline as it would as you summit that steep hill.

Two-Stage Furnace

Furnaces with cruise control are called two-stage furnaces. And yes they work much like the cruise control in your car works once it is set. Older furnaces only have one speed. When they came on–whether maintaining a temperature or increasing it–they came on at full speed. So that 60,000 BTU furnace was always running at 60,000 BTU.

It would be like your car’s engine revving  up to 5,000 RPM whether the speed dropped just a hair below your set speed on that small incline or you wanted to increase your speed by 10 MPH.

Older furnaces don’t know how much energy is needed to maintain or reach ideal temperatures. And this costs you money.

Enter the two-stage furnace. Now your furnace can determine how much fuel and power it needs to get your home to your desired temperature. If your furnace is maintaining a set temperature it will start off running in its first stage. If it can maintain the temperature (and if installed properly, it will) there will be no need for it to go to its second stage where more power and fuel are required.

And if you lower the temperature in your home while you’re sleeping you have the luxury your efficient furnace running at full strength to resume your ideal daytime temperature.

Does Your Home Need an Upgrade?

The thought of investing in a new furnace may be overwhelming to you but depending on what furnace you currently have you could be saving hundreds or even thousands of dollars per year. And there’s even a free way to find out if a new furnace is best for you and your home.

Give us a call at (262) 728-1655 or email us to set up a free no-hassle no-obligation assessment of your home’s heating and cooling equipment. We’ll offer a variety of options and help you make the best decision to meet your needs.

See what Angie’s List has to say about two-stage furnaces.