Good evening

It is cold and my furnace is not running :-(

I am at the stage where I have opened the blower door and look at the CPU. I have been able to set a switch on the board for a selftest and manually switch on the furnace. It runs a component test and I notice that the blower motor does not start.

The LED code 41 means: Blower motor fault - Indicates blower motor failed test. Check blower, wiring, and furnace control.

The blower turns easily and did not make bad noise before.

How can I check the blower motor before I try to get it out (which seems to be a nasty task)?

What else would you guys check? As far as I can see there is no capacitor. The motor has two plugs, one with white, green, black and a yellow shortcut, the other with four coloured wires.

When I switch on the furnace there is a constant voltage of 125V/AC between white and black. The component test states that the blower should only run for 15seconds, so this voltage does obviously not start the blower.

When I turn the blower manually I don't get any voltage between the white and black on the motor. Also the resistance is more than 2M.

Is the motor really dead?


Brgds,
Oliver

 

There is still warranty on the blower motor.

However, the company I called (A1 Super Care in Mississauga) charges 315CAD to exchange a blower motor.

They told me I have no way of getting the motor direct from Carrier and Carrier doesn't care about how much the dealers quote.

What a nice system...

 

Which blower are you referring to. The large blower that moves the air through your house, or the small inducer blower.

If it is the inducer blower, there may be re settable switches. One may have tripped and the furnace thinks that the exhaust ducting has a blockage.

If it is the large motor, and your thermostat has manual / automatic positions, try it in the manual position.

Before each test, switch off all power to the furnace for a few seconds. That should cancel any codes and allow it to start fresh - at least up to the point where it locates a fault.

 

You can get a compatable motor from a motor shop for reasonable. I bought one for a heat only furnace, single speed, a few months back for $69! But it could run up to to $150 if multispeed for newer furnace and/or with a/c if you have that.

If the black is indeed your run wire and you have no juice, on manual, it means that you have no power even getting to the motor, so you need to look upstream for your problems. Either that, the black wire is not the correct wire.

What is 315 CAD?

 

My guess is Canadian dollars.

 

You are right about a nice system. This is a variable speed motor specially designed specifically for Carrier by GE I believe. You probably won't be able to buy the motor from a motor shop. Check with another Carrier dealer might find a better deal.

 

Hi Guys

Thanks for all your replies.

Here is a short summary that closes the issue from my side:

- Called the service company about three months ago to get a service contract with them and forgot to follow up on that (would have cost me 180 per year)

- Furnace failed

- With the best of my knowledge and curiosity I dived into the system and was 98% sure that the reason for the failure is somewhere in the motor, not the controlling unit.

- Since the motor was on warranty, I called Carrier to ask for a retail shop where I could exchange this faulty part

- Found out that there was no way to do that so I had to call a certified dealer who can get the motor exchanged on warranty

- This dealer came to my house to find out again that it is the motor (90 Dollars), had to drive to Hamilton (another 100 Dollars), exchanged the motor (200 Dollars)


What would I recommend anyone else?

Try to repair the things yourself (if you can). In this case I should have carried the motor to a GE shop and bought the header unit of the motor.

Once your furnace is running, get a 24x7 service contract with a reliable company.

Have a great summer and no A/C failures,
Oliver