Hey guys had a guy reach out to me the other day, because he was relocating a furnace and a water heater and a few other things in his house, and we were kind of going back and forth over that some of the things that we went over. I thought might be good to do a video on so wanted to do this. Video touching on a few of those things every house is different, so most of this stuff is sort of general rule of thumb, type things uh just keep in mind that your house may be a little different if you're relocating some sort of hvac equipment. The first.

Let's start with an outdoor unit, so if you have say an air conditioner or a heat pump outside, they are pretty much hand in hand going to be about the same if you're going to relocate them, in other words, a heat pump and air conditioner relatively. If you're relocating it you're going to have to relocate the same things, i think if you're relocating a heat pump or air conditioner you're, looking at three things, you're looking at the unit itself, so you know, if you're going to physically remove it from where it is Now and then relocate it to wherever you're going to move it to. You know, there's obviously things that you need to keep in mind the second thing being the line sets which is probably, if you're, going to relocate that outdoor unit. It's probably the most challenging thing.

If i had to pick one of the three because you're going to have to disconnect those line, sets in one way shape or form and if you're doing everything properly, you can actually trap the refrigerant in the system in that outdoor unit. Before removing the line sets and then of course, once you get it to the new location, you're gon na have to physically somehow get those line sets from the indoor unit to that new location uh, i would say most of the houses where i live here in Virginia, we have crawl spaces and a lot of cases and we're able to then reroute those line sets there are already there, but in some cases you may need to abandon those old line, sets entirely and run new line, sets to the new location and then, of Course, the final of those three would be. The electrical electrical is not that big of a deal in some cases. You can pull that electrical back into the house, maybe be in the crawl space or in some way shape or form set a junction box, and as long as you're doing everything up to code, then you can re-run it to your new location or you can just Again, abandon that old electric line and then have an electrician pull a new line from the panel out to the outdoor unit.

One thing that i want you to keep in mind, though, is, if you are relocating, that outdoor unit, where the electrical will have to run even further from the panel than it currently does. There is something called d rating that i'm not going to get into much in this video, but if you don't know much about electrical and you don't know what d rating is, then you probably should get a pro in there. The whole purpose of d-rating is making sure the wiring is sized properly and if it's not that could be a fire hazard. So now, let's talk about the indoor unit, whether you have a furnace or you have an air handler you're going to relocate that indoor unit in some way shape or form.

I've been in all kinds of scenarios. I've been in houses where it was in the attic and we relocated it in the house or in the crawl space, or vice versa. Maybe it was in the house and we had to relocate it in either the attic or crawl. Whatever this particular gentleman that i was talking to yesterday is relocating the furnace and water heater that is in a closet and he's just going to relocate it to another place in the home, but it will still stay in the home.

So if you're going to do all that talking about the indoor unit for the hvac system, you need to keep a couple things in mind. The first and most obvious thing is probably the duct work. So if you have a return and supply at the current location, you're going to physically have to get it to the new location in some way, shape or form. So whether that duct work goes through the crawl space or attic above it you're going to have to keep that in mind.

If it does not, i know in some houses, maybe it might go through a chase or it goes through the walls in some way. You might have to open those walls and have them repaired. I did have a customer this past year that what they were wanting to do what they were where they were trying to relocate it to between their carpenter and carpenter. Slash builder and me, we went back and forth all these different scenarios and we ended up basically telling the homeowner what they wanted physically was just not going to happen within their budget and speaking of budget.

I think the main thing to keep in mind here - and this is what i told the gentleman yesterday i would say - 85 of the time it is possible to relocate that unit. So his question was: is it possible well in 85 percent of the time, if not 90 of the time sure it's possible, but is it within your budget? Are you wanting to spend the money that it's going to take to get it to that new location, and only you can answer that question moving on the electrical would be very similar to what i described with the outdoor unit. If you're going to relocate it, you may have to set a junction box at the current location, or you may have to pull it back into the crawl or attic or. However, you got to do it and i would definitely say in a lot of cases you may need to just get an electrician in there abandon the old one.

Whatever you got to do that's up to code and then have the electrician pull a new line. Voltage wiring to the new location next would be if it is a furnace and you have a flue pipe keeping that in mind. So, if you're going to move the furnace from one location to another, you've still got to get rid of those flue gases. Somehow - and i have been in some houses where we abandon the flue pipe in one way, we abandon the flue pipe and then, in some cases, depending on how far away you're moving it or how you're moving it.

You may be able to reuse that old, flue pipe but then run it to the new location. Obviously it's got to meet certain codes. It's got to have certain amount of rise and things like that. But again it is possible.

The flue pipe is another one. If you don't know what you're doing, please get a pro in there because you're talking about carbon monoxide and things like that, and i have seen where hairy homeowners or they hired someone. So they get a chuck in a truck or a stand in a van in there, and they don't know what they're doing you know i've even seen where they use the wrong materials, so the furnace might be a non-condensing furnace which would need some sort of metal Flue vent b, pipe or single wall or whatever the case is that's up to code and they've gone in there and put plastic, which is a gigantic fire hazard. The gas line pretty self-explanatory.

If you have a furnace that has gas again just like the electrical, sometimes you can come off of where it is currently and then re-run it to the new location. But there are times when you may need to get a gas fitter in there to run a whole new gas line to the new location when you're talking about the indoor unit, i would say line sets is one of the big ones as well. Just like we talked about the outdoor unit, but if you're relocating that indoor unit from one location to the other in a lot of cases, trapping that refrigerant in the outdoor unit and rerouting those line sets sometimes is easier said than done and a lot of cases Almost every time i've done it, i've had customers think that it's going to cost this price and find out it actually costs this price, and that's not just us, i'm just saying from any heating and air company. They think it's just going to be a simple just like the wiring just kind of move it over, but to do it properly and braze everything and install everything pull a good vacuum all that good stuff.

It's just not as simple as the electrical goes and just rerouting it to the new location. So again, if you have an attic above the space crawl space below it, all that plays a role in this and obviously the more spacious they are, the better off you're going to be, and your pro is going to be getting everything relocated. One thing that this particular gentleman that i talked to yesterday about is: we were talking about bulkheads and that's what we call them in our area. They may call them something else across the country.

It's essentially where you will frame in where the ductwork or whatever it is you're installing you can frame it in and drywall and hide that, and if you get a really good carpenter in there, they can make it look like it was always that way. It was meant to be that way. I've seen some carpenters get in there and put some nice trim on that bulkhead. They put recessed lighting or some sort of lighting, and they make it really nice.

You wouldn't even know if you didn't know that they were trying to hide something there and then finally, just to wrap up. If you are not sure how to do what you're about to do, please get a pro in there. I think the money you might save in the long run will give you so many headaches. You may have had a heating and air system that you use for a long time had no issues and all of a sudden you've had either yourself or someone that didn't know what they were doing, relocate that system.

And then you have a ton of issues. I hope that helps hit the subscribe button. We'll see you next time, you.