Whenever people refer to the "good old days", it seems like they're forgetting the excruciating issues related to heating their houses and apartments in the winter. Sure, furnace heating and other clunky systems have been around for decades, but it took much more work and effort to make sure they were working as intended. In the unfortunate event of your heating system breaking down, you'd likely face days, if not weeks of shivering as professionals were getting to the bottom of your problem and delivering the replacement unit.

Enlisting the help of a professional was particularly difficult if you lived anywhere outside of a major city. Nowadays, the New Lenox hating repair guys are just as quick and efficient as those from Chicago. Regardless of whether you live in Illinois or California, you can count on the service to be equally effective.

With all the advancements in technology and improvements in the efficiency of repair companies, a broken heater in your home is never good news. In order to get the heat back on, you may still need to spend a significant amount of time investigating the issue and deciding on the right course of action.

If you suddenly found yourself without heat and you have no clue what to check and who to call, keep reading to find out how to handle these types of emergencies.

Before you go into panic mode and start to call up repair services, you need to perform a thorough check of your heat delivery system and ensure that it's not anything that you can't fix yourself. A lot of the time, these problems occur because of the furnace or heater failing to restart after a power outage. In this case, all you need is to perform this action manually.

Other causes of breaks in the delivery of heat to your home may be much more serious and shouldn't be tampered with unless you're a qualified professional. This applies if you own a fuel-based furnace, or, worse yet, a gas-powered heater without a vent. 

If your house is heated using the latter, you might want to consider replacing your heat delivery method altogether. After all, they weren't banned in six states in 1996 for no reason! Any heating system that uses combustion as its primary method of heating up your house should be thoroughly examined by specialists, as they may pose a serious threat to your family's life.

The most common systems use vents to get heat to all of the rooms in your home. Breaks in delivery are very often caused by clogged up air ducts. You may choose to clean them up yourself, but be aware of the fact that it's a very messy task and you may inhale some toxic fumes while you're at it! The same logic applies to air filters, which are the covers at the end of your ducts.

Finally, you should always check your thermostat to see if it's working properly. A lot of people call repair services whenever they see an oddly low temperature on their thermostat, not even considering the possibility of their measuring device being the faulty component. Try restarting it or measuring the temperature with another tool before you jump to any conclusions regarding your furnace or heater.

The work doesn't stop after the repair guys have left your place and reassured you and your family that everything is working as intended. You need to properly maintain your system in order to keep it in top condition for the years to come. Remember about cleaning your air filters and checking the condition of the vents often.

Additionally, you should perform regular checks on your furnace, if you own one. Central heating is a blessing, but it can abruptly turn into a curse. A deadly one, if you're not careful. Don't overwork it in the winter, and most importantly, don't forget about it during the summer! Deaths as a result of a furnace explosion are more common than you think, and the most tragic thing about them is that they were totally preventable, in most cases.

Finally, if you use a direct heat appliance, such as an electric heater, or a fireplace, be sure to note and take action on every problem you may encounter with them. When a free-standing, electric device is broken, it won't cause as much damage as a faulty central heating system, but continuing to use it may result in greater costs of repair in the future. As for fireplaces, the chimney-sweep service won't cost you a fortune, but it will significantly improve the quality of the heat in your home.

Dealing with a broken furnace one too many times might make you consider alternative heat delivery methods. One, often overlooked possibility is using your air conditioning set up as a heat pump. It's more environmentally friendly to use it all throughout the year for different purposes, not to mention all the power you're going to save!

Most importantly, whenever you find that your house is not heated properly, don't take matters into your own hands! Especially if it turns out to be more serious than a faulty thermostat or a power deficiency. It's always better to call a repair service and let them get a good look at your set up.