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Polar Express HVAC & Refrigeration

Heating

A furnace sized for a Texas winter, not for somebody else's.

Polar Express provides furnace installation for homes across the San Antonio metro, with 24/7 emergency dispatch and same-day service on most repair calls. One flat-rate price is approved in writing before work begins, after a heating load, venting and electrical review, and free in-home estimate. TDLR license TACLA00127982C.

Heating load here is a fraction of the cooling load. Equipment picked to match the air conditioner is how houses end up with far more furnace than they can use.

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  • Licensed TACLA00127982C
  • Since 2023
  • 4.9 Google rating

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Tell us what's going on. We'll call you back, usually within 15 minutes during business hours.

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Heating equipment in this climate usually gets chosen twice: once by whoever built the house, and once by whoever replaced the air conditioner and quietly matched a furnace to it. Neither decision has much to do with how much heat a San Antonio home actually needs. The heating load here is a fraction of the cooling load, the season is brief, and a furnace carrying far more capacity than the building can absorb blasts to setpoint, shuts off, and leaves the rooms at the end of the duct run cold anyway. Polar Express replaces residential furnaces and electric air handlers across the metro, starting with the part that decides whether the rest of the money was well spent: a heating load worked out for this house, this insulation, and this duct system. Then the equipment, the venting, the scope, the permit, and one total in writing before anything is ordered. Financing options are available, and the person doing your estimate will go through them with you.

What we handle

Furnace Installation & Replacement covers more than one failure.

The complaint that gets called in is rarely the whole job. These are the things a technician is actually looking at on this equipment.

  • A heating load, done for winter

    The calculation that sizes a furnace is not the one that sizes an air conditioner. Envelope, design temperature, and duct losses set the output, and the answer is usually smaller than what is installed today.

  • Gas furnaces in plain terms

    What single-stage, two-stage, and modulating equipment genuinely change about how a house feels, and where the next efficiency step stops paying for itself in a short heating season.

  • Electric furnaces and air handlers

    Staged strip heat, elements, and the electrical service behind them, including an honest comparison against a heat pump for a home already running all-electric.

  • Venting, combustion air, and the flue

    A high-efficiency furnace vents differently from the one it replaces, and where that pipe can safely and legally terminate is a design question rather than an install-day surprise.

  • Duct and return work at changeout

    Existing ductwork gets measured instead of assumed. Undersized returns and leaks into an unconditioned attic will cost the new equipment exactly what they cost the old one.

  • Permit, startup, and registration

    The permit pulled where the jurisdiction requires one, gas pressure and temperature rise set at startup, the warranty registered, and the paperwork handed to you.

Signs and causes

What you are seeing, and what usually causes it.

Read these before you call. Knowing which one matches gets the right parts on the truck, and a couple of them are worth acting on in the next ten minutes.

  • The furnace was sized to match the air conditioner

    Matching heating capacity to cooling tonnage is a habit rather than a calculation, and in a climate this warm it routinely produces a furnace far bigger than the house can use. What you feel is short bursts of very hot air, wide swings between cycles, and far rooms that never quite catch up.

  • Parts for it are getting hard to find

    Age matters less than availability. Once control boards and gas valves for a particular model have to be hunted down, a January failure stops being a one-visit repair and becomes a week without heat, which is a different kind of problem from an expensive one.

  • A technician has flagged the heat exchanger

    A heat exchanger that has cracked, or that is showing the corrosion which precedes it, effectively ends the life of a gas furnace. It is the one finding that moves a replacement from optional to necessary, and it deserves a look with your own eyes before anybody signs anything.

  • The winter electric bill is making the argument

    A house heating on strip elements pays full price for every bit of warmth with no leverage at all. In a climate where a heat pump can move heat rather than manufacture it for most of the season, that bill is often the strongest case for changing equipment type instead of replacing like for like.

  • The air conditioner is already being replaced

    In a split system the gas furnace holds the indoor coil and the blower both seasons depend on, so a cooling changeout is the natural moment to deal with both. Doing them years apart means paying twice for the same access and living with a mismatched pair in between.

What it costs

You approve the price before the work starts.

There is no installed furnace price worth publishing here, because the number turns on equipment type, venting, duct condition, and what your jurisdiction requires, and a figure that ignores all four is advertising rather than a quote. What we do instead is come out, measure, run the heating load, look at the flue and the electrical panel, ask how long you plan to stay in the house, and hand you a written proposal carrying the model numbers, the full scope of work, the warranty terms, and one total that holds. Financing options are available and the estimator will walk through them in person. No monthly payment figure appears anywhere on this site, because a payment without the term, the rate, and the lender's own disclosure attached tells a homeowner nothing. If you are already holding a replacement quote from another licensed contractor, a second opinion from us is free.

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What moves the number

  • Equipment type, since a gas furnace, an electric air handler, and a heat pump conversion are three different jobs
  • The output the heating load calls for, which is frequently below what sits there now
  • Efficiency tier and staging, from a single-stage furnace up to modulating equipment
  • Venting, because a high-efficiency furnace needs a different flue path than the one it replaces
  • Gas line and electrical service, and whether either has to be modified for the new equipment
  • Duct and return corrections, plus permit requirements in your particular jurisdiction

How the job runs

What happens between your call and a working system.

  1. Step 1

    In-home estimate and heating load

    We measure the house, look in the attic, check the flue and the panel, and work out the heat the building loses on a cold design night. None of that can be done from a driveway or a phone call, and the visit costs you nothing.

  2. Step 2

    Options with the trade-offs written down

    Usually two or three paths, which in this climate can genuinely include a heat pump rather than a furnace at all. Each carries what it costs, what it changes about how the house feels, and where its efficiency stops earning back.

  3. Step 3

    Install day, venting included

    Old equipment removed and hauled off, the new furnace or air handler set and secured, venting and combustion air brought to code, gas or electrical connections made, and the duct connections sealed rather than taped over.

  4. Step 4

    Startup, safety check, and handoff

    Gas pressure, temperature rise, airflow, and safeties verified, a carbon monoxide reading taken with the system running, the thermostat configured for the equipment underneath it, and the commissioning numbers written onto your paperwork.

Questions

Straight answers, before you call.

Still not covered here? The person who answers the phone can usually settle it in a sentence, day or night.

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The honest answer usually depends on what the house already has, because running a new gas line or upgrading an electrical service can cost more than the difference between the two machines. Gas heat delivers warmer supply air and generally costs less per hour of heating in this market. Electric heat carries a lower installed cost and brings no combustion, venting, or carbon monoxide considerations with it at all. In an all-electric home the comparison worth having is usually not gas against electric, it is strip heat against a heat pump.

A furnace is sized from a heating load calculation, which totals the heat your particular house loses on a cold design night through its walls, windows, ceilings, and ducts, then matches equipment output to that figure. San Antonio design temperatures are mild, so the answer lands well below what people who moved here from colder states are used to hearing. Oversizing does not make a house warmer, it makes the furnace run in short violent bursts and leaves the far rooms behind.

Not always, but often, and the reason is mechanical rather than commercial. In a split system the gas furnace houses the indoor coil and the blower that both seasons run through, so replacing one and leaving the other means paying for the same access twice and living with a mismatched pair until the second half happens. When one component is genuinely young and healthy we say so and quote the single piece.

In most jurisdictions around San Antonio, yes, and a changeout involving gas, venting, or electrical work is exactly what permitting exists for. Polar Express pulls the permit where the authority requires one and handles the inspection, working under Texas license TACLA00127982C. A contractor who offers to skip the permit to save you a little money is telling you something useful about how the rest of the job will go.

In this climate that is a genuinely open question rather than a sales angle, and it is worth asking before you buy heating equipment of any kind. A heat pump covers both heating and cooling from one outdoor unit and runs efficiently at the temperatures San Antonio spends most of its winter sitting at. Whether it beats a furnace for your house comes down to your existing fuel, your duct condition, and what the electrical panel can support.

Polar Express provides one written flat-rate price for furnace installation in San Antonio, approved before equipment is ordered or work begins. The total depends on the heating load, gas or electric equipment and staging, and required venting, electrical, or duct corrections. A free in-home replacement estimate establishes the complete scope, and financing is limited to qualifying installations.

Polar Express works with all major furnace brands across San Antonio, including gas furnaces, electric air handlers, and matched indoor equipment for heat pump systems. Selection follows the heating load, existing fuel and electrical capacity, venting path, duct airflow, parts support, and warranty terms rather than the badge alone.

Related services

The work that usually comes with this one.

Nearby

We run this service across the San Antonio metro. These are three of the areas we cover, and the full list lives on the service areas page.

One call, day or night.

Licensed, locally owned, and answering the phone around the clock. You get the diagnosis in plain language and the price before the work starts.

Call 24/7 · (210) 376-0781Book Service