As a part of our post fire, house reconstruction we are going to take advantage of the fact that the house is gutted to the studs. We want to update heating/cooling. Unfortunately, at our expense since the house mechanicals were unaffected by the fire. We live in the Northeast. We have a 35 year old furnace with forced hot water baseboard heat. I have no idea how efficient the furnace is. While we are satisfied with the furnace performance we think now is the time to update or upgrade hoping to save on future oil bills. I'm looking for recommendations or suggestions. Do we switch to forced air and maybe add AC or stay with hot water baseboard? Does AC add a large fuel cost? A large furnace cost? We currently use window AC in the MBR only and are usually comfortable with that. What size furnace/tank for a 2400 s/f home. Forced air would mean finding a spot for a chase to get the ducting upstairs and the extra cost of the ducting. Water means we could use the same 35 y/o baseboard heaters and save a few bucks. Or are there newer more efficient baseboard heaters? We have a separate hot water heater and will probably stay with that. Last - is it easier to zone water? Right now we have 3 zones and that works well allowing us to isolate unused bedrooms in the winter.

Hello. I have a 4 year old Roth oil tank installed (nside) , and today I noticed both of the bottom cap nuts on the fill and vent lines were broken, most likely from over tightening or movement from filling and/ or expansion, (see attached pics). The cap nuts on the gauge and oil line are in good shape with no defects. My question is, are these nuts integral to to the structure of the internal plastic tank , and should I be concerned about this defect ? I will be calling my service guy tomorrow, but its always nice to have another opinion in the event they tell me something different. Thanks Jim