Suburban Furnace SF Series Mine is a SF-35VHFQ Trouble shooting Blower Not responding to T Stat

Suburban SF Series Furnace – Random No Response ( No Blower Running) if you’re having issues read on.
(I had chat gpt clean this up for me.)

I have learned from other VL owners that sometimes the spyder system will glitch out. For example someone posted that when the temperature setting is met, the furnace will shut down. However, the spyder touch screen will still show the red flame icon: which means the system is still calling for heat even though the furnace was stopped by the spyder system. They said if they turned off the furnace and turned it back on via the touch screen, the red flame icon went away. They stated that when this occurs the furnace would not restart automictically when it dropped below the set point. This is something you may not notice unless you are observant. It is something to check if you are having issues with the furnace not restarting when it should. They said rebooting via battery disconnect resolved the issue for awhile. If yours is doing this I would reach out to spyder tech support. 1-866-919-9092 for help. I have not saw any follow up on what may be causing this issue.

About me: I went to welding school and did that long enough to hate it. I joined a Union and became an Electrical Mechanical Millwright by trade. I am currently employed as an Electrical Maintenance Planner a Utility in Indiana. I am not a certified RV Tech. I did have a handyman side business for several years.

I do 99% of my RV Repairs and I also do side work for my friends. (I say 99% because I have a warranty and I have used it) I did my own comprehensive Pre- purchase inspection. I wrote up a report with photos and had the dealer fix all items. I made them do full hook up during final walk through. I again tested every function thoroughly. Everything was working. In Nov 2024 I bring the Vilano home and a few days later the furnace wouldn’t start. I never had the Spyder system and figured I would reboot by cycling battery disconnect. That worked. I figured it was probably just a glitch from unplugging from shore power at walk through. It wasn’t. The problem slowly became more prevalent.

Suburban Furnace Model: SF-35VHFQ

RV: 2022 Vilano 320GK

Symptom:

The furnace would randomly fail to respond when the thermostat called for heat. No blower, it did nothing. Cycling the battery disconnect would usually reset it and allow it to run.

This issue first appeared in November 2024 and occurred intermittently upon use. In November 2025 (Thanksgiving weekend) I replaced the furnace control board, which appeared to resolve the problem—temporarily.

In January 2026, the furnace again failed to respond to a call for heat. At that point, I decided to perform a full, step-by-step diagnosis with no assumptions.

Step-by-Step Troubleshooting

  1. Power Loss / Blown Fuse

• Checked the G6 panel: no blown fuses

• Verified voltage at the furnace board plug (red wire): 13V present

✅ Power to the furnace confirmed

  1. Ground Integrity

• Tested the yellow ground wire at the board plug.

•Verified solid continuity between the ground wire and the furnace case.

✅ Ground confirmed good

  1. Thermostat / Call for Heat Signal

The Vilano 320GK has three wires going to the furnace board plug:

• Red: +12V power from coach

• Yellow: Negative Ground from coach

• Blue: Thermostat from spyder +12V when calling for heat.

• Verified using a Fluke multi-meter

• Spyder thermostat sent ~13V on the blue wire when calling for heat

✅ Thermostat and control wiring working correctly power and ground were good.

  1. Control Board Functionality

Although the board was recently replaced, I verified its operation.

Normal Board Logic:

  1. Board has +12V power and ground

  2. Thermostat sends +12V on the blue wire (call for heat)

  3. Board sends that power to:

• Over-temperature switch: if its ok it passes power to the sail switch.

• Sail switch is normally open with blower off

  1. Since the sail switch is open, voltage does not return to the board. That’s good and next:

  2. Board starts the blower

  3. Airflow lifts sail switch, closing the circuit and the Voltage returns to the board.

  4. Board sees the “proven circuit” and continues purge run. Then ignition starts and opening of the gas valve.

If the sail switch were stuck closed, voltage would return immediately to the board and the blower would not start because the board knows the sail switch is stuck or bypassed and the safety test fails. Resulting is the no response symptom I was getting But that wasn’t my problem. My system was working as it should and the blower should have been running. To prove it I lifted the sail switch. Power went to the board.

Test Performed:

• Manually lifted the sail switch to close it sent power to the board.

• Result: igniter clicked and gas valve energized and opened (gas supply off)

✅ Board logic confirmed functional

✅ Sail switch and Over Temp limit circuit, igniter and gas valve functional.

Because everything’s proven up to here I moved on.

  1. Blower Motor Testing

• Verified 13V present at the motor red lead

• Verified solid ground between black motor lead and the furnace case.

• Confirmed 13V across red and black motor leads (probed wires).

• Motor spun freely by hand but would not run.

Final Motor Test:

• Disconnected motor leads from board and case ground.

• Measured resistance across motor windings

• Meter read: OL (open loop)

A healthy motor should read approximately 1-3 ohms or at a minimum when the meter is set to continuity it should beep.

My Blower was OL = Blower motor has internal failure..

❌ Blower motor has internal failure.

Final Diagnosis

Failed blower motor with open windings or stuck brush. Something inside is causing intermittent no-response behavior whenever this happens. Apparently it finally failed completely.

This explains:

• Random no responses

• Temporary recovery after power cycling the big jolt of

Power made it work.

• Eventual total failure.

A replacement aftermarket motor has been ordered.

What I Learned from researching/ Advice for Others

The Suburban SF series furnaces have been installed across multiple RV brands, and there are numerous reports of early and repeated blower motor failures, including brand-new rigs and first time use. The previous owner of my Vilano never used the furnace in the 2 years he owned it. They were snowbirds in the keys and warm weather only campers.

Before replacing:

• Control boards

• Sail switches

• Limit switches

Verify the basics with a meter.

If the motor has power and ground but reads OL across the windings, it’s bad—even if it spins freely.

Note: As these motors start to fail they can struggle to get up to speed and do not move enough air to close the sail switch or struggle to keep the switch closed. This can show up as the blower is running but fails to ignite and shuts off then the goes through the sequence again eventually locking out. Or its running but starts acting strange like when its running out of gas because the sail switch opens and closes rapidly

A proper diagnosis can be done in 30 minutes or less and may save you significant time and money.

Parts:

If you need a board. I recommend Dinosaur Electronics. It has a 3 year warranty and is a universal board. It is plug and play on this furnace. It is around 100.00. You can purchase here and no you do not need to be a Rv Tech. I recommend this site because Amazon has vendors selling fakes labeled as Dinosaur Electronics.

I ordered my motor from

They have a wide array of RV parts including The over temp switch, sail switch etc. They will verify your model number making sure you order the correct part. My motor was $99.00 with free shipping. I went with aftermarket because Suburban is using the cheapest they can find obviously it failed early.

@RyanB Here is my longest post. lol Feel free to move it to what ever forum is best.

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I think you beat my longest post earlier.

I am happy to have never had a single problem with my furnace. Early on I had somebody I met on the road insist I should carry a spare blower wheel - he even gave me a spare to carry. We were full time in our Beacon for over 3 years and happy to say we never had a problem.

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@RyanB This furnace has been wonky from the first week I brought the Vilano home.

I did my own Pre purchase inspection. I wrote up a report with photos and the dealer fixed all items. I made them do a full hook up during walk through and I again tested every function thoroughly. Everything was working. I bring it home and a few days later the furnace wouldn’t start. I never had the Spyder system and figured id reboot by cycling power. That worked and I figured it was probably just the way it was. The problem slowly became more prevalent.

I removed the blower assembly today and replaced the motor. Furnace is working perfectly.

one note: The SF-35VHFQ blower housing only has 2 screws and then several plastic locking clips. The clips will likely break. All of mine did: Mainly because I did not want to remove the furnace from the RV and then remove the inner core from the case. If you do that you can easily get to the clips. That would have been a lot of extra work and its really not necessary. If the clips break: The good news is there are 5 unused screw holes from the factory to install screws. In fact, If you order a motor from Suburban they now include the 5 screws. I went with an aftermarket motor so I found some small screws in my stash and installed in the factory holes.

I took the motor to work today and disassembled it. I wanted to see what the issue was. As suspected the issue was in the brushes. The brush on the negative wire was stuck. Both brushes were not sliding free in the brush housings. We tweaked the housing just a little with a screw driver to make more room and put the brushes back in. We had continuity when we put the assembly back on the shaft. The windings are all ok. My electrician here at work loves things like this. He is going to carefully reassemble the motor and test run it for fun. There really is no reason it shouldn’t run. Basically the tolerance is too tight on the brush housings and as the carbon dust from the brushes accumulate the brushes bind and lose contact with the commutator surfaces.

If you look at the carbon brush on the left you can see a line in it where it was scraping the housing.

We fixed the motor. We soldered all the internal connections and opened the brush housings just a little for smooth action. It ran good when connected to battery.

Hey Shawn, would you mind posting the phone number or the name and/or address of the Dinosaur Electronics of where to order the motor and parts for the furnace.

I think my furnace is beginning the intermittent process of needing to reset it occasionally by turning it off and back on at the spyder control center.

I also need to ask how to add photos to a post here on the forum?

Thanks Ralph

@Ralph0808 I ordered the board from partsfortechs.com. It was the site Dinosaur suggested. Dinosaurs phone # (541) 994-4344 they do not sell directly to user they suggested the website below. However they are very helpful. Joe is who I have spoken with and he is very knowlegable. Anyone can order from parts for techs.

I ordered my motor from RV Parts & Accessories | 20,000+ Products In-Stock | RVupgrades.com I ordered the $98 aftermarket motor for my furnace I asked them to let me pay 99 for the motor to get free shipping and they did the price adjustment.

I did have to file the flat part on the shaft about 1/4” further down so the blower wheel would sit centered in the correct position. It was easy modification, But worth mentioning. I used a 1/8 inch cutting disk on my angle grinder and gently cut it back.

I have noticed that some spyder issues can be resolved by turning off the battery disconnect for 10 seconds and turning it back on. The Spyder system is a computer and it seems that sometimes a reboot refreshes the system and glitches go away for awhile. The suburban boards are prone to failure. I would recommend replacing the board with a Dinosaur board and keep old one as a spare.

Before throwing parts at it. I would suggest following the troubleshooting steps to verify if its the spyder system, board, Sail switch, over-temp switch or blower motor.

Someone on the VL facebook group noticed that when their furnace shuts off, the red flame for call for heat on the touchscreen stayed red: until they turned off the furnace on the touch screen and turn it back on. They rebooted the system via battery disconnect and it stopped doing that. It seems the system gets glitchy.

For photo uploads I see a icon with an arrow. See photo.

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Thank you Shawn for the information I will keep a closer eye on the red flame indicator and see if it is still there after the furnace has failed to work.

Thank you

Ralph

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I like the way you explained your trouble shooting method and if I am really having issues with it I will test my system and see what I find. I just wanted to know where you were able to order the parts before I started the process.

Thanks for the help and advice Shawn

Ralph

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Thanks. I wanted to make it simple as possible. I tried to list it step by step so that anyone comfortable with a meter and troubleshooting could follow it.