[ronvinyard]

Hi All!
New to this forum, but can't believe how much helpful info is being exchanged for the DIY set. anyway here's my issue. We recently swaped a 20 year old coleman nat gas furnace for a newer (Less than 5 years) coleman evcon modelDGAT090BDF unit. Swap was very easy since they were identical in size and mounting positions. Won't go into a ton of details but everything went fine, the unit which hadn't been used before (according to the guy it was bought from) started right up and heat was flowing. We are in Southern Oregon and winters are fairly mild, this unit was running less than I expected and seemed to be cycling nicely, couldn't have been happier. until the first gas bill came. the old unit had some faulty electronics and our tech said it was cheaper to replace than repair and we decided to go to a pellet stove, so we quit using this old unit alltogether. then pellets went through the roof and we bought this replacement unit, our biggest bill with the old setup was $125. The first bill went from $28 (no gas heat) to $85, sounded about right, but was only a half month of use. The next month bill comes in at $285, so immediately reprogram t-stat and set temps into the high 60s. Next bill was $365. a call to the utility company says my readings are correct and I am not sure what to do, we purchased pellets and start to use the stove again and leave the heat on to run as a backup, hardly comes on at all now, bill comes today $445!!

Sorry for rambling, I need to call someone but when anyone hears that I installed myself, then they aren't interested. How do I approach this, I read some other posts and checked my meter and the 1/4 foot needle on the meter takes less than 5 seconds to make a whole turn, when the heat is on. when the heat is off nothing moves. one guy said I have to have a gas leak, and I said the only thing we changed was replaced the old flex line from the gas line to the furnace with a new one, no leaks there. there is a little nozzle thing that screws into the top left of the gas valve that I think might be the orifice and it has nat. and LP marked on it and the Nat side is screwed into gas valve with the arrow in the right direction.
there was no bag with a different set of orifices or any notation that it's set on LP. We went to a larger diameter flex line when replaced because of the whistling when it came on but that got better after replacement.
So do I need the gas company to see if the meters bad, this only started with the first usage. Does it just need adjusting? I thought it was new and unused and sure looked like it, I guess I assumed it would be set to a good average from the factory, maybe I'm way wrong?
Just very frustrated and don't know what to do next or what not to say, so that someone can come take a look. My wife is going through the roof so I need to find an answer or at least the right direction.
Thanks for any ideas in advance!!
Ron