Looking at gas warm air furnaces (Figure 1), April shipments dipped 8.1% compared to 1999. But March shipments were up 12.3%. The end result is that year-to-date this category is up 2.2%.
April shipments of oil warm air furnaces (Figure 2) dropped a sharp 15.6%. However, February and March shipments were both up even more sharply at 35.1% and 22.2%, respectively. This provides a year-to-date total that is up 7.2% over last year.
For steel boilers, oil and bare units had a precipitous drop of 40.3% in April. Although monthly shipments have alternated up and down, the downs have been steeper, and for the year this group has decreased 11.3%.