How To Properly Maintain Your HVAC Unit

If you have an HVAC unit you need to take care of, you have to keep up with maintaining it. There are a lot of ways to work on this depending on what’s going on with the unit. Read through these tips and find out what you need to know about maintaining HVAC units.

One of the most important tasks you should work on when working with an AC unit is to clean its filters on a regular basis. If a filter is clogged and/or dirty, then it’s going to cost you money because it reduces your system’s efficiency. In other words, it will have to work harder to cool your home, so you’ll have to pay more in electrical costs. A clean filter can lower how much energy your unit uses by up to fifteen percent in most cases.

You will want to make sure the AC’s condenser coil and evaporator coil are clean. They collect a lot of dirt over time, especially if the filter hasn’t been changed on a regular basis. If the condenser coil is outside, then it can get very dirty because of the environment around it. You want to make sure you leave two feet between foliage and the coil, so you can be sure that air can flow around your condenser. If dirt builds up on the coils attached to your unit, it can reduce how much heat they can absorb.

If you have an AC unit that’s in a window, make sure you check the seal between the unit and the window. If the window frame is leaking air, then you’re going to want to fix the problem because moisture can cause damage to the seal and that can cost you a lot of money over time. If you’re not sure what to do with your unit because air is leaking around it, you’re going to want to contact a professional. They can make sure the seal is solid and that you don’t have to worry about air getting in or out when it shouldn’t be.

If it’s about to be winter time in the area you live in, you’re going to want to prepare your AC unit with r22 alternatives for the cooler weather. If you have a room AC in a window, then you should take it down and put it in a safe place in your home. If you have a central AC unit outside, then you’re going to want to cover it up. That way, winter weather and any debris that could come its way will not cause you any issues. There are plenty of different covers you can invest in or you can use something like a tarp.

It may be wise for you to just hire a professional every now and then to check out your unit to see if it’s working right. For instance, before summer hits you can hire a professional to come out and look at your AC to make sure it’s going to work properly when you need to use it. You don’t want to wait for the weather to get hot to find out you have a problem with the unit. It’s better to find out about the problem before you need to use the unit than to wait until it gets way too hot to even be comfortable in your home.

Before hiring a professional, you’re going to want to look into their history to see if they have done good work for others in the past or if you should avoid them. It’s much better to know who you’re hiring so you know what level of service to expect from them. The easiest way to learn about their past is to find reviews from people that have used their services, so you can find out whether or not they were happy with the end result.

If you have any serious problems with your HVAC units at your home, you shouldn’t work on the problems yourself without professional assistance. You can end up making the problem worse which costs money when you have to pay to have it repaired. Or, you may end up getting hurt because you didn’t know what you were doing. If you don’t do the work properly, you could end up with an electrical fire on your hands too and other bad problems. That’s why you should get help instead of trying to do it on your own without any training.

Figure out how much training a professional has so you know whether they are cut out for the work or not. There are a lot of different schools people can go to to learn about HVAC systems. You want to ask the company if they hire people that are trained and that have the right level of skill to do good work. If they just hire anyone that says they can do the work, then they may end up sending someone out to you that’s not that good and just makes your problems worse.

When you work with a professional, there are a few things they need to do. First, they should make sure there is enough refrigerant for the unit to use. They should also use a leak detector to test for any leaks that could be going on. If there is any refrigerant in the system that needs to be taken out of it, they need to do it right instead of just releasing it into the atmosphere. They’re going to need to make sure the evaporator coil is getting enough airflow going through it and they should look for seal duct leakage if you have a central system.

Maintaining your HVAC unit the proper way will make it last you a lot longer. You want the work to be done by professionals if you don’t know how to maintain the unit properly. If you notice any problems with what you have, get someone out to fix it right away before the issues get beyond repair.