Fall is here… Winter is coming… will you be warm and comfortable through it all? A properly running HVAC system can mean the difference between comfort and discomfort in your home. After all, you invested in an HVAC system so the following article will help you maximize your investment. You can enjoy a warm, worry-free home through the fall and winter when you use these tips to maintain your HVAC system. Locate all the vent and air exchange covers in your home and ensure they are free of dust and debris and are not blocked by furniture or large objects. This will help to keep dust from blowing around your home and also make sure proper air flow and consistent heat to each room. Clean and/or replace your HVAC filters regularly (as often as is recommended by the furnace manufacturer or your HVAC installing expert). Have your ducts cleaned regularly. Before winter is a great time to have them cleaned because the windows will be closed for winter so you won’t get new dust and debris coming in. Vacuum your home around the same time to eliminate any dust that is currently outside of the ductwork, to keep it from cycling back in. Test your HVAC system before you need it. Run your system and listen for unusual sounds or smells. You’ll want to do this for two reasons. First, you might notice a very slight burning smell as a small amount of dust burns off of the heating unit, so it’s nice to be able to open the windows and air that out. (Note: the burning smell should disappear quickly. If it persists or is very strong, shut your HVAC unit down and call an HVAC expert right away.) Second, testing your HVAC system before you need it means that if there is a problem, you can get it fixed right away instead of being uncomfortably cold while the system is being repaired! If you try running your HVAC system and it doesn’t turn on, look at the following things first: Is your HVAC unit plugged in? Did you check the circuit breakers to make sure they are in the correct position? Do the batteries need to be changed in your thermostat? These 3 simple steps could be the difference between an HVAC system that works and one that doesn’t. If your HVAC unit has pipes that connect to the outside of your house (such as exhaust and fresh air intake pipes), make sure they are clear of debris and not blocked by anything. If you need to call an HVAC professional, check the brand name and model number of your HVAC unit over the phone. This will help them understand the situation better even before they arrive at your home. Summary With the colder weather on its way, it’s important to make sure that your home is safe and comfortable for your family. That means making sure your HVAC system is running the way you want it to run. Use these tips and ideas to help you have a more comfortable home for your family.

Your home is an investment, and your home’s HVAC system is an investment into the comfort and safety of your family. A well-maintained HVAC system is an important part of your home. Homeowners who take the time to care for their HVAC systems will get a long life out of their systems and save money and time in the long run while enjoying a comfortable home year ‘round. Use these tips to help you: #1. Clean the fan blades and coils near the end of fall. Falling leaves from trees can clog up your air conditioning unit’s fan and coils so clear it out after the leaves have fallen, and don’t let too many leaves pile up around the unit. Pay particular attention to grass clippings while mowing and when you use a leaf blower. Note: make sure to turn off the power before cleaning the unit. #2. Have your HVAC system serviced twice per year, in the fall and the spring. This type if preventative maintenance is highly necessary to ward off any expensive troubles from coming your way. #3. As the temperature outside drops, remember to turn off your outdoor condenser unit. This means that you should turn it off to prevent damage if the weather falls under 60 degrees Fahrenheit. This will ensure your system works well each year, which could save you quite a bit in repair costs. #4. Equipping your home with a programmable thermostat can be an excellent way to cut utility costs. In fact, you can save as much as 10 percent on both heating and cooling when you turn your thermostat down by 10-15 percent for at least 8 hours daily. Some can even be controlled from a computer or smartphone. #5. Clean your ducts and filters. As temperatures drop, HVAC systems will run and can burn off the dust that has accumulated over the summer. To avoid a smoky smell, and to avoid blowing dust around your home, have your ducts and filters cleaned. #6. Walk around your home and check to make sure there is no furniture blocking the vents. Not only do blocked vents make your HVAC system work unnecessarily harder, it can also be dangerous to have something sitting on a hot vent for too long! It is important that you take care of your unit. When HVAC systems fail, they can be costly to repair. But these tips can help to prolong the life of your HVAC unit and keep your family safe and comfortable for many years.

Do people in your home fight over the thermostat setting? In many homes, someone is too hot, someone is too cold and no one is happy. Even in a home with adequate central air conditioning, mom or dad may find the temperature to be fine in the kitchen or living room, but then upstairs, their son is home from college wanting to study at his desk, but he can’t because the desk surface is hot enough to fry an egg! This is a house that might benefit from a zoned HVAC system. What is a zoned HVAC system? A zoned HVAC (Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning) system allows the homeowner to set different temperatures in different parts or “zones” of the house. Rather than one thermostat for the entire house, each zone can be regulated with its own thermostat. A zone can be as small as one room or as large as an entire level of the house or an addition to the house. How does zoning work? In a home with an existing forced air heating and cooling system (and one thermostat), it may be possible to install an automatic damper system into the HVAC ductwork that would divide the home into zones. The better way to set up a zoned HVAC system is with ductless mini-split units. These units come in a variety of styles and models, but basically it’s a rectangular heating and cooling unit that is mounted high on the wall (or into the ceiling). That’s actually the first part, the indoor air-handling unit (evaporator). It’s hooked up to the second part, an outdoor compressor/condenser. Several of the indoor units can be hooked up to one outdoor unit. Each indoor unit is controlled with its own thermostat. Reasons why you might want a zoned HVAC system Ductless mini-splits are a great solution for a newly constructed house, but also a good retrofit for houses with non-ducted heating systems (like hot water heat or electric heating). They also work well for new additions to a house that lack ductwork or separate buildings like a garage or shed converted into offices or hobby rooms. Why might you want to look into installing some ductless mini-splits? 1. To solve the multi-level home heating/cooling problem (described above). 2. To balance the temperature in homes where one side of the house gets more solar heat than the other side. 3. To heat/cool only the parts of the home in use. (Why heat/cool a huge house if you’re mostly only using a few rooms?) 4. To get heating/cooling in new house additions / separate buildings without installing ductwork. Summary To find out how a zoned HVAC system could work in your home, call a heating and cooling expert at your preferred HVAC Company. With this surprisingly simple solution, you'll never fight over the thermostat in your home again!

Is your central air conditioning failing to battle the heat and keep you cool inside? If you turn down the thermostat to 75 degrees, is the air conditioner able to cool down to that temperature or does it work all day slowly getting there? We have three tips to cooler central air conditioning in your home, and two of them are do-it-yourself. 1. Call in an HVAC service tech once a year If you want your air conditioner to keep your house cool for many summers to come, the best thing you can do is have an HVAC service tech test the unit every spring, clean and adjust it. They are best equipped to go over everything that could be preventing your air conditioner from blowing the coolest air possible. To save money, sign up for an annual HVAC maintenance contract to service both your air conditioner and your furnace. This is the gold standard, but if you want to do it yourself there are two things you can do. 2. Clean return air vents and replace filters HVAC techs constantly recommend changing your air filters regularly and they’re not just making this up to sell more filters. Replace an air filter and you can see for yourself how dirty it is from trapping dust and debris. The more clogged the filter, the less air flow and the less cool your air conditioning will be. During months of high usage, replace filters monthly. Be sure you know where your return air filters are located—sometimes there’s only one alongside the furnace, but there can also be a filter at each return air vent. While you’re checking those return air vents, be sure to vacuum them thoroughly to remove all dust. 3. Clean the condenser coils on the outdoor air conditioner Go outside to your air conditioning unit and make sure it is free of obstructions such as grass, weeds, vines and globs of leaves and debris. Though a professional HVAC service tech can do this better, you can clean the condenser coils. First turn off the power to the unit. Next, get yourself a bottle of dish detergent, ideally one that is about 80% to 90% empty. Fill it with water to make a soapy solution. Then squirt this soapy solution on the outside front of the air conditioner. You should be squirting through some kind of vents or caging to the condenser coils. On most units these are visible on three sides. Get them soapy and after a few minutes of soaking time, use a garden hose to spray the soap away. You’ll see dirty water and debris flow away from the unit. Give it an hour to dry up before restoring the power. Important! Whenever you are working around any part of your HVAC system, always use caution and turn off the device first. Summary If your air conditioner still can’t keep up and cool your house after you’ve replaced the filters and cleaned the condenser coils, call an HVAC service tech to do an a/c inspection to determine the problem. On the other hand, an annual HVAC service contract will keep your air conditioning running well and you’ll just need to replace air filters regularly.

When summer days get hotter, air conditioning can be so awesome! It feels so good to escape the heat and cool down in the comfort of your home. At least it feels good and cool until the first skyrocketing energy bill comes in. Then things really heat up! How can you keep your house cool but also save money on the cost to cool it? We’ve checked with the energy experts and HVAC technicians and found seven tips to help you stay cool and save money on air conditioning. 1. Set your thermostat to a reasonably good temperature. Before setting your thermostat to 72 degrees because that’s room temperature, keep in mind that we tend to dress in lighter clothes during the summer. Try slowly raising the temperature in the range of 73 to 79 degrees to see what’s comfortable for your house. The U.S. Department of Energy specifies 78 degrees as the ideal compromise—cool enough and saving you money. Every degree you go up from 72 saves you three to five percent on your air conditioning energy costs. 2. Raise the temperature whenever you leave home. Whenever nobody will be home for two or more hours, you can save energy by raising the temperature by seven to ten degrees. The Department of Energy says doing this consistently will save you as much as 10 percent on cooling costs. 3. Save money at night. When you sleep, your core body temperature lowers. So you may be able to raise the temperature a bit at night, especially if you use lighter sleepwear and lighter bed coverings. 4. Switch to a smart thermostat. You can program a smart thermostat to raise the temperature ten degrees during the day when everyone is at work and then lower it 30 minutes before the first person returns home. Some smart thermostats have even more advanced features to help you truly optimize the temperature setting to save you the most money. 5. Seal up the leaks. The older your home, the more likely cold air is seeping outside. Install new weatherstripping and caulk around doors and windows. We recommend getting a home energy audit from your utility provider to find all these leaks and to find the best things you can do to make your home more energy efficient. 6. Replace older air conditioning units with energy-efficient models. Just like newer furnaces, today’s air conditioners really do work much more efficiently than older ones. If you fear you’re paying too much to keep your house cool, it would be worth asking an HVAC salesperson about your options. 7. Call an HVAC technician to tune-up your air conditioning unit. Regular inspection and maintenance is vital to keeping your air conditioner working at its best. If you suspect that it’s not cooling properly, a technician will be able to determine whether there’s a problem other than it’s a really hot summer. Follow these tips and you’ll save money while keeping your house reasonably cool this summer.

Everyone seems to have an opinion on how low the indoor temperature should be in the summer when running the air conditioning. Many people just think 72 degrees because that’s standard room temperature, but others think it should be lower when it’s hotter outside. Recently, while inspecting a rented house, I saw that the tenant had set their air conditioning to 55 degrees! What temperature should the air conditioning be set at in your home for the summer? What factors should you consider when making this decision? Why You Might Want To Set The Temperature A Bit Higher Than Your Refrigerator Thirty-seven degrees is a good cold temperature for your refrigerator. When it’s really hot outside you might be tempted to cool off by climbing into your fridge, but 37 is actually too cold, especially given what you’re wearing in the summer! Somewhere in the range of 73 to 79 degrees is a good indoor temperature in the summer (according to the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air Conditioning Engineers). On the hottest days outside, you might want to move your thermostat toward the higher end of that range because the hotter it is outside the more money it will cost you to cool your house. Each degree lower is costing you dollars (hard to define exactly how much as electricity rates vary greatly). For this reason, the U.S. Department of Energy recommends setting your thermostat to 78 degrees when you are home in the summer—it’s cool enough and will save you money. Raise The Temperature When You’re Not Home The Department of Energy also recommends turning your thermostat up seven to ten degrees when no one is home. They estimate you can save as much as 10 percent on cooling costs by raising the temperature whenever you’re away from home for more than two hours. Some people mistakenly believe it’s better to leave the temperature where you want it so that the air conditioning doesn’t have to work so hard when you get home. It really is more energy efficient to raise the temperature when you’re not home and then cool it off when you get home. Upgrade To A Smart Thermostat Instead of always trying to remember to turn the thermostat down to 78 when you’re home and up to 85 before you leave, a programmable or smart thermostat is a great investment. You can easily program it start cooling the house down 30 minutes before you get home from work so it’s a comfortable temperature by the time you arrive. You can also program a temperature change for the night while you’re sleeping. And smart thermostats will let you control the temperature using your phone so that you can easily adjust the programming if your schedule changes. Summary Now, setting your thermostat at the right temperature for your house will work well as long as your air conditioning is working well. Be sure your air conditioning can keep your home comfortable by having it regularly serviced by a qualified HVAC technician.

When summer is coming on, it can be surprising how quickly we adjust the thermostat from giving us a little heat in the morning to take the chill off the house to switching on the air conditioning to combat the afternoon heat. Even if the furnace has been working well throughout the winter, if you start hearing one of these six sounds, you may have a problem and need to contact an HVAC professional before it turns into an even larger repair bill. Scraping Sound A loud scraping noise, a grating metal-on-metal sound, coming from inside your system could be a serious problem with the blower wheel. Maybe the wheel is coming apart from the shaft and scraping the casing or in some other way the motor is causing the wheel to scrape the casing. Turn off the air conditioning or heat immediately and call an HVAC company. Fast Clicking/Flicking Sound Remember that sound when you were a kid and attached a playing card to the spokes of your bicycle wheel? If you hear that kind of fast thwapping sound from your system, something might be stuck on one of the blower wheel blades or housing around the wheel. While your air conditioning (or heat) may be working just fine, this stuck object is causing resistance and it will cause excessive wear on the motor. Get it cleaned up by an HVAC technician. Squealing Sound A squealing noise from the blower motor could be caused by a belt wearing out. That’s normally not an expensive repair and best taken care of before the belt stretches further or breaks. Grinding Or Metal Groaning Sound A bearing problem in the blower motor will make a dull repetitive groan. Some blower motors have ports for adding lubricant, but some are sealed. Adding lubricant will often eliminate the groaning sound, but you have to use the correct oil, not WD-40. An HVAC company doing an annual maintenance inspection on your system would likely do this kind of lubrication. Rattling Sound If you hear a rattling sound from your central air conditioning unit outside of the house when the air conditioning is coming on, the hardware around the compressor could be loose. An air conditioning service repair person should be contacted. Popping Sound Or Banging Sound If you turn on your system for heat and you hear popping sounds or a distinct banging sound (like from a cap gun), the system probably has dirty burners that need to be cleaned. The gas is not being ignited right away. Instead, it’s building up and then igniting in a mini-explosion. You’ll want to get this serviced by a professional immediately. Summary When operating properly, your HVAC system should be fairly quiet, but if you’re hearing one of these six sounds you really should contact an HVAC professional to come in and repair the problem before it turns into an even bigger problem.

Do you find yourself wearing a sweater in some rooms of your house but just a t-shirt in other rooms of your house? Or maybe you walk from one room, through a central room, to another part of the house and find that one spot is warmer, especially in the summer months? These "hot spots" in your home are especially noticeable when the temperatures are high but it's possible in some areas that they may exist all year 'round. So, what are "hot spots" in your home, anyway? Your home's HVAC system works on a simple premise: Air is drawn through vents (internal vents and/or external vents) and pushed into your system. From there, the air is cooled and then forced out through the ductwork in your walls, through vents, and into the rooms of your house. But here's the thing: air is invisible but it acts a lot like water: It flows in easy, meandering ways around a room, invisibly bouncing off of walls and furniture. In fact, if you could see the air flow from a vent, you'd notice that it moved and flowed from vents outward throughout the room but it stops and redirects when it hits an obstruction. Therefore, some areas of your home may not get air flow. The air just sits there. And, depending on the air flow and air pressure in the house, the ambient temperature (and temperature fluctuations) inside your home and outside, as well as other factors, hot spots can be created. Simply put, cool air isn't flowing there; it flows around or is stopped. You may especially notice hot spots by windows or exterior doors (no surprise there) but you may also notice hot spots near exterior walls, which could indicate that the insulation has degraded slightly. Or you may notice hot spots in unusually shaped rooms, or rooms where the HVAC ducts aren't venting into the center of the room. These are just a few of the reasons, and it really depends on a number of factors. Fortunately, there are a few things you can do about it. If you want a simple, temporary solution, add a small fan nearby to circulate the air more effectively in the room. Another option, in rooms that are larger but not too unusually shaped, consider a ceiling-mounted fan. However, some homeowners want more effective fixes for challenging hot spots, especially in hard-to-reach places. For these scenarios, you may consider installing extra vents to get the air flowing into that area. There are other options of course but this is a great starting point. Your home should be comfortable -- you shouldn't have to avoid one area of your home just because it's hotter than other areas! If you notice hot spots in your home, there's lots you can do about it so take a walk around your home and make note of all the hot spots… and see if you can't transform them into comfortable cooler areas!