HVAC

Winter, the temperatures drop and your furnace or heat pump quits working and you call us and then you get frustrated cause everybody and their brother has called before you and we can’t get to you as fast as you like and then we are frustrated because we can’t keep everybody happy and are running full speed just to keep up with everyone that is out of the heat. Phew!

Here are a few things to think about when the temperatures drop.

  1. Change your air filter!

    One of the most important things to do is just change that air filter, whether it’s cold out or hot out. A dirty air filter causes the furnace to work harder to circulate the air in your house and when the temperatures drop your furnace is working even harder because it is trying to heat your house more frequently to keep it up to temperature. So change that filter.

  2. Give your Heat Pump a vacation!

    I know I want to take a vacation when the temperatures drop, well so does your heat pump. A heat pump works by using the warmer temperature outside and transferring that warmth by heating the refrigerant in the lines of the heat pump to be transferred inside your house. Well, at 39 degrees and colder there’s not a lot of heat outside to transfer and your heat pump just keeps working harder and harder to try to keep up. Cycling on and off to try to find some heat outside in the cold will ice up and may eventually fail. So give it a vacation. Even though your heat pump and furnace are smart, they need your help. If you know it’s going to drop below 39 degrees tonight and stay there, go to your thermostat and switch your heat setting to the EM (emergency heat) it’s not an emergency yet, but, turn it on, it will save wear and tear on your heat pump and will not cost you any more money in power than if you had left your heat pump struggling to keep up.

  3. Have your heating system cleaned and checked out each year!

    Ooops too late now to schedule that appointment in September when we were not swamped with no heat calls, but put on note on that 2015 calendar for next year. We can still come out and do a routine maintenance on your unit we will just have to book it out a few weeks in the future.

  4. Spend $40 and buy a space heater!

    The safest is the oil-filled radiator kind. This way if you do have your heat go out, you can at least huddle the family around the space heater until we can get out there and get you up and running again.

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