Archive for the ‘Air Conditioning’ Category

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Why can’t I get my home below 80 degrees in the summer?

Thursday, January 22nd, 2009
80 degree home

 by DAN JAPE of RELIABLE HEATING & AIR originally published July 2008

In the thirty years I have been repairing air conditioners in the greater Atlanta area, this is one of the most asked questions from frustrated, hot homeowners And the answer is usually lack of tonnage or capacity and lack of proper airflow.

The capacity or tonnage of your air conditioner is the measurement of it’s ability to move heat from inside your home to the outside of your home. Air conditioners are produced from 1.5 ton to 5 ton in half ton increments. A ton of air conditioning is 12,000 Btu’s and a Btu is the amount of heat required to raise the temperature of one pound of water one degree in one hour or lower it one degree in your cooling system. A Btu is about the same amount of heat generated by burning one stick match. The tonnage of your system is picked by your heating cooling installer using a number of criteria such as sized of your home, insulation in your home, the amount of and type of glass in your home, the roof color, the amount of shade, which way your house faces and a number of other qualifiers that help determine the size needed to overcome the “heat gain” in the summer. The more tons an air conditioner is, the more expensive it is, so many times the builder of your home uses a unit that is not large enough to remove the heat properly in the summer. An air conditioner can’t be sized too large because it will not remove the moisture in your home, but it need to large enough to cycle off and on and maintain your desired temperature. Often when replacing an old cooling system, a slightly larger unit is needed to accomplish this goal. People often spend days researching the SEER rating of an air conditioner and the brand of the units available, and do nothing about what ton cooling unit to purchase. There is nothing more efficient than an air conditioner that is not running. A properly sized air conditioner will cycle off and on all but the hottest days of the year. Then it should be able to maintain a reasonable inside temperature.

Inadequate airflow from your supply vents can be the cause of both poor heating and cooling performance and with the advent of complete ducts system constructed of flex ducting with many twists and turns, many homes today have very little air delivery. Airflow in older homes with all metal ducting was far superior to the modern home of the last 15 years and often times there is very little that can de done about this due to the fact that this flex duct is sealed up behind sheetrock walls and ceilings. Many times it is not cost effective to replace all the ducting in your home with new proper metal ducting or properly installed flex duct. The airflow for your home originates with the furnace blower and it is often a good idea to increase the size of the furnace blower “drive” to help deliver more air to the remote rooms in your home. A variable speed blower furnace will also help deliver the correct amount of air without the need of spending thousands of dollars on duct modifications.

A few small adjustments when replacing your furnace and air conditioner can result in thousands of dollars of energy savings and enhanced comfort for years to come.

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What the heck is Puron (R410a) anyway?

Thursday, January 22nd, 2009

by DAN JAPE of RELIABLE HEATING & AIR originally published June 2008.

Freon or Puron? That is the question. Whether is nobler to protect the ozone layer or your pocketbook. Now is the time to consider that change has arrived. As many people are aware, Freon or R-22 is on the way , outlawed by government mandate to be discontinued in home air conditioners by the end of 2009. Starting January 1, 2010, all cooling units produced and sold will no longer be able to use R-22 Freon, the old refrigerant long favored in air conditioning. Starting January, 1 2015, there is a ban on sale and use of all R-22 except for certain uses and by that time the EPA predicts a 90% phase out of R-22. And then on January 1, 2020, all Freon R-22 will be gone except for old, recycled stockpiles of used refrigerant.

This time deadline has seemed like it is far away, but it is now right around the corner and if you buy a new Freon based air conditioner today, you may be in for a surprise tomorrow. Freon is going to shoot up in price, quickly and by the time your new air conditioner is in need of service, it will be more expensive that purchasing a new unit that runs on R410a or Puron, as the new alternative refrigerant is called.

The good news here is that R410a is a far better refrigerant than Freon R-22 ever was. It cools better, dehumidifies better, and is more efficient than R-22. R410a provides a much colder air coming out of your vents, dropping the temperature of the air 25 to 28 degrees each time it passes over your cooling coil. You will also find it does a much better job of removing the humidity in the air, which is half the battle in Metro Atlanta. There are many wonderful things about this new refrigerant, but the most important thing is that this is the only alternative on the market for cooling your home.

Many air conditioning companies have refused to invest in the new equipment needed to service and install this new refrigerant, instead telling the customer nothing about it, or misleading them about the truth on the subject. Just yesterday, I had a potential customer tell me that out of five companies he had bid his new system, two told him nothing about this upcoming phase-out and two told him it was “no big deal” and Freon R-22 would be around for many years and plentiful. The truth is, many of the lower priced air conditioner manufactures have built a lot of R-22 units, thinking the lower price would sell these outdated units and now they have to dump them on an unsuspecting consumer.

The truth about this phase out is just a Google away and no one should ignore it, regardless of what any dealer tells you. The government decided long ago to use a long, gradual phase out of Freon as the smartest way to deal with this issue. Do not wait until the very end to look into it. R410a is only slightly more expensive today and if your heating and air conditioning company does not mention it, or offer it, look elsewhere quickly and do not be mislead. The time is here now to make the change, and in the future, you will very glad you did.

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Hail Damage To Your A/C Is Costly

Thursday, January 22nd, 2009

by DAN JAPE of Reliable Heating & Air originally published May 2008

In the past few months, there have been many severe hail storms in and around the Metro Atlanta area and many homeowners have had damage to their air conditioners that is costing them many hundreds of dollars in wasted energy dollars and their insurance companies are misleading them in a effort to reduce their losses.

Your air conditioner remove heat from your home by pulling air through a coil that is very much like the radiator in your car. This coil/radiator has fins made of thin sheets of aluminum bonded to copper tubing and when these fins were struck by hail in the recent storms, they were bent and damaged to the point of reducing and changing the airflow properties of your home’s cooling unit. These fins are critical in the operation and efficiency of your air conditioner and they can’t be repaired. Most of the insurance companies handling these storm damage claims refuse to help the homeowners with these damaged air conditioners due to the fact that it is very expensive to replace these damaged coils.

The outdoor unit and the indoor cooling coils are now a matched set and in 2007 the federal government mandated that all air conditioners be 13 seer or better. This means that insurance companies must spend $2800 to $4000 to bring you back to the point you were before the storm and the fact that the majority of the air conditioners that were damaged were 8 or 10 seer means the homeowner is getting something more efficient than they had before and this is apparently the sticking point with these companies. They don’t seem to mind replacing the roofs or gutters damaged in these storms because they can be repaired with like quality and kind. But the fact that they have to “upgrade” a damaged cooling system has been the source of many problems for homeowners.

Insurance companies have been telling homeowners that this damage is just cosmetic and they can simply comb out the damaged fins with a coil comb and have an air conditioning contractor straighten out the smashed fins. This will never work and will not bring back the cooling efficiency and air flow the unit had prior to the storm. This would be similar to your insurance telling you to beat out the damaged fender in you car with a hammer after a wreck and insisting you be happy with the results.

Except in this case, you will suffer by higher cooling bills and lost cooling capacity for many years to come if these units are not properly repaired and replaced. Do not let your insurance mislead you into not pressing a claim on you air conditioner just due to fact that it still “cools”. If your cooling unit was dented by hail and the fins of your coil were bent, you will never have the same cooling you had before and your insurance company knows this. There is no way to put an exact dollar amount on what it will cost you, but over years of operation, it could be many hundreds of wasted energy dollars. Insist your insurance company treat this damage the same way they are treating your roof, replace it or repair it will a new or like kind product.

As an update to the above blog, we found many of the a/c units that were just combed out like the insurance companies promoted failed completely due to a lack of refrigerant. The razor sharp edge of the aluminum fins cut through and weakened the copper tubing of the coil causing a complete loss of refrigerant. Insurance companies have taken advantage of many policy holders by insisting that this hail damage was not a functional problem, but only a cosmetic problem. But aren’t a number of issues an insurance company deals with simply cosmetic. There job is to restore a customer back to where they were before the damage occurred, not to argue and deny a legitimate claim. The really sad story behind all this is the insurance companies paid for thousands of twenty year old roofs without flinching and many of these claims were simply fraud. The people who had legitimate damage were in many cases turned away. Call me if I can help. 770 594-9969

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Please TURN IT OFF before you DESTROY it!

Thursday, January 22nd, 2009

This time of year we are besieged with desperate phone calls from homeowners who have noticed there cooling systems not working properly or frozen up with ice. If this happens to you, turn the unit off immediately. Turn it off as soon as you can get to the thermostat! I know this is a tough request when it is hot outside, but if you continue to run an air conditioner that is not cooling up to par, you are going to do harm to your unit, waste your cooling energy dollars, and ultimately may permanently destroy your cooling system. I know this may seem hard to believe, but a large share of dead units we replace are killed by the owner refusing to turn it off when cooling is diminished. The one thing you can be assured of is, a broken air conditioner will never repair itself, no mater how long you continue to let it run. Never! Ever!

Many times customers will place a service call for no cooling and then continue to run their system thinking it might work a little until we get there to fix it. This is when most damage is done to the unit due to the lack of proper operating conditions. A unit that has frozen will do no cooling at all regardless of what common sense tells you and continued running in this condition will kill a compressor quickly. When you see ice anywhere on the refrigerant line set, you are seeing just the tip of an iceberg. The ice is covering the indoor coil preventing air from passing over the fins and it is five to six inches thick after continued operation. If you do not turn and let it thaw, you will burn out your compressor while wasting your money running a compressor that is not cooling your home. Also, if the unit is not thawed when the repairman arrives, he will not be able to find the problem and repair it properly.

A lot of customers will turn the unit off after it freezes and it will thaw and they turn it back on to find it cools again and they call our office and cancel their service call. This is a bad idea! What ever caused the icing will do it again after prolonged running and you will continue to damage your compressor . If you notice ice on your air conditioner, the first thing you should check is your air filter, as a dirty filter will cause icing and this is one of the most common problems we find. The other causes are a lack of Freon or refrigerant, a dirty indoor coil or a bad indoor fan motor. If any of these conditions are the cause of icing or lack of cooling, you must have a technician repair your unit.

One very simple thing you can do to check you air conditioner is go outside to your outdoor unit and carefully observe a few things. First, look for any ice anywhere on the unit, inside on the compressor or on the lines. Next see if there is hot air blowing out the top of your air conditioner. The hot air blowing out your unit is the heat being removed from your home and if the air is not hot, your unit is not cooling properly. The last thing you can do is located the large rubber covered line coming from your house and connecting to your cooling unit. It should always be cold and sweating water off the copper line inside the rubber insulation. If it is just cool to the touch and not sweating cold, you need service. This simply check and observation could save you thousands of dollars in energy costs and unit repair.

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Around Town: Woodstock

Thursday, December 11th, 2008

It’s almost summer and the temperatures will soon reach the place where air conditioning is not only comforting, but necessary.  It’s also the time when a lot of systems need to be replaced or serviced.  There are many companies from which to choose when you have need of such services; so why call Reliable Heating & Air?  Because they care!

Dan Jape, owner of Reliable Heating & Air, started his company in 1978 and for 29 years has provided a quality service experience for thousands of metro Atlanta homes and businesses.  His commitment to customer satisfaction has been an integral part of his business philosophy from the beginning.  Dan says, “Our desire is to provide the best products and service at a fair and reasonable price.  Our goal is to leave each and every customer with a smile on their faces.  I always treat my customers like I would want to be treated . . . with fairness and respect.”

To achieve this level of service, Dan has found the correct combination after many years of trying different approaches; he hires and keeps top quality people and utilizes the best equipment available in the marketplace.  Reliable Heating & Air employees are some of the very best technicians and installers in the industry, with a minimum of 15 years of experience, and employed with Reliable Heating & Air for more than seven years.  “We take care of our employees and give them the best and newest tools and equipment to do the best job possible.  We provide them with a new, clean truck stocked with the best reclaimers, vacuum pumps, torches, and hand tools.  This makes a difference to a tech.  Nobody wants to drive a broken-down truck with worn out tools.”

The rest of Reliable Heating & Air’s success formula comes from only using top quality products from the American Standard Company.  “I first noticed American Standard heating and cooling products in 2001 when a leading consumer’s reporting publication rated them number one in the industry for reliability.  Again in 2002 and 2005 the American Standard heating and cooling products were rated on the top by this same impartial panel.”  Dan says, “For years I sold Carrier, Payne, and various other lesser rated products because customers asked for them due to their cheaper price.  After years of repairing these low-priced machines, I now know that the up-front cost is not the way to pick a product that one expects to have a life of  20 plus years.  Those few hundreds saved up front, turn into many expensive repairs down the line with inferior grade equipment.”  At Reliable Heating & Air they are committed to using only the best supplies and equipment available so you can enjoy years of trouble-free service.  When a customer buys a new American Standard heating and cooling system from Reliable Heating & Air, they are given a free one-year preventative maintenance contract, and if kept in effect after that first year, a full coverage warranty will be provided for lifetime — no questions asked.  “I guarantee you will never spend another penny on any problems.  Just let us keep your system running at peak efficiency and capacity,” Dan said.

Most people are unprepared for a problem with their heating and air conditioning systems.  Reliable Heating & Air makes it a little easier to deal with the unexpected.  Dan says, “We work on existing homes and retrofit or change out existing equipment.  We first visit the home to do a complete system and duct evaluation.  When we go to a potential customer for their free evaluation, we take exact measurements, evaluate the equipment and supply needs, and offer those clients a complete computer-generated estimate on the spot.  After the customer accepts the proposal, we can start work immediately, usually within a few days.  We can also do same-day replacements of condensers and coils.”

But you don’t have to wait until it breaks to call Reliable Heating & Air.  Dan will come to your home, free of charge, to advise you on how to make you and your family more comfortable and save money on your cooling bill this summer.  You can always count on unbiased, no-nonsense, straightforward advice from Dan.  That is one of the many reasons he has earned thousands of loyal customers over the years.  “We have earned many customers just from giving honest second opinions.  When the other guy just wants to sell you the biggest, most expensive unit on the market, and he doesn’t tell you the downside to it, it shows a disregard for the customer’s needs and their budget.  Often people will be talked into upgrades that they don’t need and that don’t offer them any real value,” Dan continued.

As an authorized dealer for American Standard heating and cooling equipment, Reliable Heating & Air specializes in the new environmentally friendly refrigerant, R410a.  “All of our techs are trained and equipped to work with the new refrigerant.  You have to have special tools and equipment to install this new “green” machine and a number of dealers have no experience in it,” Dan says.  Reliable Heating & Air is clearly a leader in this product, having installed thousands of the new “Puron” products since it came out in the late 90′s.  Reliable Heating & Air was voted the Best of the Best by the readers of Around Woodstock and Around Roswell magazines and won the Consumer Choice Awards multiple years.  Dan Jape was elected president of the North Metro Chapter of Conditioned Air Contractors of Georgia.  He served on the Lennox Southeast Region Dealer Advisory Council and the Carrier Partners in Development Factory Advisory Team.  With more than 35 years of experience, Dan makes Reliable Heating & Air the right place to get real trusted answers to your heating and cooling questions.  Call Dan at (770) 594-9096 for help and answers for all your air conditioning and heating needs.

Besides a full line of furnaces, coils, and air conditioners from simple to complex, Reliable Heating & Air sells and installs humidifiers; de-humidification systems; UV lights that kill and prevent airborne bacteria, mold and mold spores; and even a whole-house air cleaner system that removes 99.8% of airborne allergens and dust particles from the air you and your family breathe.  This is especially important for people with breathing problems, allergies, asthma, and other environmental sensitivities.  They also sell a wide range of furnace and air cleaner filters from their offices at 13987 Highway 92.  “If we don’t carry it in-house, we can order it and deliver it to your home, free of charge.”

If you are looking for quality, commitment to customer service, and competitive pricing, Reliable Heating & Air will go above and beyond your expectations.  Now located at 13987 Hwy. 92, they are ready to service your home so that winter or summer, you are comfortable and secure.  For more information or to receive a free in-home, on the spot estimate, please call Dan at (770) 594-9096.  You’ll see why they live up to their name!

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