Common HVAC Questions

Most units have a useful life span of 15 to 25 years. When a unit needs an expensive repair, we stop and evaluate the repair cost vs replacement and which investment makes more sense. If the parts are available, we can continue fixing it—but only if it makes financial sense.

Air filters need to be replaced when they get dirty enough to start restricting airflow. Depending on various conditions like run time, pets, foot traffic, etc., this could be two months to two years. In most residential applications, changing filters every six months is a typical time span and works well.

Your air filter must be changed. Maintenance is optional but recommended. We offer a yearly ESA maintenance program as well as a one-time PTU maintenance. Benefits of a maintenance program can include fewer breakdowns, increased lifespan of the equipment, greater operating efficiency, safety, and peace of mind that the system is being inspected, tested, and maintained. Our yearly program includes a maintenance visit for the AC in cooling season and a maintenance visit for the heater in heating season. Air filters are included—we replace the disposable types and clean the washable types.

We work on them and we install and replace them. We have a yearly maintenance program where we do a start-up and replace straw pads every spring and shut them down and cover them in the fall. This program keeps the unit running at peak cooling and extends the life of the unit over a system that does not receive attention.

We do not recommend covering an AC condenser. There is little benefit to covering it, and it can be damaged if it is run before the cover is removed. Other than paint fading, we do not see any damage from the weather. They are built to be exposed in all seasons.

If you are familiar with your circuit breaker panel, you can check and see if the breaker has tripped and reset it. If you do this and the breaker trips again, then there’s a problem that needs to be looked at. Sometimes a breaker will trip due to a PG&E problem like a brown-out or power surge, and one reset is all it needs.

There are a few common causes of an AC freezing up. Low airflow can cause a unit to freeze up. Check and/or change the air filter. Make sure supply grills are not closed or blocked. Airflow problems caused by mechanical issues typically require professional diagnosis. Low refrigerant (Freon) will cause freezing up. This requires a recharge and potentially a leak check to find out where it is going. Less commonly, icing is caused by the thermostat turned down too low. We don’t recommend setting it lower than 70°, although some systems will be okay at lower settings. Turning the thermostat down does not help it cool faster. The AC is either on or off—it doesn’t work harder if turned down, it just runs longer.

In a perfect system, we will never need to adjust the refrigerant level. The only time an AC system should need a recharge is if there is a leak somewhere. The refrigerant leaks out as a non-toxic, invisible vapor. Low refrigerant can cause icing, low airflow, and low capacity where the unit runs more and doesn’t cool as well as it used to.

Intermittent problems can be very tricky to diagnose when the unit works correctly during testing. With that said, we oftentimes can fix the problem without actually identifying it. A lot of intermittent problems are caused by minor things like loose connections, plugged sensors, or plugged drains—and those are things we can resolve on the first visit without replacing parts or knowing what the problem is. In the cases where the problem is not resolved on the first visit, our next step is to try to be there when the problem is occurring so we can test to see which part is not working. This is treated as a callback and is not billed as a second service call.

We have a one-year parts and labor warranty on every repair we perform and every unit we install. Some units or parts have longer warranties from the factory. We can always access those warranties for you and get the part for free. Typical factory warranties do not cover labor, shipping, and miscellaneous parts like refrigerant and supplies. Those charges still must be paid by the customer.

We are happy to accommodate our customers by scheduling appointments for evenings and weekends, but they do come with overtime charges which increase the cost of the service. Another option is to provide us with a key, hidden key, or access code to allow work to be done while no one is there.

No, most repairs are done in the first visit. A lot of repairs only require labor for a cleaning, adjustment, or minor electrical repairs. Many other repairs that do require parts can be fixed with the stock of universal or common parts we carry on our vans.

To replace existing or add new heating and air conditioning equipment, there is no charge for the estimate.

No. We stand by our quotes—the price you agreed to is the price you’ll be charged. If, in the very rare case that something about the job changes, then sometimes we are forced to stop and make adjustments. But we never give our customer a surprise bill.

We work on all brands and models of propane furnaces, air conditioners, heat pumps, mini split systems, window units, swamp coolers, RV furnaces and air conditioners, commercial refrigeration, commercial ice machines, commercial hood vents, and pellet stoves.

We do not work on residential refrigeration, kerosene heaters, or residential appliances.