Is there annual maintenance on air conditioners? What about ducts?

[politicat]

We have a lennox central air conditioner, and the two years after I had it put in, the company that did it came out for free inspections, but the lady who owned the place retired a couple of years ago and went off somewhere to enjoy her hard-earned gains.

Do I need to schedule someone to come out and check things out before we turn it on?

And duct work... what's up with this vacuuming out the ductwork? I crawled into the crawlspace on Sunday to peek into the ducts and do a couple of other things down there, and the ducts look okay. Do we really need someone to come out and suck out our dust bunnies and hairballs?

The filters on the HVAC actually do get changed regularly - allergies, you know.

(Oh, and the weird noise we were getting on the furnace... it went away. Weird.)

[jschurchin]

1. To answer your question about annual........

maintenance. Yes. The evaporator and condensing coils should both be cleaned. Have them check the system freon charge to make sure it is operating at proper pressure. Also have them check the blower motor to make sure it is bolted securely, this may be your "noise".

Low freon charge and/or dirty coils will cause the system to operate inefficiently and/or "freeze" up.

Service call= about $50, freon R-22 or Puron= about $10/lb.

Hope this helps.

[Stinky The Clown]

2. We've always had our HVAC system under a care contract.

It isn't that cheap. Our latest charge is $395 a year. For that we get two on-site visits and all repairs are free, including parts. There are some non-covered things, like filters and such.

So we get ours checked twice a year, at the seasonal changeovers.

[politicat]

3. Maintenance is scheduled for friday.

I found the company who bought the company I used, and they had my records. It looks like we skipped getting maintenance done last year, but the whole system is still under warranty, so we should be okay. Lucky me, I'm getting an early-bird special.

And I scheduled a furnace check up for October.

Thank you very much for the info. It really does help.

I miss being a renter sometimes.

[NMDemDist2]

4. smart idea, and the main thing is filter changes regularly

monthly even

my HVAC guy told me that is the main thing to do to get years and years of no problem service out of any unit

[politicat]

5. We change filters every month. It's the only religious ritual we have.

There are stickers that goes on the calendar and a reminder in my iCal and one in my PDA and one in my husband's wiki...

He has allergies. One of the cats has allergies. I have allergies. Changing that filter is our #2 defense (#1 being Claritin.)

We buy the "Take everything out of the air but the air" filters in annual lots. Cheaper, and I don't have to remember to buy them but once a year when we get down to one filter.

[NMDemDist2]

6. good, that will do more for your air handler than anything else you

do

as for the ducts, I cleaned mine when I moved in but they shouldn't need it more that every 5-10 years depending on your dust levels

mine had construction junk in them still and the house was 9 years old.......