01 · 4 min read
Prepare your AC for summer
The pre-season checks that prevent most July breakdowns — and the two you should never do yourself.
Most mid-summer emergency calls trace back to something that was visible in April. Cooling equipment fails under load, so a system that limps through mild weather can still quit the first week it runs all day.
Start outside. Clear two feet around the condenser, cut back anything growing into it, and rinse the fins from the inside out with a garden hose — never a pressure washer, which folds the fins flat and chokes airflow. Indoors, replace the filter and pour a cup of warm water through the condensate drain to confirm it runs clear.
Two checks belong to a technician: refrigerant charge and electrical connections. Charge is not something a system 'uses up' — if it is low, there is a leak, and adding refrigerant without finding the leak just pays for the same problem twice. Capacitors and contactors are the most common failed parts on a summer call, and both are cheap to replace before they strand you.
02 · 3 min read
Spring HVAC checklist
A short seasonal walkthrough that takes about twenty minutes and catches most of what goes wrong.
Spring is the cheapest time to find a problem. Demand is low, parts are available, and nothing is an emergency yet.
Work through it in order: replace the filter, confirm every supply register is open and unobstructed, clear the outdoor unit, check the condensate drain, and run the system in cooling for fifteen minutes while you listen. Grinding, screeching, or a hard click followed by silence all mean stop and call.
Finally, check your thermostat schedule against how you actually live now. Schedules set two years ago are one of the quietest sources of wasted energy in a house.
03 · 3 min read
Best thermostat settings
Why setback works, why 'crank it colder' does not, and what humidity has to do with comfort.
A thermostat is a target, not a throttle. Setting 68 when you want 74 does not cool the house faster — the equipment runs at one speed and simply runs longer, which mostly wastes energy and can freeze the coil.
Setback does save. Letting the house drift while nobody is home reduces the temperature difference the system fights against. On a heat pump in winter, make setbacks modest — recovering more than a few degrees can trigger backup electric heat, which costs far more than it saved.
Comfort is humidity as much as temperature. A house at 76 and 45% relative humidity feels better than 72 and 60%. Longer, slower run cycles remove more moisture, which is exactly why two-stage and variable-speed equipment feels more comfortable at the same thermostat setting.
04 · 5 min read
Repair vs. replace
A straightforward way to decide, without guessing and without pressure.
Three things decide it: age, the cost of the repair against the cost of replacement, and whether the failure is likely to repeat.
Age matters because efficiency and part availability both fall off. A system past roughly fifteen years is near the end of its designed life, and repairs on it buy less remaining time than the same repair on a five-year-old unit.
On cost, a common rule of thumb is to weigh the repair against the age of the system — a large repair on an old unit rarely pays back. The judgment that matters more is whether the failure is systemic. A failed capacitor is a part. A leaking evaporator coil or a failed compressor on an older system is usually the system telling you what comes next.
Ask for the diagnosis in writing, with the measurements behind it. Any recommendation to replace should be able to explain what was measured and why repair does not make sense — not simply assert it.
05 · 4 min read
SEER2 explained
What the efficiency number on the sticker actually measures, and how much it is worth to you.
SEER stands for Seasonal Energy Efficiency Ratio: cooling delivered over a season divided by the electricity used to deliver it. Higher is more efficient.
SEER2 is the current version of that test. The important change is that it measures equipment against higher external static pressure — closer to the resistance of real ductwork in a real house. Because the test is harder, a SEER2 number reads slightly lower than the old SEER number for the same equipment. It is not a downgrade; it is a more honest measurement.
The practical point: efficiency gains shrink as the number climbs. Moving from an old low-efficiency system to a modern baseline is where most of the savings live. Going from high to very high efficiency costs considerably more for a smaller additional return, and it only pays off at all if the ductwork can actually deliver the airflow the equipment is rated for. Efficiency claims assume good installation — a high-SEER2 system on undersized ducts will not deliver its rating.
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