Design Comfort Blog: Archive for May, 2014

3 Causes of Low Air Flow in Your AC Unit

Friday, May 23rd, 2014

When it comes to comfort from an air conditioning system, it isn’t only cooling power that’s necessary to keep you cool. The air conditioner must be able to blow out enough of that conditioned air through your vents to provide an even spread of lower temperatures through your home. If you notice that the flow of air from the vents has dropped, something is wrong and you should contact specialists to look into it.

When you need repairs for your air conditioning in Millcreek, UT, pick up the phone and call Design Comfort right away. You can trust our trained staff with all your home comfort concerns.

3 reasons you might experience low airflow

  1. Clogged filter: This is one of the more common troubles that can afflict an air conditioner, and fortunately it is one that you can easily prevent. The filter is designed to catch outside particles that enter the return vents and stop them from entering the AC’s cabinet. If the filter isn’t changed often enough, it will catch enough debris that it will start to cut off the flow into the AC, and that will cut down on the flow out of the AC as well. Along with lowering airflow a clogged air filter will force the system to work harder and could trigger icing across the coils. Change the filter once a month to prevent this from happening; should serious trouble start, call for repairs.
  2. Blower fan malfunction: The blower fan in the air conditioner’s air handler send air from the return vents across the evaporator coil and then into the ventilation system. This is the work horse of airflow, so if the fan malfunctions because of a broken motor or mechanical problem, you’ll need to have trained repairs to restore it and your airflow.
  3. Broken ductwork: The ducts that carry the air from the air handler to the rooms must maintain a tight seal along their length so they will not lose air pressure. It only takes a small hole of gap between sections to lead to a drop in the air pressure that will result in lowered airflow from the vents. Breaks need professional indoor air quality technicians to repair and seal them (no, duct tape isn’t the answer) not only to restore the AC’s airflow, but to protect the ducts from dust and debris contamination.

Call for the right repair technicians

Because a drop in airflow can come from either problems in the air conditioning or the ductwork, make sure that when you call for repairs from technicians with skill in both HVAC work and indoor air quality services.

For the proper work for air quality and air conditioning in Millcreek, UT, look to the comprehensive services of Design Comfort. We are ready 24 hours a day to help you.

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The Importance of Sizing an Air Conditioning System

Friday, May 23rd, 2014

When you have a new air conditioner installed, one of the most important decisions to make is how powerful a new unit you need. This is called “sizing” an AC, and it’s more difficult than you may imagine. This isn’t a case where you can simply choose the largest system available. If your air conditioner is too large or too small, it will have serious consequences and the system will probably need early replacement.

Proper sizing requires calculations from HVAC professionals. Since professionals are necessary to correctly install an AC, make sure you have them on the job from the beginning. Call Design Comfort today to speak to our technicians who handle air conditioning installation in Salt Lake City, UT. They can assist you with finding the right system for your comfort.

Problems with an AC That Is Too Small

If you have an air conditioner that is too small to cool down your home, the system will start to run longer than it should to struggle to reach the desired temperature. This puts extreme stress on the AC and will wear it down rapidly. It will also fail to evenly condition the house, with many rooms developing hot spots because the system cannot produce effective cooling levels.

Problems with an AC That Is Too Large

It sounds logical that if an air conditioner is too large you can simply decide to run it less often. However, the problem that an oversized air conditioning system encounters is that it will start short-cycling: it will reach its target temperature so rapidly that the compressor will turn off early before completing the cooling cycle, only to turn back on again a short time later. This creates a huge power drain because the AC uses the most electricity when it turns on the compressor. The amount of strain put on the compressor will also threaten to burn it out after only a few years, and when this happens the whole air conditioner usually must be replaced.

You don’t want either situation to occur, so make sure you have AC installation done right the first time. Professionals will perform a heat load calculation which will factor the amount of heat your home traps and generates, and how much power is needed to overcome it and provide all rooms with even cooling. Once they finish the calculation, the technicians can select the air conditioner size that will work for you without draining power or wearing down rapidly.

Since 1982, Design Comfort has delivered quality air conditioning installation in Salt Lake City that has kept our customers cool and content through the hot summers. Make us your first call when you need a new AC for your home.

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How Does an Air Conditioner Cool the Air?

Friday, May 16th, 2014

Air conditioners are quite a feat of engineering. While they seem to just blow cool air, there is actually much more going on than appears to the eye. Simply put, your air conditioner takes the hot air from your home, runs it through your air conditioning system, and then returns it as cool, dry air. So, what appears as cool air blowing into your home is actually the same air with the heat removed. Want to know how your air conditioning does this? Let the Millcreek air conditioning system specialists at Design Comfort explain how this happens.

Refrigerant

You may have heard your air conditioning specialist say the word “refrigerant” in regard to your air conditioner. Refrigerant is the chemical your air conditioner uses to facilitate the heat transfer process. It does this by completing a cycle in which it changes from a liquid to a gas and back again, taking on and then dispersing heat from the air within your home.

The 3 Main Components of Your Air Conditioner

Your air conditioner has 3 main parts: the compressor, the condenser and the evaporator. These components are responsible for changing the refrigerant from a liquid to a gas and back to a liquid, all within your air conditioning system.

How Do the Refrigerant and Components Work Together to Cool the Air?

In its different states, the refrigerant carries out heat and then helps to cool the air that is brought back into your home. How? When a liquid converts to gas, it absorbs heat. So when the refrigerant is in a gaseous state, it absorbs the heat from your property. As the refrigerant gas moves through the system, it passes through the outside unit, where the heat is released and the refrigerant cools. The cooled gas moves back into the house to the evaporator, where warm air is blown onto the evaporator coils now holding the cooled refrigerant. This creates chilled air, which is delivered to the inside of your property via the ductwork.

Removal of Humidity

In addition to lowering the temperature, your air conditioner does a second important job: it also removes humidity. Moisture is a conductor of heat, which is why humidity makes things feel so much hotter. As your air conditioner removes heat, it also removes moisture from the air and drains it outside your home. Without this function, you would have cool, moist air in your home rather than cool, dry air.

It’s a Complex System

Your air conditioner is a complex machine that benefits most when a licensed professional manages its maintenance and repairs. For over 30 years, Design Comfort has been working on air conditioners in Millcreek. If you would like to know more about our products, installation or repairs, call us today!

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3 Reasons to Replace Your Water Heater

Wednesday, May 7th, 2014

You turn the handle with the letter “H” or the red mark on it, and hot water pours out of a faucet or showerhead. This is something you expect to happen every day, and thanks to a sturdy water heater, you will get it almost every day.

But then that day will come when it won’t happen: you have a dead water heater and you need to replace it with a new system. This happens to all water heaters eventually—no home appliance can endure forever. But you may decide to replace your heater before this occurs: here are three good reasons to schedule water heater replacement service in Salt Lake City before the heater gives out on you entirely.

Installing a new system to provide you with the hot water necessary for daily comfort is a simple task for the right professionals: call on Design Comfort, where water heaters are one of our specialties.

1. It is exceptionally old

You should know the age of your system and the manufacturer’s expected lifespan for it. (Look on the heaters tank to find this information.) Most heaters will last 1–15 years with maintenance. A heater over 15 years could begin to fail at any time, and should be replaced before it turns into a money waster and a source of numerous repairs. You have already received a great return on the initial investment; get ahead of the heater before it begins to fail.

2. It has started to corrode

Corrosion striking the tank is often the sign of a water heating system in its final stages. When rusty brown water starts flowing from the taps, or if you spot corrosion on the water tank, then the water heater is on the verge of dying and repairs will not reverse the process.

3. You want to shift to a tankless water heater

If your family has grown since you installed the water heater, you might start to find that the old heater is inadequate for your needs and runs out of hot water too rapidly. In this case, consider the switch to the technological advance of the tankless water heater, which not only saves power (no need to keep a tank of water constantly hot with continuous energy use) but provides you hot water on-demand… so you’ll never run out of hot water, no matter how many people in your home need morning showers. Ditch the old storage heater for a tankless model if your installer thinks it will better fill your needs.

Remember that you need to have trained and qualified installers put in a new water heater for your home or else it will not work as expected and encounter efficiency and performance issues. Trust the work to the staff at Design Comfort, where water heater replacement in Salt Lake City is one of the services we take pride in.

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