Three Reasons To Have Annual Checkups On Your AC Unit
Annual checkups are an important part of responsibly caring for your AC system. Although you may feel your AC unit has been going strong on its own for five or ten years and can do the same again without outside intervention, you don't really have any proof that your compressor won't eventually fail from overuse and neglect. After all, if you aren't having the unit serviced regularly, who's to know what condition it's in? Here are three reasons you shouldn't neglect the annual visit from your AC contractor.
1. Repair savings
If caught and repaired in time, system malfunctions are often much less serious than they would otherwise be. In addition, the annual checkup can actually prevent problems. For example, the technician will notice if the unit's airflow is blocked and will remedy it, potentially saving you from a unit failure. And by checking to make sure your machine has enough coolant, the technician can prevent the problems that occur when refrigerant is low; not only inefficient cooling but potentially catastrophic incidents like frozen-over coils as well. Freezing over can not only indicate that your refrigerant is low, but if you continue running the machine with frozen coils, the freezing can spread up the line to the compressor and cause it to fail.
2. Energy efficiency
You wouldn't expect your car to run efficiently if it never had an oil change or new tires, would you? Similarly, your AC unit will become more and more run down the longer it goes without a checkup and maintenance visit. Cleaning the coils to make heat dispersal more efficient, lubricating any parts that need lubrication, and checking refrigerant are all part of an annual checkup.
3. Effective cooling
Whether because your coils froze over and you have to turn the unit off until they thaw or because the unit is simply too dirty to effectively eliminate heat, an uncared-for AC unit can be much less useful than one that's had its annual maintenance done. For best results, have the checkup done in the spring before the weather has gotten truly hot so that if your AC unit has developed a fault it will be less likely to show itself before the maintenance technician can remediate it.
These three reasons all demonstrate that if you have an AC unit and you want it to run reliably throughout the summer without sucking up energy or failing badly, your best bet is to have preventative maintenance through a place like R & R Heating & Cooling of Polk CO Inc.