Your HVAC Equipment Blog

When I make mistakes, I often chalk them up to a learning experience.

Without failure, there would never be any sort of achievement.

So, while I don’t enjoy making mistakes or being wrong, I get something out of it and I’m not afraid to be mistaken. However, when it comes to something like HVAC repair and making a stupid choice, it’s much tougher to swallow. This exact scenario happened to me this past summer. We live in a region where the heat pump remains pretty quiet this time of year. Thankfully, our winter is very mild and doesn’t need much heating. So the heat pump gets a well deserved break given the fact that it runs pretty much 8 months of the year. That’s because there is air conditioning demand for that length of time. But the summer, is a whole other animal. So when I came home from the commercial HVAC of the office in mid July, I expected to enjoy the central air conditioning of my house. But what I walked into was a hot, sticky house. Of course, my brain told me to call the HVAC professionals and have them come out to fix it. But my ego had other ideas and I skipped that call to the HVAC company. The fact that the HVAC equipment was still running was the thing that really guided my mistake. I thought perhaps I could poke around and find an obvious problem even though I have no heating and cooling expertise. Of course, I only made the situation worse and eventually had to call the HVAC professionals to come fix the heat pump. The only thing I got out of my adventure into HVAC repair was voiding the warranty on my heat pump.

heating equipment

It’s like this Covid thing just won’t go away.

Of course, I’m thrilled that there are vaccinations available these days so my life isn’t in danger.

I spent more than 18 months cooped up inside the central air conditioning of my home when the pandemic started. Even if the company had not closed the offices with the zone controlled HVAC, I couldn’t have worked there. That’s due to the fact that I am immuno-compromised and the early days of the pandemic were terrifying for me. And with Covid going on and on, it’s nice that I made the decision to stay home. When the company opened back up and that wonderful zone controlled HVAC was turned back on, I chose a different route. Thankfully, my company was willing to allow me to stay working remotely. That had a lot to do with the fact that my work excelled during the time that I was home in my own air conditioning doing my work. I found out that working from home really is better for me personally. The interruptions and the constant drama in the office had more of an effect on me than I thought. Working from home in the central air conditioning of my house was remarkably better when it came to the quality of my work. So these days, I have my own office that used to be the guest room. I even had the HVAC company come in and install a ductless heat pump so I have the sort of heating and cooling that rivals my old office.

heated floors

It was definitely like a game of musical chairs but with much bigger consequences.

For a long time in our home, we were one room short.

And we did our best to deal with it. We have a nice home with great central air conditioning but we ended up having one more kid than number of rooms. So once the kids were older, we tried to make it more fair and rotate who had to share a room. That devolved into disaster pretty quick and there was never a quiet moment where I could just come home from work and enjoy the air conditioning. So it was obvious that we either had to move or we had to add a room to our home. Given the current climate on the real estate market in our region, getting a new house was out of the question. My wife and I decided that since we were going to add a room, why not make it for us. We also liked the idea that we are adding value to our home as that is our biggest investment. So we added a master bedroom with an ensuite bathroom. I was surprised that the HVAC contractor couldn’t extend the ductwork to include the new bedroom. But I got a lesson in the fact that HVAC equipment is specifically sized to the air volume of a home. So we ended up with a ductless heat pump and we love it. The ductless heat pump is so quiet and yet produces such quality heating and air. It’s hard to believe that something so small does such a big job so easily.

 

boiler repair

I actually liked going to the mailbox during the summer for the first time last year.

That’s because I was actively working to lower the costs of all the air conditioning that we require in this region.

For sure, there is no way around living in this part of the country without plenty of air conditioning. But the fact that we were spending more than a car payment for cooling was unacceptable. However, when we first moved here the heat and humidity of this region was just so overwhelming. So all that we could do initially was to lean into the thermostat. While we were comfortable inside the house with all that air conditioning, the costs skyrocketed. But at first, it seemed like that was a fair trade off given how different the summers are down here then what we were accustomed to prior to moving. But after three years of that sort of behavior, I knew we had to change. So I talked to some locals as well as consulting the HVAC company. This was all very informative and I picked up plenty of tips on how to reduce our dependence on air conditioning. I even was able to rely on a checklist from HVAC company. All I had to do was go to the HVAC company website and download this checklist in order to prepare the house for the heat of summer. What I didn’t expect what is how big a difference doing without all that air conditioning made when it came to being outside. The heat was less overwhelming now that we were acclimating to higher temperatures.

cooling industry

So the fact that we got more than 30 years out of that HVAC unit is remarkable.

Selling a house is not an easy thing to do in any circumstance. But when it’s the first time you’ve done it after living more than 30 years in the same place, it’s a serious undertaking. Honestly, I really didn’t know where to begin. After spending many hours inside the central air conditioning of kitchen discussing the pros and cons of selling, we finally decided to sell. Thankfully, we have a great friend who is one of the best realtors in this region. It was just so nice that we were able to trust someone considering that we really didn’t know where to start or what to do. The first thing our friend did was walk through pointing out all the great things inside our house. That is a very professional and respectful way to start that process. Because before long, we had to get down to what needed to be changed. One of those things was obviously replacing the residential HVAC. This was not a shock to either my wife or I considering that HVAC unit was original equipment when we bought the house. Actually, my wife and I had the heating and cooling equipment installed just after buying the house. So the fact that we got more than 30 years out of that HVAC unit is remarkable. But so much of that credit goes to the HVAC company and consistent HVAC maintenance. I will say that I was stunned by what new residential HVAC and the latest in HVAC technology was able to do for the value of our home. We got so much more then we thought we were going to get for our home and a lot of that is due to the HVAC equipment upgrade.

 

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Being scared awake in the middle of the night is not my idea of a good time.

• And being scared awake by my gas furnace shutting down was even worse.

But perhaps the worst thing of all is that this heating problem shouldn’t have happened at all had I done what I was supposed to do. I think that was the thing that made me more furious than anything else. But anytime I get yanked out of my bed in fear, I’m not going to be happy. When I heard the big bang come from the basement, it nearly lifted me out of the bed. I had a feeling that it was the gas furnace but I was sure of it once I got about halfway down the stairs. I could smell a sort of hot metal odor that had a bit of an acrid component to it. It was in the single digits outside so the idea that we could get by on space heaters until morning was out of the question. All that was left to do was make the dreaded phone call for emergency HVAC service. There was no way I was going to subject my family nor the water pipes to sub freezing temperatures. The HVAC technician was able to get there fairly quickly and made short work of the repair. Of course, I was prepared for the stiff bill that comes with a late night HVAC repair. However, the real kick in the teeth was when the HVAC professional told me that had I gotten the heating maintenance done, none of this would have happened. Well, I’m not forgetting again. The very next day I signed up for the HVAC service plan.

cooling