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An Easy Way To Save Money — Let Your Air Conditioner Breathe!

Palm Air Staff|20 February 2017

Here's an easy thing you can do to keep your air conditioner running as efficiently as possible: Don't crowd the condensing unit, the outdoor part of your AC. For example, shrubbery planted around a condenser can be a problem in the long run. They might not seem like an issue at first, but what's going to happen to those shrubs?

Yep. As the shrubbery gets bigger, it's going to crowd that condensing unit. When it does, it's going to restrict the air flow across the condensing coil. Basically, the condensing coil is where all the heat that got picked up from your home gets dumped outside. Your AC is engineered to remove the heat by having a designed amount of airflow over the condensing coil. If less air flows over the coil, less heat is removed. That means the whole cycle warms up a bit, and your AC works harder to keep your home cool.

You'll pay extra for it in more than one way: (i) Your monthly electric bill will be higher; (ii) your equipment may not last as long, so you'll pay more in repair bills and in having to replace the AC sooner.

There are a lot of ways that condensing units get their airflow blocked. The most common is from plants growing too close to the unit. Dirt and leaves piling up around the condenser cut air flow, too. These are things you can easily control by trimming the plants around the condenser and clearing away any debris.

If enough dirt gets between the fins of the condensing unit, that's also going to reduce air flow. When you get your HVAC system serviced each year (you do, don't you?), the service tech should check and clean the coil if necessary.

Sometimes, the HVAC company creates the problem by placing condensing units within inches of one another, or right up next to a wall or a fence.

Not only are those condensing units too close to the wall of the house and the fence, they're way too close to each other, too. They're going to be fighting each other for air when adjacent units are running at the same time. This is a terrible situation and should never be allowed to pass the building inspection.

At Palm Air, we know to keep some space around your AC so it can breathe. Placement, spacing and countless other details can affect the efficiency of your HVAC system. Our approach to air conditioning goes beyond the equipment itself to make sure everything works optimally. Contact us today for 24/7 expert AC service!

Article source: Energy Vanguard