Residential & Commercial HVAC and Refrigeration Tips Blog | Atlantic Refrigeration & Air Conditioning, Inc.

Should You Replace Your HVAC System With a Heat Pump?

October 28th, 2019

You’re reading this because it’s fall and you have plans to make a big change to your HVAC system before the winter weather arrives. You’re debating about a new choice for comfort: a heat pump. Heat pumps are similar to air conditioners—they move heat from one place to another using the circulation of refrigerant. The difference is heat pumps can switch the direction they operate so they function as both air conditioners and heaters. But if your furnace has been overheating frequently this year, this might be the right time to consider a full system upgrade.

This sounds like a dream choice, doesn’t it? Your year-round comfort needs taken care of with a single system that can switch jobs with an adjustment of the thermostat. Of course, it can’t be that simple. And it isn’t.

It’s Time for a Planned Inspection of Your Home’s Heater

October 14th, 2019

October is the best time of the year to plan for a maintenance inspection and tune-up for the heater in your home, no matter if you use a furnace, a boiler, a heat pump, or a ductless mini split system. These annual inspections are essential for a heater to work in top shape, avoid unnecessary repair work, and stay within manufacturer’s safety limits. It’s not something you can skip a year here or there.

Fortunately, arranging for this service is straightforward: call a professional Delaware HVAC contractor who offers a maintenance program. Signing up for one of these programs not only provides you with heating maintenance each year, it usually includes air conditioning maintenance in the spring and a raft of other benefits.

We offer a complete HVAC maintenance program for our customers. If you aren’t signed up, give us a call today so we can get you on the schedule as soon as possible to inspect and care for your heater before the winter weather arrives.

Dealing With an Upper Floor That’s Too Hot

September 30th, 2019

One problem that our experts in air conditioning services in Seaford, DE often handle for our customers is fixing uneven cooling in a home. It’s something of a marvel that modern air conditioning can provide even cooling in the first place when you consider the size of many homes, the difficulties of air circulation, and the many ways heat can enter different parts of a house. However, the technology of modern central air conditioners allows for a proper level of cooling and air balancing that can deliver the even spread of comfort homeowners want.

The uneven cooling problem we run into the most is the upper floor that’s warmer than the first floor. Heat rises, and this makes it easy for the second floor to become stuffy. Heat also enters through the sun on the roof, adding to the problem. There are other potential obstacles to a comfortably cooled-off second floor. We’ll take a look at what can be done to fix this problem.

Your AC Has Limits! Know What It Can Do

September 16th, 2019

Hot weather continues through September and into October, and air conditioning systems that have put in work since the start of summer are now at a higher danger of a breakdown. Enough stress can accumulate on even the best-maintained AC to lead to a malfunction.

We want to help you avoid a late-season air conditioning repair in Delaware. Our technicians are ready to help you with 24/7 repairs whenever your AC begins to fail. (Never hesitate to call. Delaying air conditioning repairs because fall weather is coming soon is a poor plan that can lead to worse problems.) To help you take the pressure off your cooling system, we’re going to talk about the limitations of what your air conditioner can do. Pushing your AC over these limits is a fast way to have a broken AC.

You May Still Need AC Help at the End of Summer

September 2nd, 2019

When the weather starts to cool down as summer comes to a close, the AC in your house will run less often. There will still be some hot days during September when the cooling system will need to put in extra work, but this is the air conditioning season homestretch.

This doesn’t mean, however, that you can ignore AC issues or that you won’t need to schedule air conditioning services in Dover, DE before the fall. Procrastination on repairs can lead to serious trouble, and there are other services you may want to schedule at this time of year. There’s never a wrong time to repair or make upgrades to your AC—moving earlier is always better than too late.

Is a Ductless AC System Worth It?

August 19th, 2019

We are proud to work with the finest manufacturers of HVAC equipment. This is one of the ways to ensure we provide quality service to our customers. When it comes to ductless heating and cooling systems, we only install the best products from Mitsubishi, the leader in cutting-edge ductless mini split technology for homes.

If you’ve been thinking about installing a ductless air conditioning system for your house, we strongly recommend you speak to our professionals about a Mitsubishi system. But before you even reach that stage, you probably want to know if going with a ductless air conditioning system is even worth it. The answer, at least for many homes, is yes!

Air Filters: Your AC Filter Isn’t Enough for Cleaner Air

August 5th, 2019

One of the important jobs we do for our residential customers is install air filtration systems to help improve indoor air quality. Low indoor air quality is an unfortunately common occurrence in modern homes, and putting in these filters can make a tremendous difference in the amount of airborne pollutants circulating through a home.

If you have a central air conditioning and heating system with ductwork, then you already have at least one air filter in your house—the filter on the HVAC cabinet. This filter is usually located in a slot on the cabinet between where the return air duct meets the blower unit. You might think this filter is good enough for most air cleaning. But this is not the case. The filter isn’t even there to clean the air your household breathes at all. For quality air filtration, you’ll need to arrange for installation of air filters in Delaware and Maryland.

How to Choose a High-Efficiency AC

July 22nd, 2019

The efficiency of air conditioning systems—that is, how well they transform electrical power into cooling power—has improved in huge leaps over the last twenty years. The change in efficiency from ACs in the ’70s and ‘80s to today’s special high efficiency models can be almost double. Even standard mid-efficiency air conditioners are far more efficient than the models of the past.

If you are planning to call an HVAC contractor in Delaware to install a new central air conditioning system for your home, we recommend looking into a high-efficiency unit. They cost more than mid-efficiency units, but if you have professionals to help you choose the right unit and install it, you’ll receive a return on your investment that will pay back the extra installation costs in a few years.

Refrigerant Leaks Need to Be Fixed ASAP

July 8th, 2019

We want to preface this blog post by saying that all air conditioning problems are serious. All air conditioning problems require prompt attention. Not all air conditioning problems are necessarily equal, however. Case in point: the refrigerant leak. No AC issue is a welcome development, but few strike fear into the heart of the AC user quite as much as the refrigerant leak. The reason for this is quite simple. Refrigerant is what makes cooling your home possible.

If you have any reason at all to believe that you’ve got a refrigerant leak in your air conditioning system, then you need to schedule air conditioning repair in Middletown, DE, immediately. The longer that you wait to do so, the greater the risk of serious damage to your home cooling system. Of course, before you can schedule your refrigerant leak repair services, you first need to recognize that you’ve got a refrigerant leak! Read on to learn more about potential warning signs.

Why Your AC Might Shut Down

June 24th, 2019

The modern residential air conditioning system is a complex piece of refrigeration equipment. Any type of complex machinery is in danger of breaking down at some point, no matter how well it was built or how well it is cared for.

Does hearing this make you worried about your AC’s performance this summer? If you’ve kept up with annual maintenance for the system, you probably won’t run into any problems—but there’s never a 100% guarantee the air conditioner won’t shut down on you during an extremely hot day.

When you have an AC that won’t start, you may need an HVAC company in Middletown, DE to repair it. In some cases, the problem is simple and you can get the AC running yourself. We’re going to look at some of the reasons your air conditioning system may shut down, and which of them will require calling pros to fix the AC.