Touchstone Heating & Air Inc. Blog: Archive for the ‘Air Conditioning’ Category

Why You Should Upgrade Your Thermostat

Monday, July 13th, 2020

modern-thermostatYour thermostat is the part of your air conditioning system that is going to control everything that your system does. This means if something is wrong with your thermostat, it is going to impact your air conditioner’s operation. Likewise, having an updated and effective thermostat will have a positive effect on your comfort.

Take a moment to think about how old your thermostat is? Or how well it is really working. Your answer to that question may tell you what you didn’t want to know–it is time for an upgrade. If you are looking to invest in a  best thermostat, we’d like to offer our help getting it installed. It’s a job for the pros after all. The main question is, is an upgrade really worth it?

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AC Short-Cycling—What Might Cause It

Monday, June 15th, 2020

service-tools-air-conditionersYou may not have heard of ­short-cycling, but you may have noticed it in your house. It’s when your air conditioning system turns on and off more often than normal. Your air conditioner’s cooling cycle is the process of it turning on at a request from the thermostat, running until it registers the house has reached the thermostat setting, then shutting down until the thermostat makes a request again. Most AC cycles last for 15 minutes or more, and if you keep the thermostat at the same setting during the day, the cycles should have a steady pattern.

When that pattern becomes the AC turning on and off multiple times over an hour—less than 15 minutes on at a time—then it’s short-cycling.

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What Can Cause AC Fans to Stop Working?

Monday, June 1st, 2020

desk-fanYour air conditioning system has two fans that are essential for it to work. The fan you’re most used to hearing and feeling is the indoor blower fan. This fan is located at the bottom of the HVAC cabinet, where it pulls air from the return air ducts and then pushes it past the evaporator coil, where it’s cooled, and then into the ventilation system.

The second fan is in the condenser cabinet outside. This fan draws air through the grill of the cabinet to run it across the condenser coil and release heat. The fan then pushes this heat through the top of the cabinet.

If either fan stops working, you won’t have a cool home. A broken indoor fan means air won’t move through the ducts. A broken outdoor fan means the AC can’t effectively release the heat it drew from indoors and won’t cool down the home’s air.

What causes these fans to break, and what can you do about it?

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How to Stop AC Drain Clogs

Monday, May 4th, 2020

washing-an-air-conditionerYou might see the words drain clogs in the title and think, “Wait, Touchstone isn’t a plumbing company.” True, but we’re air conditioning professionals with a long history of helping people stay cool in Florida weather, and so we know all about a specific type of drain clog: the air conditioning system drain clog.

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Why Your AC May Be Having a Rough Start to Spring

Monday, April 6th, 2020

tulips-in-springAir conditioners get a head start on the summer in Florida, so you’ll already have your air conditioner running on a routine schedule during the spring. But what if your air conditioner doesn’t seem to be up to the task? Why does it seem like it isn’t able to do the job it once did? Why is it starting to give you trouble?

A faulty AC in the spring is nothing unusual, unfortunately. It can be a leftover problem from the end of the fall, or something that developed during the stretch the air conditioner wasn’t working regularly. It can also be due to lack of maintenance.

That last one is the most important, so we’ll start with it…

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Looking for Better AC Efficiency in a New Unit?

Monday, March 9th, 2020

touchstone-new-ac-yorkWarm weather settles in early during the year for Florida—if it can ever be considered to have “gone away” in the first place. If you’re looking to change your air conditioning in Gainesville, FL because you have an ancient money-guzzling cooling system, early spring is the best time to schedule the work. Speak to our technicians, and they’ll help you get started finding the right new unit with no rush.

If the money you’ve spent on cooling your house the past few years has irritated you, then we’ll guide you toward an AC unit with better efficiency. Below we’ll look at a bit more at the quest for an energy-efficient choice.

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The Top 5 Reasons to Schedule a Pre-Season AC Tune-Up

Monday, February 24th, 2020

AC-repair-contractorSpring arrives officially next month. And in Florida, it’s already unofficially here. Time to prepare your home’s central air conditioner for another sweltering summer slam. How do you do that? Call your reliable professional HVAC technician (spoilers: that’s us) and tell them you want a pre-summer AC tune-up and inspection.

There are many reasons for pre-season tune-ups, and we’ve picked the five biggest. So put your hands together, we’re counting down…

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Your Air Conditioning System Has Its Limits

Monday, September 9th, 2019

young-woman-shiversIn the Florida fall weather, home air conditioners still put in plenty of work—and sometimes they’ll hit their limit and need air conditioning repair in Newberry, FL.

We want to discuss air conditioning system limits in greater detail so our customers can understand what their ACs can and cannot do. An AC is not an unending supply of cooling that works against the heat no matter what—it has limitations, and we’re going to look closer at them.

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The AC Cooling Cycle: How Long Should It Last?

Monday, August 26th, 2019

AC-plastic-grateA problem our technicians often address in air conditioning systems is short-cycling. This is when an air conditioner becomes trapped in the start-up cycle so it doesn’t complete a regular cycle. The thermostat activates the compressor to begin cooling down the house, but for some reason, the compressor shuts down early. Soon after, the compressor starts again, only to shut down early once more… and the process repeats.

Most of the time, short-cycling requires professional air conditioning repair in Alachua, FL to fix. No matter what, don’t allow your AC to continue this stop-and-start routine. It increases wear on the system and endangers the compressor. You might end up with a dead AC years before its time. And you will certainly have higher electrical bills because the start-up cycle uses the most amount of power of any part of an AC’s operation.

But to understand when an AC is short-cycling, you have to understand how long a “regular” cooling cycle lasts. Let’s get into the details …

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Air Conditioning Won’t Run? It May Be a Contactor Problem

Monday, August 12th, 2019

electrical-componentsThe “no cool” is the most common air conditioning emergency call we get. Our technicians are available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year to rush out to help with whatever has caused and AC to stop doing its job.

There are several reasons for an air conditioner to stop working. A common one we’re going to look at today is a problem with a contactor. What’s a contactor? That’s as good a place to start as any …

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