When your indoor unit will not turn off it can be annoying, but sometimes if it continues to also heat…scary. We give detailed instructions on what to do if your furnace will keep running and will not turn off. Walk with us as we show you step by step how to fix a furnace that is not turning off and also signs that you may need a professional to help you. We hope this helps you save time and money when it comes to your home’s hvac system.
Author: Andrea
Heat Pump Not Blowing Hot Air: Is My Heat Pump Not Working?
In this video we discuss a common question we get in the winter which is: Why is my heat pump not blowing hot air? I often get calls from customers who think they need a service technician out because they feel cool air coming from their vents. We explain why just because the air feels cool, you may still be experiencing your heat pump working normally. Due to how heat pumps operate, sometimes the air feels cool however it is still warm enough to heat your house. We hope this helps you save money on a service call when you may not actually need one!
Preparing Your Outside AC Unit For Winter
This video covers why preparing your outside air conditioner for the winter elements can be a great idea. However, there are certain mistakes you want to avoid when winterizing your outside air conditioner for winter. If you cover your air conditioner, you want to make sure you first have an air conditioner, not a heat pump. It is also a great idea to only cover the top of the unit instead of wrapping the entire air conditioner. Also a good coat of wax on the outside unit is a wonderful way to protect it from the elements.
We recommend this cover for your air conditioner during the winter:
(As an Amazon Affiliate, we earn from qualifying purchases.)
Furnace Filter Slot Cover: Easy Fix to HVAC Air Leak
We’re All About Sealing Up Ductwork
In the video above we explain a very easy simple tip to seal the space around your furnace filter slot.
We want to deliver the airflow where it’s supposed to go and the furnace filter slot is a weak spot in every system that allows air to escape the filter and go directly to your furnace blower.
Why Is It A Problem That Some Air Escapes The Filter And Goes Directly To The Furnace Blower?
When air is not filtered, it allows all the dust, dirt, and allergens to go directly into your furnace blower and into your house. This will make your furnace dirty and less efficient. Your house will seem to have more dust, and dirt in your furnace creates many problems and will cause parts to wear faster and break more often.
Even More Important If Your Furnace Is Located In An Attic, Crawl Space, Woodshop, etc.
If your furnace is located in a dirty (woodshop, etc) or unconditioned space, the space around your furnace filter lets the air in that space escape the filter entirely and go directly to the furnace blower. Your furnace will be pulling humid, dirty air directly into the blower compartment. That is not a good thing at all. That’s why we recommend closing the space around your filter with something like the FilterLock by Allergy Zone.
We recommend the FilterLock Furnace Filter Slot Seal Door Cover to solve this pesky problem. See below for our affiliate link to the FilterLock Furnace Filter Slot Seal Door Cover.
It improves indoor air quality by blocking allergens, dust, and gases like carbon monoxide from entering your home.
(As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.)What is a SEER Rating? [How to calculate your SEER rating and how to use your SEER Rating]
Your air conditioner SEER rating stands for Seasonal Energy Efficiency Rating. In this video we not only explain how the rating is determined, but also how you can use the SEER Rating to determine how much electricity your air conditioner uses and how much money your air conditioner costs you each summer. You can also use this calculation in reverse to determine your air conditioners REAL operational SEER Rating. Get ready to do some math!
Use Your SEER Rating to Calculate Your Electricity Costs
1. Capacity (Tons x 12,000 BTUs) divided by SEER rating = Watts
2. Watts divided by 1,000 = KW
3. Kilowatts x Hours of Use = Total kw hours
4. Total kw hours x electricty cost kw hour ($0.12-$0.15) = Total $$$ to run A/C for the Summer
Electronic Air Filter Replacement With Micro Power Guard (Plus How Electronic Filter Works)
In this video Ramon shows us how to properly replace the media filter in his MicroPower Guard Electronic Air Cleaner. The MicroPower Guard an air filtration system designed to trap microscopic contaminants that traditional filters can’t catch.
The MicroPower Guard Air Cleaner uses an electric charge to polarize and trap harmful particles while simultaneously cleaning the air in your home.
It is important to change the filter correctly in your electronic air cleaner. If you leave the power on to your furnace while you change the filter, it could damage your system.
Air Conditioner Freon Leak Symptoms (Why is Freon Expensive?)
In this video we share the symptoms of a freon leak in your air conditioner and how to know if your air conditioner is low on freon or out completely! We also share why freon is so expensive and how you can prevent a freon leak at your house.
Freon is a brand name for the refrigerants R-12, R-13B1, R-22, R-410A, R-502, and R-503 manufactured by The Chemours Company. The term “freon” is a common descriptor or proprietary eponym (similar to a generic trademark) like “xerox” or “kleenex.” It is commonly used when referring to any fluorocarbon refrigerants.
Air Conditioner Not Cooling Enough?
Has this ever happened to you? Your air conditioner is running, but it is just not quite keeping the house at the temperature you want it to be. It always is working hard and not cooling the house enough. We get this question in many different forms and the answer as to why can vary.
Air Conditioner Not Cooling Enough?
Is there something you can do about your air conditioner not cooling enough or are you stuck with certain areas of your house never getting below 85 degrees in the summer time? When it comes to your air conditioner, just about every symptom could have several different possible solutions. There’s always multiple explanations as to what could possibly be going on. For that reason before we get started fixing the problem, we need to cover our bases and get to the bottom of what is really causing the problem if your air conditioner is not cooling enough. The first thing you should do is to take an inventory of what is happening.
Take An Inventory Of What Is Going On With Your Air Conditioner
When you think you have a problem with your air conditioner the first thing to do is nothing. That’s right. Don’t touch anything. Just leave it alone and take an inventory of what is happening. Go to the thermostat. Is it set on cooling? What temperature is it set at versus what is the room temperature?
If you know the air conditioner is set to cool, and you can see that it is not getting to the set temperature, you know you have a problem. What’s working and not working? Is the furnace blowing air inside? If you go over to a register and put your hand in front of it is it blowing air? Now to the unit outside. Is it blowing air? There’s a little fan on the top or side of your air conditioner. Is that fan blowing or not blowing. If it is blowing air what is the temperature of that air? Hot or cold? If you know those things we can really help figure out what’s going on.
What Is The Temperature Of The Air Coming From The Outdoor Fan?
What difference does it make what the temperature is of the air coming off the outdoor unit fan? When you put your hand over the outdoor fan, the air coming from it is usually hot. What your are feeling is the heat that was inside now being pushed to the outside. So, if you feel air coming for the outdoor fan and it feels cool instead of warm, that means the hot air is not being taken out of the inside of your house. Under normal circumstances the hot air from inside is rejected outside.
What Is The Solution To Your Air Conditioner Not Cooling Enough?
So let’s say everything appears to be working but just not quite cooling enough. Usually around 80% of the time it needs maintenance. A dirty coil for example, can cause your air conditioner to not be efficient and to not cool as much as when it is clean. Dirty filters will also cause your air conditioner’s performance to suffer and can cause a multitude of problems relating to efficiency. When the air is not allowed to circulate properly, your air conditioner will feel like it is not keeping up to the desired temperature especially in the heat of the summer. The good news is that if your air conditioner is not cooling enough, a simple maintenance visit will more than likely fix the issue. However, we strongly recommend a trained professional to do the maintenance on your air conditioner. A maintenance visit and the complete cleaning of a cooling system involves high voltage electricity and refrigerants at high pressure. There are also many smaller components that can be damaged in the process of cleaning your air conditioner if you do not know how to do it properly. So, if your air conditioner is not cooling enough, don’t fear the worst. It is probably something very simple that can be fixed during an air conditioner tune up or maintenance visit. It is a good idea to get your air conditioner checked out if it is not cooling enough because it is currently using much more electricity that it needs. So it’s already costing you more money than it should, plus you’re not comfortable. Maintenance will help that a lot by cleaning up all of the components.
Check Your Air Conditioner Early In The Season Especially If You Think It May Have A Problem
In addition to getting an air conditioner maintenance and tune up to address the problem of your air conditioner not cooling enough, we recommend you do some in-house things to keep the cool air in your house. Take an inventory of your house to make sure you are not blocking registers or releasing the conditioned air. One common issue we see every summer is a customer complaining about the duct work sweating near the basement. Water dripping from the duct work isn’t normal and the issue is usually resolved by finding a basement window that got left open and closing it. If a basement window is left open during the spring, it lets in an endless amount of humidity in your basement. This causes condensation to collect on everything that is cool and will cause things like the duct work to “sweat” and cause water issues in your basement.
Double Check Those Storm Windows
Another thing you can do on your own to make sure your air conditioner can keep the desired temperature is to make sure your storm windows are closed. If your storm windows are left open during the heat of the summer you go from what could be the equivalent of a double or triple pane glass to a single pane window. You don’t notice these things when it is 72 degrees outside, but you do when it is 100 degrees outside which can cause your air conditioner to not cool enough.
Two Products You Must Try If You Have Allergies
Matt has worked in the HVAC industry for more than 20 years and there are two products he has in his own home that he does not want to live without. One is a UV Sterilization System and the other is a Micro Power Guard high efficiency air cleaner. As a life-long allergy sufferer, he is allergic to pollen, ragweed, animal dander, you name it. However he always says that when he is home, he doesn’t feel like he has allergies. “Growing up I was a mess. But now I can open my windows in my house, and because of the filtration that I have in my system, it’s actually helping clean the air out constantly, so that that’s where it really helps and I don’t suffer.”
Allergy Sufferers Keep Their Homes Closed Up
Homeowners, especially if they have allergies, are reluctant to open their windows. Therefore they are going from heat to air conditioning immediately because they they just cannot handle opening the windows because the suffering is not worth the economic savings that they’ll get by opening the windows and not running the air. This is a good call because that is exactly what the Mayo Clinic recommends if you have allergies. Here is the list of recommendations from the Mayo Clinic to combat the allergy season:
- Use the air conditioning in your house and car.
- If you have forced air heating or air conditioning in your house, use high-efficiency filters and follow regular maintenance schedules.
- Keep indoor air dry with a dehumidifier.
- Use a portable high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filter in your bedroom.
- Clean floors often with a vacuum cleaner that has a HEPA filter.
If you keep your house closed up and do not have a high efficiency filtration system or UV sterilization system, it is like breathing in a bubble. Homes are built so tight we are all just sharing the same air over and over again and that would be the equivalent of me blowing up a balloon and then having somebody else breathe what’s in the balloon. We’re doing it every day in our homes. Gross. Let’s freshen up that air.
What Does An HVAC Professional Use In His Own House to Combat Allergies?
Two things. One is a UV (Ultraviolet Light) Sterilization System. The UV Sterilization System has two bulbs in it that produce two different types of UVC rays, which are used for killing germs and bacteria and viruses. This is the same type of light they are using at hospitals where they wheel it into a hospital room and shine UVC rays on the surfaces of the room that could potentially have bacteria. The UVC Light is there to kill bacteria and viruses. There is a seperate bulb inside the chamber that produces UVB rays which helps to take care of all of the chemicals that we have in our homes. So many items in our homes off gas chemicals and we breathe them. Think of anything in your home that has a smell: Glade plugins, candles, aerosols, detergents, beaches, even the paint on your walls and the glues in the carpet have chemicals in them and we breathe in those chemicals potentially triggering allergies and illnesses.
Second is a Micro Power Guard Air Filtration System
The Micro Power Guard takes care of the particles floating around our homes. There are particulates in the air such as dust, pollen, animal dander, smoke, etc. that regular air filters don’t do a great job at removing. Regular disposable air filters will catch the bowling ball-sized particles but will leave the finer particles that can effect your allergies. How the Micro Power Guard is so efficient is because it has an electronic polarized media. It uses the electricity to polarize or magnetize itself and turns it into a magnet for particles and it does it through a carbon insert. It uses electricity to pull the small the small fine particles towards it so that it definitely doesn’t get through for you to breathe. We’ve been putting these in four years now and they work better than anything else we’ve used. They’re amazing. They’re safe and reliable too. Our Micro Power Guards have a lifetime warranty. True Story: The only time we had a Micro Power Guard fail was when a customer submerged it in the bathtub in order to clean it. Other than that, they’ll work forever.
Air Envy?
Yes. It’s a thing. We’ve actually had cases of air envy where where one homeowner says, I don’t know what you did next door, but I want air like his. Whatever you did over there. That’s what I want. Once you experience clean air you will notice when it is not there in other homes or buildings. Matt doesn’t notice two cats in his house and he’s allergic to cats. Matt said “I’ve had I’ve had friends over for hours and later said ‘you have cats?’ and I say actually we have two of them and I’m badly allergic to cats. They cannot believe they didn’t notice when they came into my home.”
UV Sterilization System and Micro Power Guard Help With More Than Just Allergies
We’ve written before about how Micro Power Guard Air Filters also help with illnesses in your home. In a study done by Environmental Health and Engineering, Inc.* researchers set out to measure the potential exposure benefits of whole house high efficiency in-duct air cleaners. The study focused on sensitive subpopulations such as those who have asthma or severe allergies. The results indicated that the use of high efficiency in-duct air cleaners provide an effective means of controlling allergen levels not only in a single room, like a portable air cleaner, but the whole house. The National Environmental Education and Training Foundation recommends the use of portable air cleaners in bedrooms of asthmatics. While the use of portable air cleaners in the bedroom did prove to be beneficial in the study, the researchers found that in reality, the use of high efficiency in-duct air cleaners provide a more effective means of controlling allergen levels and the influenza virus not only in a single room, but the whole house.
Perhaps the most interesting result from the study…
Involves the estimation of the risk of influenza infection from an individual who remains in the home over the course of a five-day infectious period with someone who currently has the illness. Since influenza can trigger asthma, the researchers were interested in the effect of high efficiency filters on the transmission of the illness. The study assumed that the infectious individual spent one-half of their time in the bedroom and the other half in the family room, while a healthy individual spent 69% of the corresponding time indoors at the home during which they were exposed to the house-wide average concentration of quanta in air. For this scenario, the risk of infection by influenza was greater than 30% in the ventilation configuration with a portable air cleaner in both of the two rooms frequented by the infectious individual. In comparison, the risk of infection was less than 4% for the high efficiency in-duct system. The “high efficiency air cleaner” used in this study was a high efficiency electrostatic air cleaner with HEPA-like removal efficiency for aerosols. One Hour Heating and Air Conditioning has this product for your home as well as more options that add even more protection for the health of your indoor air.
What Is A Heat Pump?
How Do Heat Pumps Work?
Before you understand how a heat pump works you must understand how an air conditioner works. A heat pump works just like an air conditioner except it also runs in the opposite direction in order to create heat as well. In heat pump mode we are taking heat out of the air outside moving it inside.
With an air conditioning system, you have the unit outside and a unit inside (usually the furnace down in your basement). The furnace contains the blower which is our means of moving air. You also have a cooling coil located on top of your furnace. Inside of the air conditioner unit outside is a compressor we’ll think of it as a pump that pumps refrigerant between the indoor and outdoor units. Above the outside compressor is a fan.
In the spring and summer when your thermostat says “hey it is getting a little warm in here.” It sends two signals out. It sends one downstairs to the basement and it turns on the blower. The blower now comes on and it starts pulling all the air out of the house via your return air grills. (You see the return air grills usually high on the wall toward an interior wall.) It starts pulling all the air out of the house and it takes it down to the furnace and it then accelerates it and pushes it through that cooling coil.
The cooling coil is hooked up to the unit outside via the refrigerant lines. That the second signal the thermostat sends out is a signal to the unit outside in the yard. This turns on the compressor and it starts starts pumping refrigerant through the coil inside and circulates to the coil outside and back again. It just got this creates this loop of refrigerant going from inside the house to outside the house.
What we’re doing is were actually absorbing the heat out of the house and into the refrigerant. It is being circulated then outside to the coil where we’re circulating it through that coil and we’re releasing the heat outside in the yard. (If you’ve ever placed your hand above the fan on your outdoor unit you feel hot air. That is actually the hot air that was taken out of your house!)
On the inside portion of your cooling system, we’re taking the warm moist air out of the house. Then we’re blowing it through that cooling coil and chilling it making it cooler. Then that cool air gets blown back inside the house.
That’s how an air conditioner works.
A heat pump does that very same thing. Normally you wouldn’t know the difference between an air conditioner or a heat pump. They look exactly the same but unlike your air conditioner, it also starts up in the wintertime. In the winter time we need heat in the house. When you need heat, the thermostat sends out those same two signals. It turns on the blower downstairs and we start gathering all the air up and blowing it through that coil downstairs.
The thermostat also starts up the unit outside and gets the fan going and everything. However, the heat pump is literally running backwards than how an air conditioner works. The refrigerant flow is the opposite of what it is in the air conditioning mode.
In heat pump mode we are taking heat out of the air outside moving it inside.
Then we release the heat from the outside air into your home inside. It is just the opposite of what the air conditioner does.
If it is already cold outside, how are you taking heat out of the air outside and moving it inside in order to heat your home?
Ah you are paying attention. Though it is 32 degrees outside It is outside feels cold to us. There is still usable heat in the air. Absolute zero is way way way below zero. So, on a 30-35 degree day, there’s plenty of heat that we can absorb out of the air outside and release it inside the home.
Pros and Cons of a Heat Pump
Heat pumps do a great job heating your home, however let’s say the temperature overnight gets down to zero. As it gets colder outside, there is less heat available outside. When it is colder outside, the air we are blowing inside will not feel as warm.
At 30-35 degrees there is plenty of heat available outside to heat a typical home. As it gets colder and colder and colder outside at some point the heat pump is going to be running all the time trying to keep up with the demands of what you need inside. Eventually it will need supplemental help. Supplemental help could mean a gas furnace or electric heat strip heat because it is just too cold outside.
The Economics of the Cost of Heating Your Home
For years here in Johnson County, Kansas City Power and Light would have a heat pump rate. There was a dramatic cut in the rate for electricity. In the winter months you would get a drastic cut off your utility rate. And so it was economically advantageous to operate that heat pump instead of burning natural gas. If you think back 10 years ago, natural gas prices were unstable. They would spike up one year, were would see a fifty to a hundred percent increase in gas prices from one year to the next, so it made it very advantageous to use the electric source to heat your home. When you’re using that heat pump you’re using electricity.
Right now we are in 2019. Kansas City Power and Light has taken away those incentives as far as electric rates. (I have a heat pump sitting out in the yard, but I do not use it.) I also have a high efficiency gas furnace and with the price of natural gas and the efficiency of my appliances, I’m better off just using natural gas to heat my home instead of electricity. Without that break in the electrical rate, there is no economic advantage in using the heat pump and personally I find the warmer air from the gas furnace more comfortable.
Now, some climates are perfect for heat pumps no matter the utility rates. There are places in the south were they don’t have weather that goes much below 40 degrees so only having a heat pump is a perfect solution to heating the home.
Also, as far as efficiency goes, with the all electric heat pump, you can think of it as always twice as efficient as that furnace. The furnace air feels warmer, however the heat pump is running twice as efficiently. It will deliver twice as much heat per dollar as the furnace does.
So it just depends on what your options are on weighing the pros and cons of using a heat pump.
How Do You Know if You Have a Heat Pump?
The dead giveaway is on your thermostat. You’ve got a few more switches on your thermostat if you have a heat pump.
With a regular air conditioner thermostat, there are heat | cool | off positions for your system. There may also be a blower switch which either says automatic or on. A heat pump thermostat has few more switches on it. If you have a heat pump you’ll see a term like emergency heat on the thermostat and you’ll have a heat | cool | off switch just like an air conditioner. The emergency heat is a setting that you can manually turn off the heat pump, and turn on the gas furnace or whatever you use for supplemental heat.
If something malfunctions a with the heating option on the heat pump, you can go to manually go to the emergency heat setting turn off the unit outside and still have a source for heat in that house.
What Is That Loud Noise Coming From My Heat Pump?
There are a few common noises that you may have with a heat pump.
Often you may hear a loud shaking from the outdoor unit. That is most often the heat pump going through a defrost mode. Depending on the weather conditions, there will be times when the heat pump has frost form on the unit outside. It is working normally but when the temperature drops outside the heat pump will ask itself every 90 minutes if there is frost on the outdoor unit. It has little sensors so it will know if there is frost or not. If frost is detected it goes through a defrost cycle. That sounds like a “whoosh”. What happens is in order to get rid of the frost the heat pump will reverse the direction of the refrigerant and run backwards. The unit is trying to use the hot gas of the refrigerant to defrost the unit outside.
If you’re fortunate enough to see this defrost mode, it is quite a show. Since it melts the frost off it turns to steam and so it literally looks like their outdoor unit is getting ready to explode.
Seriously, we have gotten terrified calls from homeowners witnessing the defrost mode thinking that something was blowing up outside.
Pro Tip For Being Kind To Your Heat Pump
If you are running your heat pump during winter storms, it is common to hear a rattling noise outside. Ice can form on the fan blades and possibly even get out of balance because there are ice formations on it.
Ice storms is another can be a problematic time for a heat pump. Sometimes it doesn’t hurt to just go ahead and turn it off and run the furnace instead.