Lakeway, TX and other communities in the Austin area feature their share of businesses. If you’re a business owner or an office manager in the area, you know how vital a good commercial HVAC system is to your company. It means reliable heat in the winter and cool air in the summer: keeping your employees comfortable, protecting important equipment like computers, and providing an inviting environment for customers to visit and revisit. Chances are, you don’t have an HVAC expert on staff, which means you’ll need to hire service not only to install and replace a commercial HVAC system but to provide timely repairs and maintenance. Those needs differ from residential HVAC systems, so before you task a given company to keep your commercial system running, there are certain specific qualities you should look for.
Familiarity with Commercial Systems
A commercial HVAC system differs from a residential system in a number of important ways. It must support a larger space, for starters, and the heating and cooling needs are often much more precise. While the system operates according to similar principles, the practical necessities of the system demand a technician who understands them and has worked with them before. Look for a company with real experience dealing with commercial systems, not just someone who will transpose what they know about residential systems.
Timely and Effective Repairs
This is very simple: does the company offer 24-hour emergency service and do they stand by their work if they do? If a commercial HVAC system goes down, you can’t afford to sit on your hands and wait a few days. Doing so costs you business and costs you money. Find a service that can perform repairs quickly and during off-hours, so that you can continue working without any needless disruptions.
Intelligent Air Services has the skills and experience you need for commercial HVAC services!
Cedar Park, TX still has its share of cold weather this time of year, and it’s natural to assume that ice will form on the outdoor part of your heat pump just like it does everywhere else. In point of fact, however, ice on the heat pump can be a big problem, and it might not be the weather that’s to blame. If the ice seems excessive or you witness a corresponding loss of heat or similar problem accompanying its appearance, you should shut off your system and call in a trained professional right away. Here are three reasons there’s ice forming on your heat pump, most of which need a technician to correct.
1. Broken Defroster
Modern heat pumps come equipped with defrosters to melt the ice that forms on their surface. If the defroster goes down, ice will form up, interfering with the heating and cooling process. The system will then struggle to heat and cool your home efficiently, and the strain will eventually lead to a serious breakdown if the defroster isn’t fixed.
2. Lost Refrigerant
The refrigerant in the system travels through a closed-loop, alternately heating and cooling the air at different stages of the process. When it leaks, frost forms on the evaporator coil (which is located in the outdoor part of the unit) which interferes with the heat pump doing its job. Again, the system will work harder to do its job, raising your monthly heating bills and the risk of a further breakdown in equal measures.
3. Outside Factors
Sometimes the problem isn’t with the heat pump at all, but with things outside of the system. Snow build-up around the outdoor unit can contribute to ice formation, as can ice that melts in a thaw and then refreezes when the temperature drops again. Keep your system clear of snow and wipe off any meltwater that forms during a thaw.
Talk to Intelligent Air Services for heat pump repairs of all varieties!
Spring is coming faster than you may think here in Round Rock, TX, and that means that allergy season is almost on top of us again. If you have sensitive family members who suffer from allergies or similar conditions, now is the time to make your home a little cleaner and safer. Electronic air cleaners and UV lights can help you clean up your home and reduce the risk of those panicky moments when the sneezes start to come. Here’s a brief breakdown of how they work.
Electronic air cleaners work best for those with dust allergies or dander allergies. They work by ionizing the particles in the air as they pass through your ductwork when you are running your heater or air conditioner. The ionized particles then stick to the sides of a collection pan, removed from circulation. They’re efficient because they’re very thorough—no particle is too small to escape its attention—and while the collection pan needs to be cleaned, it doesn’t take nearly the time or effort required to clean or replace the less effective air filters in your home.
UV air cleaners can be used on their own or in conjunction with an electronic air filter. They focus more on biological contaminants: germs, bacteria, dust mites, and other creepy crawlies in the air. The UV light kills them as they pass through the duct system and gradually scrubs the air clean whenever you run your heater and air conditioner. They don’t require much servicing beyond periodically changing the bulb, and the protection they provide to sensitive members of your family can’t be beaten.
If you have someone in your home suffering from allergies, asthma, or a similar condition, give the professionals at Intelligent Air Services a call to install an indoor air quality product for you!
For many homes in Austin, TX, a traditional centralized heating and cooling system does the job just fine. These systems heat or cool the air in a single spot in your home, then use a fan to blow the conditioned air into all the rooms via a system of ducts. It works well, but it can’t work for every home. Some households would benefit more from a ductless heating and/or cooling system, which installs a number of smaller, independently controlled units throughout your home. Each unit is charged with heating/cooling the air in a single room or section, and each one can operate fully independently of the others. They aren’t right for every home and they cost more to install than centralized units, but some homes can benefit immeasurably from their presence. Which ones and why? Here’s a quick breakdown.
Large Homes
Large homes tend to have equally large heating and cooling bills, as a centralized system works overtime to get every corner the correct temperature. A ductless system allows you to heat or cool only those rooms you’re using at any given time. That helps cut down on wear and tear and saves you considerable amounts of money on monthly bills in the process.
Homes That Can’t Support Ducts
A duct system usually needs to run through hidden parts of your home, such as the attic or crawlspace. If your home can’t do that—either because it predates modern HVAC systems or simply because it has an unusual layout—then a ductless system makes an excellent alternative.
Homes Where Temperature Is a Point of Contention
Say you like the temperature to be at 74°F. Your spouse or another household resident likes it to be 70°F. Ductless systems let you have your cake and eat it too by tailoring different rooms with different temperatures at the same time.
For more on ductless heating and cooling, call the pros at Intelligent Air Services today!
Spring comes early here in Austin, TX, and while we still have some cool days ahead of us, we’ll be using our air conditioners more and more often. Now is the perfect time to get your air conditioner ready for spring. You still have time to schedule services and make adjustments without having to worry about fitting it in before the next heatwave, and by doing so early in the season, you can be sure that your system is in fighting shape once the heat begins in earnest. Here are a few tips on getting your air conditioner ready for spring.
The outdoor portion of your air conditioner vents hot air into the atmosphere as part of the overall cooling process. Over the winter, twigs, leaves and other detritus may have built up around the system, and as spring begins, weeds and other growth may cause trouble too. Make sure you clear all of the detritus away from your outdoor system and leave a clear space of about two feet around your system.
Air filters are designed to catch dust and hair from the air as it passes through your ducts. Most of them are supposed to be replaced, and you should do so before the beginning of spring, then every few months after that. Better yet, look into an electronic air filter, which can do the job more efficiently without forcing you to swap out a dirty filter.
A maintenance session from a trained professional is a great way to catch any potential repair issues when they’re still small and manageable. It will also clear up little problems such as loose bolts and excessive dust, helping your system perform at its best when the temperatures start to rise.
For more tips on preparing your air conditioner, give the pros at Intelligent Air Services a call!
Few things can be more exasperating than a heating system that shuts off unexpectedly, or which refuses to turn on in the first place. Thankfully, it alerts you to the problem right away, and here in Austin, TX, our warm weather means it constitutes a nuisance rather than a threat to your health or safety. Even so, a heater that won’t turn on is a problem that needs fixing fairly promptly. In some cases, it’s an issue you can resolve with a little troubleshooting. In others, you need the services of a professional to take care of the issue.
Causes You Can Fix
Most of the time, a cause you can address yourself doesn’t involve anything wrong with the heater itself. A power surge, for instance, can trigger the circuit breaker and cause the heater to be deprived of power. Resetting the breaker in your box can resolve the issue quite well. You should also check your thermostat to see if it’s out of batteries or has been set at the wrong temperature—both easy issues to correct—and make sure you change your air filters on a regular basis. A clogged filter can cause your system to overheat and shut down as well, so make sure you change or clean your filters once every few months at the minimum.
Causes That Call for Repair Service
If the problem is in the heater itself, you usually need an expert to perform a proper repair on it. This includes issues where the ignition system has failed, where there are clogs in the burners or the fuel line, where the heat exchanger has cracked, or where there’s a problem (electrical or otherwise) with the system’s fan motor. It takes a pro to diagnose and repair such issues, which means that if you can’t correct the problem with troubleshooting, you should shut the heat off and call in repair service.
Trust Intelligent Air Services with heater repair services!
Winter in Leander, TX often means heating repair calls, and if you end up on the wrong side of one, you have a company you can trust to come and make repairs. But of all the problems we tell our clients to watch out for, none are more important than your heat exchanger. When it cracks or becomes corroded, it constitutes much more than just a simple breakdown. You need to look out for cracked heat exchangers and shut down your furnace as soon as you do.
The heat exchanger transfers heat from the burners to the air that gets blown into your home. It also filters out the trace toxins that appear in the gas and funnels them out of your house through a vent. When the cracks appear, they disrupt the heating process, making it much harder for your heater to do its job. More importantly, it can release toxins like carbon monoxide into your home, which is why you need to shut the furnace off in the event you spot a crack. It simply isn’t safe.
The good news is that you can take steps to stop the problem before it starts. If your system has a carbon monoxide detector, it will shut the system down automatically, though you will need to get the problem fixed before it will turn on again. You can also spot signs of a cracked heat exchanger by checking the burner flames for yellow-colored flame or flickering; looking for soot coating the inside of the heater, or noticing a smell similar to formaldehyde in the vicinity.
Don’t trust heat exchanger repair or replacement to just any company. Call the pros at Intelligent Air Services today, and make sure the job gets done right!
If you own a heat pump here in Austin, TX, it probably contains an outdoor compressor unit that vents air out of the system in order to facilitate the heating or cooling process. The same holds true with a more traditional air conditioner, which likely hasn’t seen much use in the past few months, but similarly uses an outdoor compressor unit to vent warm air out of your home. In both cases, it’s very important to keep the unit clear of bushes, shrubs, and other debris. That means not only ensuring that there’s a good two feet of space between the unit and any foliage but preventing anyone from stacking items nearby or otherwise blocking the system. Always go out and clear any debris away after a storm or rainfall, and it’s probably a good idea to check for weeds and any other growth every few weeks in the winter. Why? Because they can have a detrimental effect on your system.
The outside unit needs to be able to vent air in order to keep your system functioning as it should. If it can’t, then the results could cause components in your system to overheat. In some cases, safety features will shut the system down before that happens, but you’ll still need to address the problem before your system will function again. In other cases, there are no such features and your system runs the risk of destroying a key component, necessitating expensive repairs.
Beyond that, nearby foliage runs the risk of dropping twigs, leaves, and other detritus directly into the system: interfering with moving parts and possibly causing a breakdown in the worst circumstances. A trained technician can fish about any debris, but by pruning back nearby plant life, you can prevent the situation from arising in the first place.
Call the pros at Intelligent Air Services to learn more!
A geothermal heating and cooling system is installed beneath the ground on your property: a series of looped coils that circulate a liquid facilitating a heat exchange with the earth. The temperature below ground never changes once you get more than about ten feet down or so, which makes it an infinitely renewable source of energy for your home in Austin, TX. The heat exchange allows the system to heat or cool your home while providing a number of unique benefits that only this exciting technology can offer. The up-front costs are the biggest impediment, but offsetting them are 3 long-term benefits that you should consider very carefully.
Because it takes advantage of the renewable thermal energy in the earth, a geothermal system only needs to power the pump and a few other components with electricity. That means it costs much less to operate than other forms of heating, especially for larger houses or those that don’t have a lot of insulation (which is fairly common here in Austin, since our summers are long and hot).
Because the coils are underground, they’re protected from the ravages of the elements, and from wear and tear in general. That means the chances of the system suffering a breakdown are very low, and that when breakdowns do occur, they usually take place with the smaller surface unit, making them easy and fast to repair.
Because geothermal systems use much less energy, they are considered very green sources of energy, reducing our dependence on foreign oil as well as doing our part for Mother Nature. Over time, that can reduce your carbon footprint a great deal.
If you have questions about a geothermal system for your house, the pros at Intelligent Air Services can answer them. Pick up the phone and call us today!
Winter has come, and while we can handle the “cold” weather fairly well in Austin, TX, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t take the time to improve your home’s energy efficiency. An energy-efficient home will help lower your bills during our sweltering summers as well as our mild winters, and over time could put a great deal of money back in your pockets. We offer a number of products that can do so, and the more you know about them, the better you can make an informed choice about which ones might be right for your household.
Insulation
Home energy efficiency begins with insulation, and surprisingly many Austin households don’t have adequate amounts in their home: mostly because people assume it is effective in cold weather only. But besides lowering your heating bills, insulation keeps hot air out in the summer just as effectively as it keeps warm air in the winter, which means your air conditioner won’t have to work so hard to maintain a comfortable home.
Duct Sealing
A breach in your duct system can have devastating consequences, forcing your heating or air conditioning system to work harder to do their jobs as unconditioned air gets pulled in. Dust and dirt can enter your home through a duct breach as well, lowering your indoor air quality and increasing irritation to your nose and sinuses. A professional technician can hunt down any breaches in your ductwork, then seal it up so it doesn’t cause any additional problems.
Humidifiers and Dehumidifiers
Dry air is a problem in the winter just as moist air is a problem in the summer. Without properly balanced humidity levels, your heater and air conditioner must expend more energy to make you comfortable. Look into installing a whole-house humidifier or dehumidifier to resolve the issue.
Call Intelligent Air Services to install or repair any of these products!