If you have a newer and larger home, you no doubt have an air conditioning unit sitting outside your house. If you are like most people, you also have not looked into how to maintain it. However, good maintenance on your AC unit will save you a lot of money in the end. While it will, of course, saves you on your energy bill, it will also save you from having to replace your HVAC unit as well. It might not be too hard to imagine that your home’s HVAC system has several parts. Whether you use an AC and furnace combination or a heat pump, your system will have both an interior unit and an exterior unit. The exterior unit in your homes heating and cooling system has both a condenser coil and compressor. Likewise the interior unit in your homes HVAC system has both an evaporator and blower. Before we start doing any maintenance on either of these, be sure to cut the power off to the HVAC unit through both the homes breaker switch and the shut-off switch near the unit outside your home. Starting with the external unit, you need to clean the inside of the heating and cooling unit. Wipe down the fins around the outside of the unit and make sure any bent fins are straightened. Then clean the debris around your external unit, make sure it is level, and finally clean the evaporator coil. While it is a lot of work, it is definitely a good investment in keeping your heating and cooling system running efficiently for a long time.
