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Ensure your air conditioner is in excellent operating order when summer is approaching.
To guarantee unimpeded air circulation. One of the most crucial maintenance recommendations is to clean or replace your air conditioner filter. This will improve the effectiveness of your system. As well as stop dust from spreading throughout your house.
Cleaning the condenser coils and the exterior unit of your air conditioner is a further step. Since materials like leaves and branches can accumulate and obstruct adequate ventilation. Using a soft broom to sweep the area around and inside the unit is an easy fix. Again, ensure the unit is switched off at the power source when doing such a job.
How can I prepare my air conditioner for summer?
With hot Aussie summers, so too comes long stretches where air conditioners are blasting cool air. Before summer rolls around, you want to ensure your air conditioner is working properly. This is because the last thing you want on a 40-degree day is for your house to feel like a sauna.
An air conditioner without regular cleaning results in dust, leaves, and dirt gathering. All of which decrease the efficiency of your unit.
There are some straightforward DIY maintenance tips that you can take before summer arrives. Ensuring your air conditioner is in the best shape to battle the heat.
You do not want any electricity running through the unit to ensure your safety. So before any maintenance on an air conditioner is done, you must ensure the system is turned off both on the control panel and the service panel.
Cleaning the air conditioner filters
After a few years of dust collection, cleaning and replacing your air conditioner filter is one of the most advisable air conditioner maintenance tips. This ensures unrestricted air circulation. Doing so will prevent the recirculation of dust around your home. This can apply to the inbuilt filters with individual stand-alone units and the inlet filter for ducted units.
Filter blockage can also drastically reduce the efficiency of your system. Thus, making the air conditioner unit work harder, using more energy, and ultimately increasing the likelihood of a system breakdown. Cleaning air filters is relatively easy. Simply remove the filter and use a soft brush to remove any dirt or small debris.
In the case of inlet filters, if not checked for many years, please be aware that a layer of dust can have accumulated above the filter. Therefore when removing the filter, one needs to be careful. In case a layer of dust is waiting to come down on you. For this reason, even though it’s “only” a cleaning job. It’s best left to a professional.
Depending on the nature of the filter, you can also wash the dust off the unit with soapy water and a little brush.
If you didn’t follow our air conditioner buyers’ guide, you might have installed a unit with a flimsy filter. In this case, relatively low-flow water and careful handling are advised.
After this exercise, let the filter dry in the sun before placing it back on the air inlet. Make sure the filter has dried completely before re-installing. If you find that your filter is damaged, you should replace it immediately.
Cleaning the condenser coils
Cleaning condenser coils is the next step in preparing your air conditioner for summer.
If left obstructed, the condensing unit will drastically reduce efficiency, increasing energy expenditure and decreasing cooling ability. Therefore, ensuring that your condenser is running effectively before the summer months when it is working the most is imperative. In addition, the fins are very easy to bend – so utmost care should be taken, and if very dusty or dust gets wet and is baked in, call a professional to assist.
A simple home rag is effective in cleaning the blower’s fan blades. It may also be advisable for specific systems that don’t run regularly until summer to spray a small amount of lubricant in the moving fan area for lubrication.
Cleaning the condensing unit
To clean inside the condensing unit, you must first remove the panels and protective grille. We strongly advise having a professional undertake this work.
Removing the protective grill can be done with a screw or nut driver. Ensuring the person undertaking this work does not tug at wires connected to the fan. The coils can be cleaned using only light pressure using a soft brush or coil brush. For slightly more stubborn dirt or dust, one could mix detergent and water and lightly apply them to the coils.
If the coils show any sign of corrosion, have a professional check the seriousness. In the case of a significant decline, this issue could develop into a warranty claim if the unit is still in the warranted period.
There is a commercial air conditioner coil cleaning solution available. However, for most soft dust and dirt, this is not needed. When clearing condenser coils, the person must be careful not to damage or bend the delicate coils or fins.
Cleaning the outdoor unit
Cleaning the outdoor unit of your air conditioner is essential as debris such as leaves and branches can build up to prepare your air conditioner for summer. Unfortunately, this will preclude proper ventilation for your unit. A simple solution is to get a broom and clean up around the team to ensure space for the division to intake air.
Make sure over time, no one has put anything bulky near the air inlet area of the fan, as this will cause issues, mainly if the unit is used a lot.
Enlisting a professional HVAC cleaning service could be an effective means of ensuring your air conditioner system is prepared for summer. This advice especially applies to units that reach their 5-year plus life cycle.
These services can do all of the jobs above swiftly and safely.
