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With autumn in full swing, Arlington, TX residents may find the need for air conditioning service to be redundant with such mild weather. With this in mind however, it would be a shame if anything were to happen over the holidays such as rust or corrosive damage that would make your AC suddenly fry out on you. Now that you’re not using it, it’s the perfect time to treat your air conditioner to these seven troubleshooting, and maintenance tasks to make sure when summer comes around you’ll be as comfortable as if your air conditioner was brand new.

#1 Cleaning Your Air Conditioner.

The heart of air conditioning service lies in making sure all the parts of your air conditioner run smoothly in conjunction with each other. This can be ruined however by the buildup of dirt and debris that accrues naturally throughout years of use. Now that your air conditioner isn’t seeing as much use, the natural steps to take here would be to turn off the power to your air conditioning unit, and clean the fans, the interior unit, and the grill of any major debris that got stuck in your unit.

#2: Listen To Your Compressor.

It’s not every day that you’re listening for odd sounds coming from inside your house, but now that you have the time, you can listen for any unusual noises coming from your ac unit. If the air conditioner runs and you can hear a buzzing or grinding sound, take off the grill and see if you can hear where it’s coming from, worst case scenario you would have to contact an air conditioning service professional to diagnose the problem and install a new part. At least in this case though it’s a problem that’s solved before it breaks other parts of your ac unit.

#3: Carefully Inspect Your Unit.

For Arlington, TX residents, continuous use of your AC through the summer months can lead to overuse. While signs of stress can usually only be correctly identified by an air conditioning service professional, there are more obvious signs of distress you can see for yourself before turning it off for the rest of the season. Especially for outdoor air conditioners, check the unit’s casing for cracks and rusting as the result of water damage, and check the seals to make sure they aren’t loose. If you encounter any of these issues, you can contact an air conditioning service technician right away and notify them of the problem.

#4: Prepare the Area Around Your AC Unit

Now that you’re not going to be outside as much, the next step would be to do maintenance to the area directly around your ac unit. If your ac units under a gutter for example, check to make sure your gutter isn’t steadily leaking around your unit, or else that leak may turn into a problem if left unattended for 6-8 months. Also make sure to give adequate clearance for a couple feet around your ac unit, to make it so your unit gets proper airflow in the event you need to turn it back on. When spring comes around and you have to perform any periodic air conditioning service and maintenance on it, you’re ready to get started right away without spending any time cleaning or putting anything away.

#5: Double Check Your Unit’s Warranty and Check If It’s Intact

With HVAC equipment becoming higher tech over time, the requirements to keep some warranties intact may be more stringent than the ones for older models. In these cases, checking to make sure you’re performing proper air conditioning service and maintenance, as well as recording these in the event of a dispute is a good idea. It would also be prudent to sign up with your Arlington, TX, HVAC company of choice to perform a scheduled maintenance plan. This ensures your warranty is continuously up to date.

#6: Winter-proof Your Air Conditioner

The weather in Arlington, TX around winter is generally mild and dry, however in the event of a sudden cold snap or thunder storm, your ac unit may undergo corrosion, or other parts can break down. To prepare for this you can cover it in a large tarp, and tie it down with bungee cords to protect it from rain and debris. Home improvement stores also sell ready-made covers for ac units. Secondly, you can contact an air conditioning service professional, and consult how to best go about insulating any external pipes leading into your home, to prevent them from bursting in below freezing weather. Finally, throughout the months leading to spring, you can perform periodic checks on your air conditioner to make sure nothing gets under the tarp, and no water/debris is sitting on top of it.

#7: Schedule Major Repairs and Replacements Before The Holidays

It can be tempting to brush of the need for air conditioning service and maintenance, and simply wait for spring before you schedule anything to important. However, it would be prudent to say that a lot of customers wait until the last minute to schedule a major installation job, and if you got your foot in the door before everyone else rushes to get their AC or their heater replaced, you won’t have to put up with the hassle or the wait everyone else has to. According to the department of energy in 2012, replacing your ac unit with a more energy efficient model can save between 20-40% in home cooling costs, so catching up on those savings now, as well as catching up on any repairs or maintenance now would be much more sensible.

In Conclusion:

The summer months are behind us, but neglecting air conditioning service and maintenance means the summer highs are going to be that much harder to sit through without an air conditioner to make things bearable in Arlington, TX.