Category Archives: HVAC

HVAC Mistakes That Can Cost You A Lot Of Money

The Top 3 Bay Area HVAC Mistakes That Are Costing You A Lot Of Money

As we are all sheltering in place, home-based tasks that may have been neglected are getting new attention. One of these is the fact that your home heating and air conditioning system isn’t delivering an even and consistent temperature around the house. This is especially true for rooms that may not have gotten a lot of use prior to being pressed into service as a home office!

You might also be seeing increased energy bills as a result of working from home and sheltering in place. You may also have realized that your allergies are aggravated by being in the house all day. In this article we share three steps to take to properly manage the flow of heat or cool air around your home more efficiently. Continue reading →

Seven Spring Air Conditioning Maintenance Steps

With the extra time at home we are spending as we wait out the Coronavirus pandemic, people are filling their time with previously deferred home chores. Home and property owners are tackling a long list of projects that would also qualify as Spring Cleaning. This could be tidying up the yard, planting a garden, making indoor and outdoor repairs or getting your Bay Area air conditioning system ready for the summer. While many of these tasks are DIY, running an A/C maintenance check should be done by A/C maintenance experts.

As we do every year with the approach of warmer weather, we offer our seven spring air conditioning tips:

Remove winter covers if you use those (which we recommend), inspect them for damage and store them neatly away in a dry place.
Have Bay Area air conditioning services and home insulation experts check the attic insulation. Do you have at least nine to ten inches if insulation throughout the attic area to prevent the loss of your cooled air?
Call a Bay Area air conditioning repair service to perform a seasonal inspection and service to make sure there are no problems before you switch the system on.
Change the system filter. Buy extra filters to have handy for replacing the old ones every few months.
Have your ductwork inspected for breaks or blockages, and to get dust and allergens removed.
Using mild soap and warm water, you can wash the exterior of the unit, removing any dirt or debris from the fin area (being very careful that you do not bend the fins while doing this cleaning), and the outer housing of the unit. Given the chance to damage the unit, have your A/C technician handle this.
Open any under-the-house vents if your property has them. Be sure that you have a vapor barrier in place on the soil or earth in your crawl space (which doesn’t apply to homes with slab foundations.)

As you did in the Fall, you can also check the doors and windows to confirm that they are still properly sealed. If they are not sealing properly or having issues opening or closing fully, they could make your air conditioning system work overtime as cool air escapes through the gaps and cracks.

Do You Need Bay Area Air Conditioning Services?

Now is the time to get HVAC experts in to help service the system in your home or property. To get professional help with both attic insulation and HVAC services in the Bay Area, contact Element Home Solutions. They can provide a free quote and ensure your air conditioning system works at peak efficiency this spring, summer and for years to come.

How Your Heater and Air Conditioner Can Aggravate Allergies

Many people with allergies look forward to rainy weather, when airborne irritants get damped and tamped down. Common outdoor allergens such as tree and grass pollen are significantly reduced by Bay Area winter rains, and you spend more time indoors anyway. Unfortunately, indoors may not prove a refuge from your allergies if your heating and ventilation system needs maintenance.

Does your HVAC System Filter Out Allergens?

It turns out that heater maintenance for allergy sufferers is crucial for those who live in Oakland, San Jose, or anywhere in the East Bay. The good news is that maintaining your heater as an allergy fighter isn’t as difficult as you might think.

Scheduling a Heater and A/C Inspection

One of the best ways to maintain your heater as an allergy fighter is to schedule an inspection, preferably in the late fall or early winter before it really starts to get cold. The HVAC contractor who performs your inspection might find issues with your heater that can be fixed before they get out of hand. At the very least, they can clean out your furnace, which can go a long way towards controlling indoor allergies.

Cleaning Your Air Ducts

Of course, cleaning out your furnace won’t do a lot of good if you have dirty air ducts. You might need to contact a professional to clean your ducts if they’re particularly bad, but in the meantime you can clean off your vents and the area right behind them yourself.

Replacing Furnace Filters

You should at the very least check your furnace filters once a month if you don’t plan to replace them. This is a very easy task that can keep dust and mold out of the air in your home, but it is also one that many homeowners tend to neglect.

Installing a Humidifier

Running a furnace in the winter tends to dry the air in your home. This can irritate your throat, eyes, and your skin and make any allergies you have feel much worse. You can have a whole-home humidifier installed and connected to your HVAC system, but you might be able to get away with using a smaller humidifier in your main living area if you have an apartment or a smaller house.

Contact Heating and Air Conditioning Professionals to Set Up Your Home to Fight Allergies

As with anything else in your home, maintaining your heating system is something that is best left to professionals. If you suspect that you have an issue with your heating system of if your allergies are out of control, contact Element Home Solutions today. We will be happy to inspect your furnace and respond to any problems that it might have.

4 Dangers of Neglecting Heating Maintenance

Even though a functional heating system is a necessity during the winter, people still tend to take them for granted. They skip their all-important annual winter heater inspection, ignore all but the most obvious problems with their San Jose HVAC systems, and otherwise slack off when it comes to home furnace maintenance. You might not think there would be problems with ignoring a mostly-functional furnace in a Bay Area home, but all heating and air conditioning systems require regular maintenance if they are to keep working properly. Here are just four dangers of foregoing regular heater maintenance for your San Jose, Oakland or other Bay Area home. Continue reading →

Common Winter Heater Repairs for Bay Area Homes

Outdoor temperatures cool down during the Bay Area winter rainy season. You need to know that you can rely on your furnace to keep you and your family comfortable until the weather reliably warms up in late April. Like any mechanical piece of equipment, your furnace may encounter problems that affects its efficiency and could cause it to stop working altogether.

What Would Cause Your Heater to Fail?

Below we explore some of the common issues that cause the need for furnace repair in homes from Santa Rosa to San Jose. Continue reading →

Keep Your Home Warm With Mitsubishi Hyper-Heating® Technology

Element Home Solutions has added great new heating and cooling systems to our roster of available home energy solutions. One that homeowners are finding attractive is the Hyper-Heating® Technology from Mitsubishi Electric’s Cooling and Heating Division.

If you are considering installing a hew heating and air conditioning system, we may recommend this new technology as a solution.

How does Mistubishi Hyper-Heating® Technology improve heating system performance?

When the Bay Area rainy season drops temperatures, your home’s heating source may not keep all the rooms in your house comfortable. Supplementing your existing oil, gas, propane or wood system is the solution. Hyper-Heating technology is designed to provide you with year-round comfort even in our rainy winter.

Hyper-Heating vs. Conventional Heat Pumps

Split-ductless heat pumps, which feature an indoor and outdoor unit, allow homeowners to cool and heat their homes without the hassle, expense and inefficiency associated with furnaces, stoves, and other traditional air conditioning methods.

How do they work? Heat pumps use refrigerant to transfer heat. In the winter, they absorb warmth from the outside air and transfer it inside. In the summer, they extract warmth from the home and transfer it outside.

These heat pumps were traditionally designed for moderate climates and couldn’t handle extreme temperatures. As the Bay Area begins to experience more temperature extremes, a modernized split-ductless system was needed where the refrigerant could work more efficiently so the pumps can bring in enough heat. Patented Hyper-Heating technology erases the 20°+ separating you from year-round comfort, energy savings and increased efficiency.

Year-Round Heating and Air Conditioning Comfort and Control

Hyper-Heating INVERTER® (H2i®) technology uses an enhanced compressor system to deliver heat down to an outside temperature of -13° F. Supplementing your existing climate control system with Hyper-Heating offers a number of other benefits:

Heating System Efficiency

H2i systems qualify for the ENERGY STAR Tier 2 level. This means that these ductless mini-splits go above and beyond ENERGY STAR’s minimum requirements for efficiency. The INVERTER-driven compressor uses only the energy it needs to cool or heat an area. It automatically senses and responds to changes without constantly turning on and off. This saves energy – and money.

Energy Bill Cost Savings

Oil, propane, and gas heating bills can give you sticker shock, especially during cold (or hot) snaps. By using a Hyper-Heating solution as a supplement, you can dramatically cut your costs. Some users see a 50% reduction in energy use. You may also qualify for tax incentives, rebates and other programs.

Room-by-room Comfort

Do you spend most of your time in the living room with your family or working in your home office? Why heat unused rooms? Ductless units offer precise control so you keep the rooms you use most at your ideal temperature. They also allow you to heat rooms that your existing system doesn’t reach efficiently or effectively. Whether you want to work comfortably in your garage or turn your three-season porch into a four-season addition, Hyper-Heating puts the control into your hands. Guess what? This saves money too.

Ductless Energy System Installation

An H2i system can usually be installed in about a day. No messy ductwork. No huge remodelling bill. No damage to your home’s architectural integrity. These ductless heat pumps work seamlessly with your existing climate control system.
They can adapt to meet the changing needs of your home so you enjoy year-round comfort in extreme temperatures. Don’t let the term “Hyper-Heating” fool you. They cool as effectively as they heat. You don’t need a separate unit, or another expense, to condition your home in the summer.

Supplementing your home HVAC system simply and quickly is now a reality for Bay Area homeowners, thanks to Hyper-Heating technology, efficient, effective ductless heat pumps.

This article was adapted from a Mitsubishi Cooling and Heating Division article.

Three Keys to Buying a Gas Furnace for Your Home

Replacing old Bay Area home heaters can seem very expensive initially, but it is often a great investment that saves you money in the long run. Given advances in furnace design, an old gas furnace probably isn’t as efficient as a new model, especially if it hasn’t received regular home furnace maintenance. Older heating systems have to work harder to keep a home at a comfortable temperature, which leads to higher utility bills. Beyond that, older gas furnaces are more likely to break down simply due to years of use and wear and tear (and that lack of regular maintenance!) Repairing a gas furnace may not be as expensive as replacing one, but the price tags of constant repairs will add up before long. Continue reading →

How to Protect your Air Conditioning System from Winter Rain

The winter weather in the Bay Area can do more damage to an outdoor air conditioning unit than many people realize. Even though you might not be using your A/C when the temperature drops in the East Bay and South Bay, you still need to give your outdoor unit some winter protection.

Protect your A/C Unit from Winter Rain

Continue reading →

HVAC Company in Oakland Shares 4 Dangers of Neglecting Heating Maintenance

Oakland HVAC Company Shares Reasons Not to Ignore Heater Maintenance

Even though a functional heating system is a necessity during the winter, people still tend to take them for granted. They skip their all-important annual winter heater inspection, ignore all but the most obvious problems with their HVAC systems, and otherwise slack off when it comes to Bay Area furnace service. You might not think there would be problems with ignoring a mostly-functional furnace in a Bay Area home, but all heating and air conditioning systems require regular maintenance if they are to keep working properly. Here are just four dangers of foregoing regular heater maintenance for your Oakland, San Jose or other Bay Area home. Continue reading →

Electric or Gas Furnace – Which New HVAC System is Right for Your Home?

Homeowners have plenty of choices when it comes to furnaces, but many of them start with a basic question: Choosing between an electric furnace and a gas furnace. A good Bay Area furnace installation company can install either one for you, but you still need to weigh the pros and cons of each option before you come to a decision.

Bay Area Furnace Installation – Electric Furnace

An electric furnace can be a few different things, but for the purposes of this blog, we’re going to talk about an air handler that uses heat strips or coils to heat air that is circulated throughout your home. The biggest advantage of electric furnaces is that they rely on electricity instead of natural gas, which is mandated if your home doesn’t have access to a natural gas line. They can also be cheaper in some places where electricity is less expensive than natural gas. The downsides of these furnaces are that they generate original heat instead of transferring heat, and they do raise your electricity bill. They also tend to be less efficient than gas furnaces for larger homes, so they may have to strain to keep your house at a comfortable temperature. You will have to contact a company that provides heater repair in San Jose or Oakland before long if your furnace is pushed too hard, so you might want to consider a gas furnace if you live in a larger home.

What About Gas Furnaces for Your San Jose HVAC?

Gas furnaces are known for providing powerful heat, which makes them the more efficient heating option for larger homes. They also pair well with air conditioning, with many Bay Area HVAC companies offering systems that provide both heating and cooling. Natural gas is also often cheaper than electricity in many areas, so a gas furnace could be the cheaper option if you have access to a natural gas line. Adding a gas line to your home is expensive, which is really the biggest disadvantage of this kind of heating system. You should also invest in a carbon monoxide detector in your home if you want to make sure that your gas furnace is running safely, and you may have to install an additional indoor heating coil in your home if your air duct system doesn’t extend to every room in your house.

Many of the pros and cons of electric and gas furnaces depend on where you live and what is more affordable over time for you. If you have a smaller home with no natural gas line, an electric furnace is a great option. On the other hand, a larger home that already has a gas line will do well with a gas furnace. Element Home solutions, as a Bay Area furnace and air conditioner installation company, can give you the advice you need on what furnace is right for your home. Please contact us or call (888) 980-4822 for more information about how we can help you!