Protect Your Financial And Physical Health - AC Cleaning Tips

A blocked or dirty return air filter will reduce the amount of air flowing through your system.  Energy consumption of the system will increase and your electricity bills could skyrocket.
Other serious and costly problems can be caused by failing to regularly clean your return air filter:

• icing up of the evaporator (due to lack of airflow)
• flooding and water damage (drains don’t work with high vacuum due to dirty filters)
• collapse of a return air duct

Occasionally, if dust and debris make their way to expensive components such as the evaporator coils and block the coils, you may need to replace the system altogether – which is an astonishingly pricey proposition.

It’s important to your health that fresh air, not mixed with any dust or particulates, is circulated through your air conditioner.  Dirty and obstructed filters can release dust, debris, spores and bacteria into your home’s atmosphere, and you or your family could suffer from serious health problems.  The most common of these are:

• asthma
• bronchitis

How often is “regular”? Ideally, your return air filter should be cleaned once a month.  At the very least, the filter should be cleaned once every 3 months (just before each season).

You don’t need to hire a professional to clean your filter/s.  It’s a quick and simple job you can do yourself.

• Pull the grille down by either unscrewing the fasia or simply by pulling down on the grille
• Remove the filter from the grille (take care to note how the filter is positioned so you can replace it easily)
• Using mild pressure with a garden hose, spray down both sides of the filter until it’s clean
• Let the filter dry, replace it in the grille and snap (or screw) the grille back up to the ceiling.

*never use a brush or vacuum cleaner to clean the filter.  It will cause the fibres to pull apart and reduce the life of your filter considerably.

Not only is regular cleaning of your return air filter easy, you now know how important it is to your financial and physical well being, too.