Your home’s heating system is a common part of everyday life and sees common use during cold periods during the fall and winter. Regular servicing and heating repair Cary help keep your furnace in top operating condition and ensure that when you need to warm up your home you can do so. You don’t want to be making emergency repairs in the middle of December. A cold home is uncomfortable and can negatively impact your health without prompt repairs. A regular servicing and maintenance schedule with a local HVAC professional addresses many common care needs and helps keep your furnace from randomly failing. Here are some of the common service and maintenance items professionals address when working on your home’s heating system.
Five Common Heating Maintenance and Service Items
- Short Cycling: your heating system should run until your home reaches the desired temperature. However, when your furnace keeps cutting off, this is called short cycling. This can be caused by servicing needs such as dirty burners, filters, or sensors and mechanical issues requiring repairs such as a faulty ignitor. Cycling issues can also be caused if your furnace is too big for your home. A heating system has to be properly sized for your residence to work efficiently.
- Overly Long Runtimes: the opposite of short cycling is your furnace running far longer than it needs to. This can point to servicing needs such as dirt build-up on the heat exchanger or a malfunction with an internal part. Typically, long-run cycles are associated with a damaged or malfunctioning heat exchanger. The heat exchanger can be an expensive repair, which is one reason why regular servicing is so important as it helps prevent issues such as this.
- Airflow Issues: a common issue that indicates your furnace needs servicing is a reduction in airflow. If you notice not as much hot air is coming through your vents when your furnace is operating, that is a sign of an underlying issue. Airflow issues have an assortment of underlying causes including old filters, damper configuration issues, leaks in your ductwork, and problems with the blower fan in your furnace.
- Water Build-Up Around Your Furnace: water pooling near or around your furnace indicates repair needs that need to be addressed by a professional as soon as possible. Leaks can be caused by damage to the heat exchanger or seals around your furnace’s evaporator coil. Heat exchanger leaks are more common in high-efficiency models with two heat exchangers installed.
- Strange Smells and Sounds: when your furnace is operating correctly there shouldn’t be any strange odors except maybe dust burning away after a long period of your furnace not being used. Burning smells can point to an issue with overheating or motor issues. Sounds to look out for can include banging or clanging noises as these indicate issues with the motor bearings. Do note that if you have a gas furnace, the smell of rotten eggs indicates a gas leak, and you should power off your heating system and vacate your home immediately before contacting emergency services.
Final Thoughts
Many homeowners don’t call a heating professional until there is an emergency. Often, this makes things far more inconvenient and expensive than needed. Preventive maintenance and repairs help protect you and your family from emergencies and help your heating system last longer and run more reliably.
