Hoff Home Comfort Blog

Need A New Air Conditioner? Choose Based On Lifetime Costs, Not Price Tags

Henry Hoff — Thu, 28 Jun 2012 13:00:55 +0000

If you’re buying a new air conditioner and are looking to save money, then you should look beyond the price tag. To choose a model that will truly save you money, choose based on the lifetime costs of the system.

Lifetime costs constitute all of the expenses involved in owning something over the entire life of the object. Lifetime costs for an air conditioner include:

Purchase and installation price
Energy costs
Maintenance and repair bills

The length of the air conditioner’s life is also a factor. Something that will last 20 years will likely cost less overall than something that must be replaced after only 10 years, since the shorter lifespan would require you to buy two new air conditioners.

So how do you know what the lifetime costs of a new air conditioner will be? The experts at Hoff Heating & A/C, Inc. can help you estimate the costs of different systems, by looking at variables such as:

Energy efficiency. This is a big one: higher-efficiency air conditioners usually cost more than low-efficiency units, but they also usually save you money in the long run. By looking for the Energy Star label and using the SEER efficiency ratings, we can calculate the total electrical cost for each A/C option.
Reliability. Repair bills can really drive up lifetime costs. Choosing a more reliable system or one with better warranties can save you money down the road.
Type of system. An air-source heat pump or geothermal system may cost more to install today, but can also replace both your air conditioner and furnace while providing the best energy efficiency available on the market. They are also known for having long life cycles, so the installation cost can be divided by more years of service.

To learn more about lifetime costs, or for other things you should know when choosing a new air conditioner, feel free to contact us at Hoff Heating & A/C, Inc. We have been serving St. Charles and St. Louis counties and the surrounding region for nearly 30 years, and we would love the chance to serve you as well.

Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about new air conditioners and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.

Hoff Heating & A/C, Inc services St. Charles County and the surrounding region, including portions of Warren, Lincoln and St. Louis counties. Visit our website to see our special offers and get started today!

Heat Pump Maintenance — Why Professional Service Is Important

Henry Hoff — Tue, 26 Jun 2012 13:00:31 +0000

To get the best cooling performance from your heat pump, schedule professional heat pump maintenance with your heating and cooling professional. You’ll maximize comfort, get better energy efficiency, and ensure smooth operation throughout the summer.

Heat pump workings

Heat pumps are complex machines with many components but at a very basic level, they just move heat from one place to another, and do it with a minimum of energy waste. In the winter, an air-source heat pump will extract heat energy from the outside air and bring it inside, and in the summer, it will remove the heat energy from inside the home, and take it outside. In cooling mode, they operate similarly to air conditioners. Heat pumps use an outdoor compressor/condensing unit, refrigerant, heat exchangers and an air handler, along with other equipment, to accomplish this feat.

Heat pump maintenance

Professional heat pump maintenance keeps these components tuned for optimal performance. These are some of the checks your heating and cooling pro will do:

Clean all components of dirt, debris and other blockages, paying special attention to the heat exchanger and blower.
Check all electrical connections and wiring for function and secure connections, and look for signs of wear.
Lubricate all moving components.
Calibrate air speed at the blowers.
Check for refrigerant leaks.
Check to ensure refrigerant is charged to manufacturer specifications, and charge precisely, if needed.
Inspect the area around the outdoor unit for objects impeding airflow, such as plants and fencing.
Check the air filter.
The technician should clearly communicate with you the work performed and the condition of your unit, and offer basic tips about maintenance that you can do yourself.

If you haven’t had maintenance done on your heat pump yet this year, there’s no time like the present. Contact Hoff Heating & A/C, Inc. Our experienced heating and cooling pros will get your system up to speed. We provide service and installation for homeowners in St. Charles and St. Louis counties and the surrounding areas.

Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about heat pump maintenance and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.

Seal Your Home, Pay Less In Energy Costs — It’s That Simple

Henry Hoff — Thu, 21 Jun 2012 13:00:40 +0000

When you seal your home, you reduce the amount of air coming inside and going out. Those leaks cost you money summer and winter because they make your HVAC equipment work harder. Sealing the leaks isn’t a difficult process once you know where they are.

Find the Leaks
You can conduct your own test with just a few common household items. First, draw a simple sketch of your home’s layout and close the windows and exterior doors. Extinguish any gas-burning appliances and turn on the exhaust fans.

Walk through the house with lighted incense, covering the entire perimeter of your home, including the attic and basement. Note on the floor plan where the smoke wavers. The moving smoke indicates air coming inside. Typical places for air leaks include window frames, exterior doors, electrical outlets and switches, and places where the cables and pipes enter or leave.

Seal the Leaks

Seal exterior door leaks with fresh weather-stripping, available at home improvement stores. You can add a door sweep to the exterior doors to block drafts coming in or going out. These sweeps are available at home centers. If you need one, measure your door before going to help you buy the right size.
Check the window frames outdoors if your windows indicate leaks. You may find small cracks or crevices between the frames and the walls. Seal with exterior caulk.
Use expanding foam or insulation to seal your home where the leaks are larger, around pipes entering the foundation, coming out of the attic or around dryer vents.
Find foam gaskets made for sealing the light switches and outlets at home centers. Turn off the circuit breakers for your outlets before removing the cover plates and inserting the foam covers between the outlets and switches and their covers.

Hoff Heating & A/C, Inc. has provided quality HVAC services for St. Charles and St. Louis counties since 1983. If you’d like additional information to help conserve energy, please contact us today.

Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about {INSERT TOPIC} and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.

Designing A Duct System Means Careful Consideration — 3 Key Factors

Henry Hoff — Tue, 19 Jun 2012 13:00:48 +0000

Designing a duct system for new high-efficiency HVAC equipment takes into account issues such as balanced air flow, consistent temperature distribution and practical installation. These technical factors add up to one everyday thing: maximum interior comfort for your family. Inefficient ductwork can offset many of the anticipated gains from upgrading your heating and cooling system and produce disappointing results. Variations in residential construction and system loads often make some design compromises necessary. However, a few basic concepts can be applied when designing a duct system in the majority of cases:

Where possible, route the ductwork through conditioned areas of the home. Thermal transfer through the walls of ducts is excessive when they run through hot areas like attics or cold ones like crawl spaces or unimproved basements. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, temperature loss from conduction in these areas equals the loss from all other sources such as leaks. If routing ducts through conditioned areas isn’t feasible, ductwork in areas of acute temperatures such as attics should be insulated to prevent loss.

In an ideal duct design, each room should have its own return air duct and grille for proper air balance. Where this is not practical, rooms without a return air duct should be linked to rooms with returns to permit free flow of air. This may be accomplished by running “jumper” ducts through the ceiling between the rooms or by installing grilles in room doors or in walls between adjoining rooms.

Serving St. Charles and St. Louis county homeowners, Hoff Heating & A/C has made your family’s comfort our family’s business since 1983. Contact us for sales, service or more experienced advice on designing a duct system.

Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about designing a duct system and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.

HVAC Maintenance Plans Mean Comfort, Efficiency And Peace Of Mind

Henry Hoff — Thu, 14 Jun 2012 13:00:31 +0000

If you appreciate good value, look into an HVAC maintenance plan, where you can get comfort, efficiency and peace of mind, while also saving money on your energy bills and taking better care of the environment.

A professional HVAC contractor will address relatively minor issues before the turn into serious problems. This will bring you peace of mind while also avoiding possible expensive repair or replacement bills.

At Hoff Heating & A/C, Inc., we offer two levels of HVAC maintenance plans for cooling and heating systems.

With our Silver Plan, you’ll receive two planned visits each year, before both the cooling and heating seasons. Your system with be thoroughly cleaned, inspected and tested with each visit. Plus, you’ll get priority service if you have a breakdown ,and you’ll receive a 10 percent discount on parts and repair.

With our Gold Plan, you’ll get three visits each year, including a Indoor Air Quality visit that will monitor performance of your system during peak operation. You’ll also get a 15 percent discounts on parts and repair.

Another difference between the two plans is that with the Gold plan, if you have a breakdown between visits, you will pay for service call fee during business hours, and only a service call fee, rather than overtime charges, after business hours. With the Silver Plan, you would pay regular service call or overtime charges.

Keeping your system running efficiently is a vital part of home ownership. Rely on professionals to make your system as efficient as it can be.

For more information on HVAC maintenance plans and other home comfort issues, please contact us at Hoff Heating & A/C, Inc. We’ve been serving St. Charles and St. Louis counties and the surrounding area since 1983.

Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about HVAC maintenance plans and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.

How UV Lights Can Be Used To Improve Your Indoor Air Quality

Henry Hoff — Tue, 12 Jun 2012 13:00:48 +0000

Are you worried about the quality of the air in your home? You have good reason to be. Dust, mold, bacteria, and viruses can contaminate indoor air, and the air inside your home can be up to five times more polluted than the air outdoors. To purify your indoor environment, consider a UV light air filtration system to keep your family healthy.

UV lights are germicidal, which means they will target organic contaminants in your home such as bacteria, viruses and mold. Hoff Heating & A/C, Inc. uses Lennox Healthy Climate Germicidal Lights, which are the highest-intensity lights on the market. Installed directly into your home’s air distribution system, UV lights significantly improve air quality by neutralizing and ultimately killing micro-organisms in your home’s air.

For a comprehensive indoor air quality program in your home, combine a UV light filtration system, which attacks micro-organisms, with a high-efficiency air filter, which will remove non-organic dust, debris and other materials. This will provide you with the best possible indoor air quality.

For more expert advice about UV lights and other issues related to home comfort, please feel free to contact Hoff Heating & A/C, Inc. We serve homeowners in St. Charles and St. Louis counties and the surrounding areas.

Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about uv lights and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.

HVAC Maintenance Tips That Can Help Keep Summer Allergies At Bay

Henry Hoff — Thu, 07 Jun 2012 13:00:41 +0000

With spring here and summer not too far off, people in our area who have allergies often confine themselves to their homes to get a bit of relief. Unfortunately, your home is not always a refuge. In fact, your home can act as a concentrator of the particles that cause allergies. If you would like to find a way to make sure that your HVAC system is doing all that it can to protect you from allergy-inflaming particles, there are several HVAC maintenance tasks you can do yourself.

Your Filter
Your HVAC filter is designed to remove dust, pollen, mold spores and other particles from the air that’s being pumped through your ductwork and into your home. If this filter is dirty or damaged, it will not perform this function properly. Some filters are designed to be cleaned on a regular basis. Others are disposable and should be replaced every one to three months depending on the model and your own home circumstances. Before you install the new filter, take the opportunity to clean away the dust and dirt on the frame the filter goes into.

Leaky Ductwork
One of the primary ways that you can get allergy causing particles and substances in your home is through leaky ductwork. Cracks and poor connections in ductwork can draw in dust, pollen and even chemical fumes from unconditioned areas in your home and blow them into your living spaces. You should carefully inspect your ducts for leaks and loose connections and repair them with mastic tape. An HVAC professional will be happy to inspect and seal your ducts if you don’t feel comfortable with this task.

Scheduled Maintenance
Another way to ensure that your HVAC system is allergy free is to sign up for regular maintenance with a local professional. The technician can check filters, look for leaks and also perform a duct cleaning if necessary.

Regular professional HVAC maintenance is one of the most effective ways to keep your home allergy free. If you would like further information on this topic, please contact Hoff Heating & A/C, Inc.Our team of experienced professionals are happy to help homeowners in the St. Charles and St. Louis county areas.

Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about HVAC maintenance and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.

Helpful Tips image via Shutterstock

Home Comfort Is Easy With A Smart Thermostat

Henry Hoff — Tue, 05 Jun 2012 13:00:40 +0000

Did you know that you can improve your entire HVAC efficiency with one small change? Doing away with your old manual thermostat and replacing it with a smart programmable model is a simple fix that will see almost immediate benefits. It will improve home comfort, increase energy efficiency and lower energy bills.

Programmable thermostats with new “smart” technology work with the cooling and heating equipment in your home to find the ideal temperatures, with some even able to control humidity levels. You can program the unit to operate at different temperatures based on the day or time. Most units allow for home settings, away settings and vacation settings. A professional installer can quickly add a smart programmable thermostat to most existing HVAC systems.

Consider just a few of the benefits offered by smart programmable thermostats for home comfort and energy savings:

They conserve energy: Within just a few days, the thermostat can identify the exact energy necessary to cool or heat your home to the desired temperature. This eliminates energy waste.
They have many programming options that will enable you to set the best temperature for your home according to your schedule, whether it’s during the week or on the weekends.
They give maintenance reminders: A smart thermostat communicates with your other equipment and can identify the ideal time to switch out filters and perform other maintenance tasks on your HVAC system.

To learn more about smart thermostats and how they can improve home comfort in your home, contact us at Hoff Heating & A/C. We serve St. Charles and St. Louis counties and the surrounding region and can help you choose the best thermostat for your home. Then we’ll install it for you, and show you how to program it for optimum home comfort.

Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about home comfort and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.

Expert HVAC Advice — Why It’s Essential To The Purchasing Process

Henry Hoff — Thu, 31 May 2012 13:00:28 +0000

When you’re considering buying new heating or cooling equipment for your home, you should always seek expert HVAC advice to make the best decisions for your home and family. Here’s some reasons why:

At this time of year, air conditioning becomes a high priority in eastern Missouri. According to the U.S. Department of Energy’s Energy Savers program, upgrading to a high-efficiency air conditioner will save significant energy and reduce your electric bill. Your HVAC contractor can help you decide what type of air conditioner or heat pump is right for your home and budget.

Size is an important factor for both cooling and heating equipment. It’s not something you can do on your own, or handle by just ordering the same size furnace or A/C as your old model. If you choose one that’s too big or too small, it may use up too much energy while not adequately cooling or heating your home. An HVAC professional can evaluate a variety of factors in your home in deciding the best size equipment for your situation.

How much are you willing to spend? A furnace with a high annual fuel utilization efficiency (AFUE) rating will cost more initially, but it will save money over time on monthly energy bills, since only a small amount of energy output is wasted. A high-efficiency modern furnace will have an AFUE rating of 90-98 percent. A/Cs and heat pumps also come in higher efficiency models.

Your HVAC contractor can also predict costs over time of equipment, taking into consideration efficiency ratings, energy costs and unique elements of your home, and can also maintain the system if you choose to invest in annual HVAC service.

You may be tempted to buy discount equipment online, but beware. You’ll be making a decision without expert advice, you may not get a full warranty, and it may end up costing more in the long run if you have problems later. Since many HVAC contractors only install their own products, you may be forced to hire a handyman or install the equipment yourself rather than relying on the services of a professional. For the best quality, energy savings and peace of mind, seek expert HVAC advice and purchase from trusted HVAC contractors.

For expert HVAC advice when you’re upgrading your heating and cooling system, please contact us at Hoff Heating & A/C. Based in O’Fallon, we proudly serve St. Charles and St. Louis counties and the surrounding region.

Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about expert HVAC advice and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.

Preventative Maintenance image via Shutterstock

How The R22 Freon Phase Out Will Affect Your Future A/C Decisions

Henry Hoff — Tue, 29 May 2012 13:00:34 +0000

Over the next eight years, homeowners will see dramatic and expensive changes surrounding home air conditioning. The standard refrigerant R22 Freon, a common component of most home cooling systems, will become more and more scarce, and correspondingly expensive, until the year 2020. After 2020, R22 Freon will no longer be manufactured, which makes it very likely that any existing supplies of this refrigerant will become extremely expensive.

Freon prices are skyrocketing in response to new government regulations addressing environmental emissions and ozone depletion. The Clean Air Act, which is regulated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, requires that ozone-depleting R22 Freon (also known as HCFC-22) must be eliminated by the year 2020. At this time, it will no longer be made, though some of it will still be recycled at great cost.

This requirement creates a situation even worse than sharply rising R22 prices. To comply with the Clean Air Act regulations, many homeowners will find their only option is to replace their home air conditioning system by 2020.

This situation may cause hardship for many homeowners, but it can also be seen as an opportunity to invest in a high-efficiency air conditioning system that can save significant amounts of money on monthly utility bills. Keep in mind that a high-efficiency system purchased now will have almost paid for itself through monthly savings by the time the R22 Freon phase-out happens in 2020.

Hoff Heating & A/C has been providing quality heating and air conditioning services to customers in St. Charles and St. Louis counties since 1983. Contact us today for more information on the R22 phase-out and what it will mean for the future of home cooling.

Our goal is to help educate our customers about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about R22 Freon and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Resource guide.