Can you believe it? It’s Labor Day weekend! The summer is coming to a close, and those triple digit temperatures will hopefully soon be over for the season. So, what are your plans? If you’re leaving town for cooler weather, follow along with our checklist to prepare your HVAC system for your absence.

Turn Down the Air Conditioning

Conserve energy while saving a few dollars by simply adjusting the temperature setting on your thermostat. If you have a programmable thermostat, you can also easily set it so that your house will be cool and comfortable for when you return. Unless you have pets in your house that would suffer from higher temperatures, turn up the temperature and save money.

Change Your Filters

With summer monsoons soon ending, it’s a good time to replace your air filter. Why not do this one small chore before you head out on your holiday vacation? Clogged filters are a leading cause of HVAC inefficiency. It only takes a few minutes to clean or replace your filter. You’ll not only breathe easier, you’ll appreciate the smaller energy bill, too.

Protect Your Outdoor Unit

It’s a reality that thieves tend to target homes that appear to be unoccupied. Many specifically scope out empty homes on vacation weekends. One of their prime targets is HVAC equipment because it’s expensive and often surprisingly easy to steal. To combat thieves, install lights on timers and motion light sensors. You may also want to consider an HVAC unit cage for added protection. Since the system and the copper in the system is valuable, protection is a must.

Schedule a Fall Tune Up

Another task to add to the pre-vacation to-do list is call for a fall HVAC tune up. Routine maintenance does so much for so little, and it’s as easy as calling Bruce’s today at 480-968-5652.

With a single fall tune up, you’ll help extend the life of your system, reduce the chance of a large-scale breakdown, and increase your energy efficiency.

Happy Labor Day from everyone at Bruce’s Air Conditioning & Heating.

While it’s not quite time yet to pack away the summer clothes, autumn will be here next month. Soon, we’ll be enjoying shorter days, cooler mornings, and pumpkin spice everything. But, before it’s time to haul out the Halloween decorations, it’s a good idea to schedule a seasonal tune up to ensure your HVAC system is good to go for the season ahead.

If you have never had routine maintenance on your system, you may be unsure of its benefits or if there’s even a reason to schedule a tune up. This is why we wanted to share with you some important reasons why this minor cost can add up in big savings for you down the road.

Extending the Life of Your System

During a tune up, one of our technicians will carefully inspect and clean your HVAC system, making necessary adjustments to ensure its efficiency. Small issues can be identified and addressed before they become substantial and costly problems.

Mitigates Large-Scale Breakdowns

Homeowners who have regular HVAC maintenance rarely experience unexpected breakdowns because their systems are primed for the season. This can be a major advantage during the hot summer months and on those few weeks in the winter when the temperatures drop below freezing.

Keeps Utility Costs Down

Well-maintained HVAC systems are, by far, more energy-efficient than those that never receive regular tune ups. In other words, you’ll be seeing lower energy bills. This savings is far greater than the cost of an HVAC tune up.

Schedule Your Maintenance Appointment

At Bruce’s, we do our absolute best to ensure a convenient, affordable maintenance appointment. We want to make it easy to ensure you do this one very important step in keeping your system operating optimally. Call us today at 480-968-5652 to schedule your tune up.

Ok, we get it. Preventive HVAC maintenance isn’t the most exciting topic. But, saving you money, time and hassles is, well, kind of thrilling, isn’t it? And that’s exactly what regular tune-ups on your cooling and heating system offers.

Routine maintenance is the single best way to ensure that your HVAC system will last as long as possible while also running efficiently. You’ll not only discover that you’ll have less repairs and fewer breakdowns, you’ll also gain consistent home comfort all-year long.

So, what exactly happens during a maintenance visit?

Spring Maintenance

This is the time to ensure your cooling system is in optimal condition before it goes into high use. Of course, you can get a maintenance check on your cooling system any time of the year. During this visit, the technician will:

• Inspect and clean the coil
• Check the furnace or air handler blower to make sure it’s clean and working
• Check the refrigerant level and refill if necessary

If the refrigerant level is low, the technician will also check for leaks. If there is one, it will be repaired. Simply filling the refrigerant and not treating the source of the leak isn’t a long-term fix. Refrigerant will inevitably run out, and soon you’ll be needing an emergency repair.

Fall Maintenance

While some maintenance tasks are performed during both seasons, there are some specific services that are unique to fall. This includes turning on the heater and verifying the heat pump defrost cycle. If you have a gas furnace, the technician will ensure proper operation of the safety mechanisms.

Services that are performed during both seasons include:

• Changing filters
• Cleaning and removing debris from the entire system
• Checking the condensate drain to ensure it’s free of clogs
• Checking and comparing thermostat settings
• Checking electrical connections
• Adding lubricants as needed

The reality is that your HVAC system is complex and requires regular maintenance. Let Bruce’s be your HVAC service partner year after year. Call us today about seasonal service and HVAC maintenance agreements at 480-968-5652.

On June 15^th, we officially kicked off monsoon here in Chandler, AZ and throughout the Grand Canyon state. We, Arizonans, know what that means. It’s time to get ready for some wild and wooly weather. Humidity will start creeping up, and we’ll likely be experiencing windstorms, dust storms and heavy desert rain.

One way to determine when we’ll start seeing these weather events is when there is a higher dew point. Through most of the year, the dew point in the Valley hovers below 40. Yet, as we enter monsoon season, it will exceed 55. That means hang on to your hat. The haboobs (desert storms) are here!

So, with monsoon season starting, we, at Bruce’s, thought it was a good time to share some tips to help you keep your HVAC system running properly. Yes, even though there will be rain, wind and maybe even hail, there will still be triple-digit heat.

Replace Air Filters – Often

The most important tip that we can provide is to replace your air filter on a frequent basis. Hey, this is sage advice any time of the year, but even more so, when there’s a lot of dust swirling in the air. How often, you ask? We recommend replacing filters once a month.

Maintain Your Landscaping

With monsoons come strong winds. And these winds can break off tree branches, kick up leaves and send debris careening into outdoor air conditioning units. To minimize the chance of this happening to you, make sure that there is clearance around the outside of your unit.

Invest in a Surge Protector

Lightning can be amazing to watch during monsoon storms. But lightning strikes can cause strong electrical surges that can trip your home’s circuit breaker and even take out your air conditioner. With a surge protector for your home’s HVAC system, you can save yourself an expensive monsoon season service call.

Get an HVAC Tune Up

Don’t wait for a system failure to give us a call. You’ll save yourself time, money and hassle by being proactive. Call us for HVAC preventive maintenance. With a quick tune up, we can identify and address small issues before they become big problems. And we can help ensure your system is running efficiently to save you on your summer utility bills.

First, it’s important to note that there are specific types of air conditioning filters which are designed to be reused. However, unless you know for certain that you have this type of filter in your HVAC system, you shouldn’t assume that it’s wise to clean and reuse them. In other words, unless your filters are built for reuse, you should remove them when they’re dirty, discard them and install new ones in their place.

Why Cleaning Filters Isn’t Enough

In the dry, desert environment where we live, HVAC filters trap a tremendous amount of debris which lodges in the fibers of a filter. There is no amount of surface cleaning, scrubbing or vacuuming that is going to completely remove the dust, dirt and pollen that collects over the course of time. Rather, these particulates create a barrier which can hinder the passage of air through the filter. This makes a unit less efficient. And over time, it can cause it to break down.

Mold and Mildew

Cleaning with water can lead to retained moisture that promotes the growth of mold and mildew on the filter. This is then distributed throughout your home, negatively impacting your indoor air. It can even cause a variety of health problems for you and your loved ones.

Damaged Filters

Don’t be tempted to slap dirty filters against a hard surface to remove dirt and debris. This will only damage the delicate construction of the filter and compromise its functionality. Ideally, replaceable filters should be changed every few months to maintain your home’s indoor air quality and to support the efficiency of your entire HVAC system. Make it a point to keep replacement filters on hand and to establish a regular schedule for replacement. It only takes a minute, but it is a truly valuable home improvement task that you don’t want to ignore.

Have questions about your HVAC system? Call the experts at Bruce’s today.