Planning for the Heat With AC Money-Saving Tips

March 21st, 2022
air-conditioner

We’re already enjoying warm weather here in Southern California as spring starts, which is exactly what we expect. We can also expect this summer to be another hot one when we need our air conditioners putting in serious work to keep us cool and happy.

Running an AC is expensive. The only electrical appliance in a house that uses more electricity is an electric water heater (if you have one). The compressor of an air conditioner draws on large amounts of power to run when the AC switches into cooling mode, from 3,000 to 5,000 watts per usage hour. For a comparison, most electrical appliances in a house only use watts per usage hour measured in the low hundreds.

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Welcome March With AC Maintenance

March 7th, 2022
air-conditioner

Wouldn’t you like to get started on summer early? We can’t change the weather outside for you, but we can help start making an important preparation for another season of hot weather. March is the time when people start to think about the coming warmer months, and it’s the time we recommend our customers arrange for regular air conditioning maintenance. 

We want to stress how important annual air conditioning maintenance is for a home. It isn’t a job you want to skip for a year or two, no matter how tempting it might seem. The air conditioner for your house is vital during the summer—you wouldn’t want to have it fail on you during one of the hottest days of the year, but without maintenance that becomes a much stronger possibility. 

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Late Winter Is a Good Time to Assess Your Heater’s Seasonal Performance

February 21st, 2022
fireplace-and-family-reading

The weather has swung back and forth in Southern California this year. We’ll have temperatures in the low 50s one week, and the next week the thermometer will edge up toward 90°F. Your heating system has likely gone through an uneven time, working hard for a stretch, then hardly working for another stretch. 

Winter ends early in Southern California, so late February is a good time to look over the season and assess how well your heater has managed it. Some simple analysis can help you understand if you need heating repair in Mission Viejo, CA or if it’s time to have a new heating system installed.

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Explaining the Thermal Expansion Tank on Your Water Heater

February 7th, 2022
water-heater-tank

How much do you know about your water heater? It’s okay if you answer “Not that much.” Homeowners can’t be expected to have expert knowledge of every major appliance in their house. It’s the reason you have professionals to handle jobs like repairing plumbing in Mission Viejo, CA.

We’re going to shed some light on an important part of your water heater today, the thermal expansion tank, often just called the expansion tank. Understanding the purpose of this component will give you a better sense of the workings of the water heater as well as when you may need to call for repairs.

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Has Your Heat Pump Suddenly Stopped Heating? We Can Find Out Why!

January 24th, 2022
cold-man-with-thermostat

The local temperatures have been swinging back and forth during the start of the year, and it’s conditions like this that will make you appreciate the power of your heat pump. You can enjoy energy-efficient heat that can handle our coldest Southern California days, and when you do need a touch of cooling, you only need to adjust the thermostat down for the heat pump to switch over to act as an AC. Our climate makes the most of heat pumps, and it’s one of the few places in the country where heat pumps will switch back and forth during a season.

A heat pump can’t be perfect, however, so you may run into a problem this winter where your heat pump just won’t heat. It may be stuck in cooling mode, or its heating mode doesn’t produce enough warmth. What’s going on, and do you need heat pump repair in Orange County? We’ll examine the “no heat” heat pump problem below—and when you need a solid answer and repairs, just call us.

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Why Your Gas Furnace Keeps Shutting Off So Soon

January 10th, 2022
Gas-Burner

So far, this has been a cold winter for us in Southern California! Our temperatures may make many other parts of the country envious, but it’s still cold for us. We imagine you’ve relied on your home’s gas furnace through the holidays and have it going steady most days into the new year. 

Unless, of course, you’ve got a gas furnace that isn’t doing its job. A trouble people sometimes run into with gas furnaces is when they shut off too soon. “Too soon” could mean the heater is running for several minutes, or it could mean the heater is running for only a couple of seconds. Either way, your house isn’t getting warm and you think you need heating repair in Orange County to fix it. 

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A Late Holiday Gift to Yourself: Drain Cleaning!

December 27th, 2021
drain-cleaning-cutaway

Getting your drains cleaned is probably not on your holiday wish list, but making a New Year’s resolution to get routine drain cleaning is a great way to say, “out with the old!”

Drain cleaning isn’t only for clogged drains—it’s an essential preventive measure to keep them from clogging in the first place. And if you’ve had holiday parties and family visiting from out of town, your plumbing had to work harder over the holidays and may have more accumulation of food and paper products than usual. That accumulation can cause slow drains that lead to clogs, odors, backups, or costly repairs.

You may be tempted to tackle slow sinks and clogs yourself by pouring chemical drain openers down the drain, but here are the cold hard facts: they rarely work. They leave most of the clog behind and can damage your pipes. And they’re extremely toxic. You can do better!

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How Long Can You Expect Your Home’s Pipes to Last?

December 13th, 2021
old-pipes

The age of your home is a good way to tell if you have pipe material that is out of date. The plumbing in Orange County is generally younger than you would find in, say, New England, where many people live in homes originally built in the early 20th century or even the late 19th. We don’t have homes of that vintage in the OC, but there are many houses old enough to have plumbing made from outdated material. The older the pipes, the more repairs they will likely need and the higher chance your house will benefit from whole-house repiping.

To get to the specifics in the title, how long you can expect your pipes to last depends on the pipe material. We’ll go over the most common ones and which you can expect to have in your house based on the building’s age:

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The Ups and Downs of Getting a Tankless Water Heater

November 15th, 2021
tankless-water-heater

Tankless water heaters have a long history stretching back to the late 19th century. It wasn’t until relatively recently, however, that they became feasible options for homes. More and more tankless water heaters are installed in homes each year as people discover the big benefits that come with them.

But tankless water heaters are not universal in homes because they do have several drawbacks. We think tankless water heaters are great options to consider, but you’ll need professionals to help you decide if you’ll get the most benefits out of installing one. We’ll go over some of the basic upsides and downsides of tankless water heaters to help you get started thinking about a new water heater installation.

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How Can I Stop Paying So Much For Heating This Year?

November 1st, 2021
money-in-the-piggy-bank

We’ve started to have our first brushes with colder autumn weather, and even some rainfall. Although we don’t have to deal with the full chill of winter that strikes many other parts of the country, we still need our heating systems to run at key times. And wouldn’t it be great if we didn’t have to pay for the occasional heat we need?

Of course, this is impossible. Heat is a form of energy, and powering a gas or electric heating system costs money. If you dread having to use your heater each winter because you don’t like what it does to your utility bills, we have some potentially good news: you might be paying more each year than necessary. Because Southern California residents aren’t as used to running central heating systems, they often make errors that lead to higher costs. 

In this post, we will look at several ways you can curb heating costs—both small tips as well as bigger jobs that our professionals can help you with.

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