Polar Bear Air Conditioning & Heating Inc Blog : Archive for September, 2014

Furnace Repair FAQ: Why Doesn’t My Home Get Enough Heat?

Monday, September 29th, 2014

If your home seems uncomfortably cold no matter how high you set the thermostat, chances are something isn’t right with your heating system. There are a number of possible causes for heat loss in your home, but the most common is the furnace. Read on for a breakdown of possible problems with your furnace, and what to do about them.

Power/Ignition Issues

If no heat seems to be coming through the vents, your furnace may be having trouble igniting. The first thing to check is the pilot light. If the pilot light is lit, the problem is elsewhere. If the pilot light is out, it is recommended that you call a professional to re-light it for you. If the pilot light is on, but your furnace is not igniting, the gas valve may be closed. It is also possible that not enough gas is getting through the gas line and into the furnace. Due to the exact nature of determining the right amount of gas to flow into the furnace, it is best to call a professional to diagnose and fix the problem for you.

Delivery Issues

If your furnace is on but not delivering enough heat, the problem may be in the ducts. Check to make sure that heat is coming out of all the vents evenly across rooms. If one room is much colder or does not have heat coming out of it, it is very likely that you have a break in your ducts. Check your air filter as well, which should be located where the return air duct meets the furnace. The furnace repair may be as simple as cleaning or replacing your filter.

If you have checked all of these factors and your home still isn’t getting enough heat, it is time to call a professional.

Polar Bear Air Conditioning & Heating Inc. is the team to contact should you require any repairs for your furnace in the Alexandria, VA area. Call us today. 

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How Dirty Coils Lead to Air Conditioning Repair

Monday, September 22nd, 2014

Many people are surprised to learn that an air conditioner does not actually create cool air. Rather, it moves the heat from the air in your home back to the outdoors. Your air conditioning system contains two coils that help this to happen—the evaporator coil and the condenser coil. As refrigerant moves to these components, it undergoes phase conversions that allow heat to absorb or dissipate. But these coils, and the rest of your AC system, require cleaning and maintenance to prevent the need for air conditioning repair later on.

Dirty coils are problematic because these parts are so important to the refrigeration cycle. Refrigerant changes from a liquid to a gas at the indoor evaporator coil, absorbing heat as a fan blows the warm air from your home over the coil. The fan then distributes cool air through the ducts. Refrigerant becomes highly pressurized and heated at the compressor outdoors and then moves to the condenser coil, where it condenses into a liquid, giving off heat into the outside air. Refrigerant continues to cycle through both parts of the system, repeating the process over again.

The coils are especially susceptible to dust because fans suck in air to blow over both the indoor and outdoor coils. If a coil is dirty, it means the refrigeration process cannot occur as efficiently as it should. Dirty coils impair their ability to participate in heat exchange, which means that other parts will have to work harder to make up for the deficiency. And as other parts run for longer periods of time, they may begin to wear out, so you’ll have to call for air conditioning repair sooner than is usually necessary. You’ll probably notice reduced cooling capacity when you have dirty coils, or you may even feel warm air from the vents.

Maintenance technicians clean the coils during any maintenance visit as well as other pertinent tasks that help to restore efficiency and keep problems at bay.

Schedule maintenance to prevent the need for air conditioning repair in Washington, D.C. Call Polar Bear Air Conditioning & Heating Inc. for maintenance or repairs today!

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Why Schedule Annual Maintenance for Your Heating System?

Monday, September 15th, 2014

We are in the last stretch before the cold weather arrives – is your heating system ready to go? One of the best ways to get your heating system in shape for the cold weather and get ahead of any potential problems is by scheduling a fall maintenance appointment for your heating system in Washington, DC. Maintenance offers several benefits that we’ll outline below, and as with any air conditioning services, it’s important to always hire trained professionals. Polar Bear Air Conditioning & Heating, Inc., has been helping customers in the Washington, DC area with their cooling and heating equipment for over 15 years, and we can help you get ready for this winter.

What Happens During a Maintenance Appointment?

Your Polar Bear Air Conditioning & Heating, Inc., technician will conduct the following during a routine maintenance appointment:

  • Full inspection of equipment, including heat exchangers and burn assemblies.
  • Check electrical components, including wiring and terminals.
  • Lubricate all moving parts.
  • Check refrigerant levels (for heat pumps).
  • Check fan belts and adjust belt tension on covered equipment.
  • Provide written recommendations for corrective actions, if any.

Benefits of Annual Fall Maintenance

There are several important benefits to scheduling annual fall maintenance for your heating system:

  • Prevent repairs – no one wants to find out their heat isn’t working on a cold winter day. Scheduling annual maintenance helps you get ahead of possible repairs by spotting them early with the thorough inspection that occurs during a regular maintenance visit.
  • Increase energy efficiency – a tuned-up heater runs better than one that is dirty and suffering from normal wear-and-tear. When your AC runs optimally, it uses less energy.
  • Extend life of equipment – the average lifespan of a furnace is about 15 years. Keeping your heater in good working order can extend this lifespan.

One of the best ways to prepare your home for winter is by scheduling heating maintenance in Washington, DC.

Fall offers a great window of opportunity to schedule maintenance, so contact Polar Bear Air Conditioning & Heating, Inc., and make an appointment with one of our experts today.

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Why Schedule Commercial Air Conditioning Replacement with a Specialist

Monday, September 8th, 2014

You’ve decided to replace your commercial HVAC unit. This is a great opportunity to save some money every month with a more efficient system and to avoid complaints about a failing, insufficient system from the people in your building. But if you don’t schedule commercial air conditioning replacement with a commercial specialist, your system may run into problems quickly, leaving you with repairs or another costly replacement far too soon.

When you contact an air conditioning technician for commercial repairs, it’s important to ensure that this person is trained specifically on commercial units. If you hire a residential technician who is inexperienced with commercial repairs, you cannot be certain that your unit is sized and installed properly, or that the job will be completed in a timely manner.

For one, you want a specialist who knows how to size your system properly for air conditioning replacement. Commercial air conditioners differ from residential units in that they are modular, meaning you can add or take away modules to adjust the cooling capacity of the unit as needed. Additionally, commercial properties are often much larger than the average home, but an inexperienced technician may be unable to gauge the proper cooling capacity in the first place, leaving you with a system that is too small to cool your business or so large that it runs into problems.

Besides, a commercial specialist will get the job done more quickly than an inexperienced technician. Because commercial technicians are familiar installing modular rooftop units, they’ll come equipped with the proper tools to get the job completed as soon as possible so that your business can return to normal operation as soon as possible. Most commercial units are also “packaged,” meaning all the parts are combined into a single cabinet. Traditional split-system air conditioners are installed in two parts, so an inexperienced technician may not know all of the ins and outs of your commercial system.

Don’t leave your AC replacement up to just any technician.

If you need commercial air conditioning replacement in Alexandria, trust the experts at Polar Bear Air Conditioning & Heating Inc. Give us a call!

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The Fashion of Wearing White and Labor Day

Monday, September 1st, 2014

You may have heard about the fashion faux pas of wearing white after Labor Day. In the present, this tradition is usually treated as old fashioned and a joke. Few people will criticize you for wearing white articles of clothing after the first Monday in September, or even take notice of it except to wonder why it was ever a major concern at all.

Where did this tradition of white clothing going out of fashion after Labor Day come from, and why did it fade away like colorful fabric washed in a hot load in the washing machine?

In general, white makes sense for the heat of summer. Light-colored clothing reflects away the radiant heat of the sun, instead of absorbing it the way dark colors do, so for thousands of years of human history people have preferred to wear white clothing during the hotter months.

However, the idea of white as strictly fashionable during the summer season only emerged in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries—the time when the very concept of “fashion” began to spread across the Western Hemisphere.

It was only the highest level of post-Civil War society in the U.S. that strict and often bizarre rules for fashion controlled whether someone was in with the “in” crowd. Compared to our ideas of what’s fashionable today, the Czars of Style in the 1880s were true despots. Things as trivial as sleeve length could determine whether a woman in high society—no matter her level of wealth—was fashionable or a pariah.

Wearing white during the only summer, when it was common for weddings and outdoor parties, was only of these restrictive society rules. When the U.S. government made Labor Day a federal holiday in 1894, the Fashion Czars gained a definite cut-off point for when wearing white was no longer “acceptable” in the upper echelons of wealthy society.

For many decades, this rule only applied to a small number of millionaire socialites in a few big cities, but in the 1950s it reached general fashion magazines that were read around the country and started to affect more people.

But time eventually broke apart this odd rule, and during the 1970s fashion became more individual. Some fashion legends, like Coco Chanel, also purposely rejected the restriction and wore white throughout the year. Today, the “no white after Labor Day rule” is little more than an amusing gag to tease friends, and almost nobody takes it seriously.

Whatever you choose to wear after Labor Day (and if it’s white, we won’t tease!), everyone here at Polar Bear Air Conditioning & Heating, Inc. hopes you have a happy end of the summer and great plans for the fall!

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