Your Air Conditioning May Be Doing The Job, But Do You Know How It Works?
Besides your refrigerator, the most used and appreciated appliance in your home during the Florida cooling months is your air conditioning system, and they both use the same scientific principle.
Air conditioning 101
Air conditioners remove heat from the warm air inside your home by utilizing the natural heat-absorbing properties of refrigerant as it evaporates from liquid to vapor. These are the components and processes involved:
- The compressor is typically located in the outdoor cabinet on the ground or roof. It pumps high-pressure vapor refrigerant to the condenser coil, which is also in the outdoor cabinet.
- Inside the condenser coil, the refrigerant cools and condenses under high pressure to a liquid, and releases heat to the outside air.
- The cool liquid refrigerant is pumped to the indoor evaporator coil, which is typically located in the attic, closet, utility room or basement. As the refrigerant evaporates under low pressure, it extracts heat from the indoor air. The refrigerant, now a cool low-pressure vapor, returns to the compressor to repeat the process until the air in the living space has been cooled to the thermostat setting.
- Unhindered airflow is needed for this process to occur smoothly. Two blowers pull air across the evaporator and condenser coils to activate refrigerant heat exchange. The blower at the condenser coil expels the hot air outdoors. The blower at the evaporator coil, which is pulling warm air from your living space through the return duct, circulates the newly cooled air through the supply ducts to your living space.
Maintenance tips
It’s important that your air conditioner have unhindered airflow. You can help by checking the air filter regularly, and by ensuring unhindered airflow at the outdoor cabinet. This seems to be a natural place for weeds, leaves and debris to accumulate. Barriers such as waste bins, shrubs and fences should be at least two feet away.
Professional preventive maintenance is needed to keep your air conditioning system functioning properly with the highest efficiency possible. For questions or service, contact NisAir Air Conditioning and Heating. We’ve been keeping Florida homeowners cool for nearly 40 years.
