Inside Your Home With Shanklin Heating - Episode 3: Why Is Your System Running But Not Cooling?

Ever wonder why your system is running but not cooling? Kip and Derek Shanklin help to answer that burning question in the newest episode of Inside Your Home With Shanklin Heating!

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

If we're getting the questions of how much is Freon, or do you guys still sell that Freon?

SPEAKER_00 0:05

It's like, okay, we want to make sure we're going down to the underlying issue. You see ice. Wait a second. My house is hot, but I see ice. That doesn't go together, does it?

SPEAKER_01 0:14

Hi, I'm Kip Shanklin. This is Inside Your Home with Shanklin Heating, where I give you real answers about heating, cooling, electrical, and air quality solutions and the systems that power up your home. And I'm Derek Shanklin. Today we're talking about one of the most common but probably frustrating things homeowners deal with when your system is running, but it's not doing its job. Your system is running in your home. What system are we talking about? Primarily, we're talking about air conditioning. This thing's running, but it's not working.

SPEAKER_00 0:46

You mean like I hear it kick on, it's running, but I'm hot, right? There's no air coming out. The house is not getting any colder. Is that what you're talking about?

SPEAKER_01 0:56

Yeah, absolutely. Because we all hear the the maybe the buzzing noise or your lights dim, things like that, to where the system kicks on. It's maybe a familiar noise, but uh it's hot in here. It's AC season is right around the corner. This is going to be happening, but uh we hear it running, but it's just not doing its job.

SPEAKER_00 1:17

Yep. When somebody calls in and says, My AC is running, but it's not cooling. We hear that over and over again. What do you usually start with? Where do we start? You know, that's the big question. You know, what what can we look at? Um, here are some real, real answers to solve that. One simple question. My AC is running, but it's not cooling. So let's get started. How's that sound? The first thing to look at is airflow. The most common problem, this is the number one most common problem is do you have a dirty filter? Never have a dirty filter, change it every day, change it last week. Nope. Look at your filters, such a simple thing that we just we overlook because it's so simple. We think it's a mechanical problem. And hey, we got to get to the mechanical part of it. Nope, let's back up, let's go to the simple things and let's look at that air, that dirty air filter. Why is that dirty air filter such a big, big deal? Well, number one, it restricts airflow across the the system, it cuts the airflow way, way down. Um the the AC there the furnace cannot move enough air with a dirty air filter. Um, it cannot reject heat. And one of the biggest issues, you know, that we we see is um when the air fills dirty, air filters dirty, it just shuts everything down on the cooling part of it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:48

Still running, but it completely cuts off the performance. Absolutely. And you said about oh, check the filter, check the filter. And we're talking about going into AC season. So if we're going into AC season, that means we've come out of heating season and well, I haven't had a problem. I changed my filter maybe around Christmas time or things like that. You know, maybe that's what goes through my mind. I changed mine this frequency. I didn't have any problem during the heating season, so there must not be any problems with it. But AC comes up, the airflow standards are completely different in the home when it comes to heating season and cooling season. So it's a great point when you said I love to look that because you may not think about it because maybe two weeks earlier you had that heat on and all is well. Your gas furnace ran, seemed to do its job. Always looked at my thermostat, made the same noises it's supposed to, but that air filter always pops back up to the surface when we start talking about cooling.

SPEAKER_00 3:42

Yeah. You know, when when you look at that dirty air filter and you don't have good airflow, you know, what what does that lead into? What does that lead into? It leads in to a frozen evaporator coil. If you'd like to talk a little bit about evaporator coils, evaporator coil, like what in the world is that?

SPEAKER_01 3:57

So it's a coil, frozen coil, or my units froze up. That's maybe some terms you hear thrown around. They're easy to search for. Uh typically what comes up when I hear no cooling, but the thing's running. So when the evaporator coil is cooling, that's that's your indoor cooling coil that on a like, for example, a gas furnace that has an air conditioner on it, it's typically mounted just above the gas furnace or even connected to it. And that's what a lot of times we will see those those refrigerant lines going from the outdoor unit to the indoor unit. They have some black insulation around them. Sometimes they're sweating condensate coming off of them, things of that nature. And that's where if we have low airflow, just like you said, that unit can't cool. That is the only thing in your home that is able to actually remove heat and humidity from your home. And if it can't get the proper amount of airflow through it, it is going to start freeze up, which sounds super weird. Why would it not be cooling if I have some ice in my house? Uh, which is kind of contradicts what you would normally think. But if the airflow is not adequate, uh, it's not able to perform its regular duties, remove the proper amount of heat. And when we remove that heat from there, that's what you actually feel in your skin, and that's when you say, like, oh yeah, this thing's working. It feels really good in here. Um, so if we don't have that proper airflow, which is a little different, like I said earlier, from heating to where heating is a little more forgiving. That heat likes to rise, heat likes to move around really easily, cold air is heavy, it likes to stay down low, does not like to go where you're trying to push it. So think of that when you're thinking about I need to change my air filter because we've got to push that cold air where it needs to go.

SPEAKER_00 5:40

You brought up ice. You see ice. Wait a second. My house is hot, but I see ice. Right? That doesn't go together, does it? I see ice building up, but I am sweating.

SPEAKER_01 5:50

About to get some ice if it's hot.

SPEAKER_00 5:52

So let's just let's just talk about that. You see ice build up. You see ice build up on the lines downstairs. You can see ice build up outside on the unit when it's 90 degrees out and the sun is hitting it. How in the world does that happen? Well, ice buildup is due to just a couple simple things. It's due to low airflow or restricted airflow or low refrigerant, low freon. Some people call it freon, some people call it refrigerant. So those are two of the big most common issues of why we see ice buildup. Why we see ice buildup.

SPEAKER_01 6:27

Yeah, that's a good point. And when we see that ice, whether you said Derek, like on our indoor units or even sometimes on that outdoor unit, you'll see like where those lines come through the home or maybe down from the outside of your house, if your system's in the attic, uh, we'll see some ice on there. If that's the case, about 90% of your cooling capacity is completely done. Yeah, it's it's not able to perform its job. So having that said, if you do see some ice around there, there's a good chance you could, if you had, for example, if your furnace is in your basement, you're gonna be like, oh, there's some water around my furnace, it's leaking. My furnace is leaking, I've got water around it. Well, our radar goes off, our technician radar says, like, wow, we probably have an ice buildup issue, which is due to things that you said, low refrigerant, low airflow. So, what's the best thing to do from there? Homeowner goes, you go downstairs, it's not cooling, it's muggy in here. Oh, I got ice on this thing. There's ice buildup, I see some water under my furnace. Turn the unit off. Best thing we can do. Turn the unit off because the ice is never going to go away unless the unit gets the time to shut off. You can leave your fan on. It's the water downstairs probably gonna get a little worse as some of that ice thaws out. Because if you see ice on the outside, there's definitely quite a bit of ice on the inside. We've got to remove that. And if you're like, oh boy, I just heard you know Derek talk about filter, I'm gonna go downstairs and check mine real quick. Well, this thing looks pretty dirty, severely discolored, it's bowed, it's bent, there's dirt and dander dog hair built up on it. Turn your unit completely off. Go ahead and change that filter, leave the system off, let it completely thaw out, which may take a little bit of time, unfortunately, and then choose to restart that system after that brand new filter. These are just those quick fundamentals you can do within about an hour's time frame to let that thing uh thaw out because if it doesn't, there's no benefit in continuing to let it run.

SPEAKER_00 8:24

You know, you talk about water puddling. Well, you had ice and now you got water puddling, and my house is still hot, correct? Yeah how does that happen? So, how do how did in the morning we went down and we seen ice build up around the unit? Um, and then in the afternoon we have water puddling. Well, there's some reasons why. Um Kip had brought up about shutting the unit off. Well, now that ice is going to thaw out. So if the air conditioner is shutting off, it's gonna thaw out. What's gonna happen? The water's gonna puddle up. It's gonna puddle up, you know. Um, maybe our drain lines are clogged where we cannot get rid of that moisture. Um, so if we see water puddling up, that's that's usually comes down to is the unit frozen, or do we just have a backed up drain line? Two of the most common issues that we see with water put puddling up.

SPEAKER_01 9:11

You know, yeah, that's a good point because that that water, you know, you the first thing that comes to your mind anytime you see water under anything, whether it's a refrigerator or your furnace or air conditioner, you think, oh, it's I have a leak, I have a leak. And to your point, it's a symptom of something else going on. And hopefully the easiest thing would be changing your air filter or the drain line being the condensate drain line being backed up. So um they both don't go hand in hand all the time. Just because you have water under your furnace doesn't necessarily mean you have ice, but they both can go hand in hand, and it's good symptoms to really keep your eyes and ears open for because if we have a really hot summer, just because everything works great in the early parts of the season, your home's not full of humidity yet, so your AC doesn't have to work quite as hard. So these things could show up later in the season. And you know, from the homeowner's mindset, again, we're we're inside your home, you're thinking, well, that's it worked great last year. This thing worked great last year. You guys have tuned it up a couple of years ago, or someone had worked on it a couple of years ago, and one of my neighbors came over and helped me out. Everything worked great last year. It's a brand new season. That system has been sitting idle the whole entire winter, even though there's pressure on the system. So it is it's a brand new system, brand new environment. So we can't take for granted that just because it worked last year, that we're ready to go this year.

SPEAKER_00 10:37

Yep. We hear a lot about low refrigerant, right? We hear that. Oh, I it just needs topped off. We need a little bit more refrigerant. Um, that's kind of the the buzz in the industry, is everybody says I just I just need a little top-off, just need a little refrigerant.

SPEAKER_01 10:50

So, or how often do you have to add that stuff to it?

SPEAKER_00 10:52

Yeah, it's always a good, good question, is well, how do I know I need refrigerant? How do I know I I need it? You know, my system isn't working. Maybe I need refrigerant. And really, refrigerant, um, once once refrigerant's in the system, it should always stay in the system. You never should have to go back and just add a little bit more or top it off every year a little bit here and there. That means you have a small leak. Yeah, um, when the refrigerant levels start to drop, that's when you start to see the ice build up and not the cooling. And when the refrigerant levels go completely away, when you have a really large leak, you won't have anything happening. No, no ice or anything. They still could be making all the right sounds. Yeah, right. Yeah, you're right. Still could be running, still could be making all the sounds, but nothing, no cool Airbnb, no ice build will be coming out if it's really, really yeah, that that's a good point.

SPEAKER_01 11:39

Because we get the question a lot, and I really like to help homeowners walk through this. Not that everyone has to be a design engineer in their system, but you know, I I I like to work with our CSRs and our service team to when we get the common questions like, how much is Freon? You know, how much do you guys charge for freon? And that's always like uh an indicator of like I wonder really what's going on in the home. Because if we're if we're needing freon all the time, or maybe it is just like you said, hopefully that dirty filter, that's always the easiest thing uh to remedy. But if we're getting the questions of how much is freon, or or do you guys still sell that freon? It's like, okay, we want to make sure we're going down to the underlying issues. It's it's uh no different than uh, you know, if you have a if you have something on your body that's wrong and my arm hurts, you don't call your doctors like how much to get rid of this arm pain. You know, it's we gotta figure out what's going on, right? Let's let's really get to the root of it. I'm not gonna prescribe you anything until we know what's going on. So uh and that's where that that that that's where the technician's viewpoint comes to comes into into intact to where we say, like, hey, we're gonna put our our physician's eyes on your system and say, like, we we know what the solution is for today, more than likely, but yeah, I don't want you to have that same issue months down the road, two months down the road, things of that nature, because more than likely something's gonna pop back up again.

SPEAKER_00 13:03

Yep, absolutely. Kip, why don't you talk about the outdoor condensers, the outside unit? Let's let's get in the outside. Yeah, that's a good point.

SPEAKER_01 13:10

So the outdoor unit, it it's uh, you know, that is the air conditioner, right? That's what's cooling your home. That's what I have. It's a great unit. I even wax it every day. I cover it in the wintertime, I take care of that thing, I make sure no one gets around it, protect it with a fence, whatever. So that outdoor unit's actually what's removing the heat from your home. That indoor coil you talk about that's froze up is absorbing the heat, and they're rejecting the heat outside at that air conditioner. So that thing needs to move air too. Everyone sees the fan on the outdoor unit. I hear that thing running, and I hear that fan howling away out there, and and so it's got to get rid of the heat. So, why do we need to talk about that? A couple different reasons. One, there's a real simple thing. I'm not saying that no one's ever done this, but some people do tend to cover their air conditioners, and what do we need to do before we fire them back up? Uncover them. Right? Yep. It's it does happen. We go out to a handful a year, honest mistake, but it it can suffocate literally that unit to where it can't reject the heat from your home. So as that unit's running, it's it's drawing air in through the sides of the unit. It's actually we call it a condenser. It's condensing the refrigerant, getting rid of the heat from your home. So just like your indoor air filter, we don't want that outdoor unit getting plugged up with, you know, uh maybe some cottonwood trees around you, dust, dirt, pollen, debris, grass clipping.

SPEAKER_00 14:34

What about the neighbor kid that just runs the lawnmower right past it and blows all the grass in? That never happens, does it?

SPEAKER_01 14:39

Oh, no way, man.

SPEAKER_00 14:40

And then, you know, the guy brings in mulch and he just piles the mulch around the air conditioner. Sure, it looks nice.

SPEAKER_01 14:45

The shrinking air conditioner.

SPEAKER_00 14:46

The shrinking air conditioner. My air conditioner used to be three feet tall. No, it's two feet tall because it's a foot under the floor. That stuff never happens, you know. I mean, the the bushes never grow into them, do they? Not at all. No, not not at all.

SPEAKER_01 14:57

But but these are we like to joke about it, but it's like these can be these can be really expensive things for the homeowner because it is yeah, like you said, you have landscape crews, you've got neighbors, you've got overgrown bushes, and hopefully that air conditioner is not in something where you have to see every day. So you maybe it's on the side of your house or the back. So yeah, we that thing has to be able to breathe. We've got to be able to make it breathe. Um, and we want to be able to take care of that's what we do when we go out to that unit. We see what the how that unit's able to breathe from the indoor and the outdoor unit. Um, one thing I do want to say about I talked about taking the covers off. Another little tip keep the power washer in the garage. No, that thing will get it clean. No, it will get it clean. It will also allow you to probably buy a new one. So uh we don't want to be there's a specific, careful way, if you will, to clean these out. And uh it's one thing we train on a lot. We take a look at the condition of those coils and louvers. They're they're uh they can be fragile, so we want to make sure we're not being too aggressive with that. Say, I'll get mine all cleaned up, I'll power wash that thing off. More than likely, you're gonna do some more damage than anything.

SPEAKER_00 16:07

If you got a cottonwood tree in the area, call a tree guy. Just get rid of it. Um, I never forget a customer we had. Um, we had to go out three times a summer and hose the cottonwood out. The cottonwood was so bad, so bad. Build a barrier very quickly. Yep, very quickly. Absolutely, absolutely. So keep it. I know this isn't story time, but yeah, fun little story.

SPEAKER_01 16:27

Well, it's like we're technicians, we go back to war stories. That's what we do, right? Yeah, people want to hear the war stories. So uh power washers and cottonwood trees. That's what you learned on episode three. Yeah, yeah, you're right. That's what they remember. Um, but in all reality, guys, this is awareness. This is about inside your home. The more aware you can possibly be of your system, of things that go on. We talked about noises uh an episode ago, but now it's like, hey, we can really see like this is what happened. We see water underneath of it. We talked about the indoor, we talked about the outdoor unit, uh, we talked about airflow, things of that nature. And all this is where regular maintenance really matters, just like your car. We want to make sure tire pressures, oil change is all done routinely. These systems don't move around, so we don't think about them a whole lot until we stare at our thermostat and say, why are we so uncomfortable here? So maintenance really, really matters. Maintenance slash education, the reason for this really matters.

SPEAKER_00 17:22

And you know, my system's running, we hear this all the time. My system's running, and it's cooling the house. It's cooling just fine. That doesn't always mean that it's cooling it the most effectively, the most efficiently. Um, we hear a lot is hey, it's cooling great on an 80-degree day. And then guess what? July comes and it's 90. Well, it's not quite cooling like it was on that 80-degree day. Well, why isn't it? You know, what what are what are things to look for? And like you say, it could be just a couple of those things, simple things that we just talked about talking about.

SPEAKER_01 17:54

The most cost-effective maintenance you can do is when your system is running very well. Like you said, it doesn't seem to have an issue. That's the time to put the laser focus on it and make sure that continues to happen. So uh this has been exciting stuff for us. Uh, I love talking about how we can help homeowners. We're in a lot of homes every day, and that's a that this is a direct result of that. This isn't something that just comes from us. This is like, hey, we want to be able to provide homeowners with that uh content and information to where they're able to take a walk around their home. It's nice, is the weather's getting nice outside, walk around your home. Yeah, see if those things Derek mentioned, those outdoor units are staying clear of it. Yeah, um, guys, thanks so much for listening to Inside Your Home with Shanklin Heating. This has been exciting. Yeah, we'll see you next time. Our family is always here at Shanklin Heating to help you guys out. Give us a call or visit Shanklinheating.com.