One of the most common issues we come across during the summer is low refrigerant in air conditioners. Refrigerant, also called freon, helps absorb heat from your home. It then travels through your system to release the heat outside. If your AC is low on refrigerant, you’ll start to see all kinds of problems, and your home won’t feel comfortable during hot days anymore. Air conditioners don’t “use up” freon. If your freon is low, it’s because there’s a leak that needs to be fixed.
Signs You Might be Low on Freon
While there’s no way to know for sure without having a technician check, there are a few ways you can find out if freon levels are a likely problem in your home.
High electricity bills
When it’s costing your family more than usual to try to keep the house comfortable, that could be a red flag. When your AC is low on freon, it can’t work as efficiently, and that means it uses more energy just trying to keep up with demands. This can get expensive!
Buildup of ice on the refrigerant line or evaporator coil
Low freon levels create lower pressure in your air conditioning system. That causes the AC’s temperature to drop, which allows ice to build up on your evaporator coil. If you notice ice on your system, use your thermostat to turn the system off before your Morris-Jenkins tech arrives. This allows the ice to melt so your technician can access all the parts they need.
You may also be interested in: Can I mix different kinds of refrigerant?
Your AC takes longer to cool your home
Your air conditioner relies on refrigerant to help it absorb and remove heat from your home. If it doesn’t have enough refrigerant, it’s going to take longer just to remove that same amount of heat.
Warm air blowing out the vents
If you put your hand up to any of the air vents in your home and feel warm air coming out, something isn’t right. Your air conditioner isn’t producing cool air, and that might be because it doesn’t have enough refrigerant to get the job done.
High humidity and sticky air
Your AC’s main job isn’t to cool the air—it’s to remove humidity from the air! In turn, that helps cool your home. If your house is feeling muggy, there’s a good chance your freon is low, which means your air conditioner is gonna have a hard time pulling moisture from the air.
How Your Morris-Jenkins Technician Checks Your Refrigerant/Freon Levels
Checking your refrigerant levels is a tricky process. It’s not as simple as reading a gauge on the side of your AC unit! Before we can even start, we have to inspect a few things. To start off, your tech will make sure your home has proper air flow. That means they’re looking at your filters, blower wheel, and indoor coil to see if they’re all clean. They’ll also check the static pressure inside the system. After that, they’ll inspect your duct system’s size by doing a few calculations. Next, your technician will figure out what metering device your air conditioner has. They’ve also gotta check the indoor humidity, outdoor humidity, and outdoor ambient temperature with a psychometer. Once they’ve got all this information, they can use a special formula to figure out the correct superheat your AC should have based on what kind of metering device it has. They’ll connect their gauges and read the pressures and temperatures of your AC. Using those, they’ll complete the calculations to find out if your system has enough freon or not.
Sound Like a Lot? Don’t Worry. We Make It Easy!
Instead of worrying about how complicated all that sounds, just schedule a Check’n’Wash! We’ll come out and check your freon levels for you. And we always do it the right way, NOT the easy way. That means we won’t skip any of those tricky steps because we wanna make sure your AC truly is set for summer. While we’re at it, we’ll take a look at the rest of the system and wash your outdoor unit to help it cool your home better!
Wanna make it easier than easy? Become a Priority Advantage® Member! As a member, you’ll get heating and cooling maintenance covered as part of your membership. And if you ever do need repairs, you get a 10% discount, as well as tons of other great perks.
