Ductwork problems that waste comfort

A variable capacity system does a really good job running and operating. But if your duck work is in bad shape and you've got, you know, you got leaks, maybe insulation's falling apart, maybe it's not sized correctly, the bad duck work's going to cause problems down the road, regardless of what type of system you have.

Return vents. Most often, your return vents are the largest vents associated with your HVAC system. They're the larger grills that pull air back to the system. Make sure that you they're free and clear of like make sure there's no couch in the way. If laundry basket, you know, drapes, toys, you know, in front of that filter system whatsoever, you know, if little Timmy's toy box is sitting some of the return grill and you know, in mama's hot, there's a reason why. And so make sure the return air has plenty of room to breathe. Airflow, super important. Check the return vents. >> Your home. >> [singing] [music]

Ignoring the ductwork. Ductwork does matter. Airflow matters. Your system is designed to output so much airflow a minute. And if your ductwork is not sized appropriately, if it's in most of the time I would say majority of the time it is undersized, then what that will do is that will cause unnecessary restrictions on that system. So it's going to be working much harder to push that air over the length of however long the system lasts. It's going to cause some premature wear and tear. And so what we want to do is we want to make sure the ductwork is sized appropriately so that way the system is able to operate freely. Your home. >> [music]

Can I compensate with higher efficiency system to overcome bad duck work? And my answer is no. I would not. I wouldn't recommend doing that. Like I'd rather do a single state system and correct all of your duck work problems as opposed to doing a variable capacity system and maintain the duck work as is. [Music]

one thing that I noticed when I come up here and it looks like this is to the master bathroom um and maybe a closet um but this duct right here you see this gas line that runs along here and goes to the to the furnace there it actually comes up right here and what's happened is they've got this thing twisted up and it's actually pushing down on um on this duct that's going to what I'm assuming is the the master bathroom right there um and so let's see if we can do anything to to assist in that situation while we're up here as well

One side of the house is hotter than the other. This could be ductwork, airflow, insulation, zoning, a dirty filter, or just a system that's not keeping up. The key detail is whether it's always been that way or this is something that has just started happening, something that just suddenly changed. So, a sudden change usually means that something failed or got blocked. Here's what you can do to check this out. Compare your rooms and don't just look at the thermostat. Walk around the house. Are the vents open? Is one return blocked? Did furniture get moved? If one area is dramatically different, write that down before the technician arrives and let them know about that.

Duck work, is it important? And my short answer is yes. If your duck work is in bad shape and you've got, you know, you got leaks, maybe insulation's falling apart, maybe it's not sized correctly, the bad duck work's going to cause problems down the road, regardless of what type of system you have. [Music]

whoever put this duct work in they did a good job of of strapping it up and and getting these uh you know getting these straps on it real well um but there's a couple of areas of concern that I see um the first one and this would be one cause of concern for her master bedroom is this right here so yeah they strapped it up they did a good job strapping it up but you can see it's almost 90 right here that's going to restrict the air flow a ton we've been in the Home Comfort game since 88 in OKC share this with a friend who's in need of some serious Home Service help

Ductwork problems, super fine, right? So, they range somewhere from about $500 to about $3,000 plus. And you're going, "Well, that is a really big range." And I would agree with you. Ductwork problems can range drastically, okay? All right, so, 20% of my AC is running, but my house won't cool service calls come down to a disconnected duct, a collapsed flex duct, or a damper stuck in the closed position, right? So, if one room isn't cooling while the rest of your house is absolutely fine, or if you have unusually high electric bills, but the house still isn't comfortable, ductwork is worth investigating. You can do a lot of this stuff yourself, okay? Go in your attic, go crawl under just You don't have to go all the way under your house, but just take a look, right? And look for any sections of duct that are visibly collapsed, right? Are they disconnected? Is there something laying on top of them? You know, guys, a disconnected duct in an attic that reaches around 160° in July is pumping your cold air directly into your attic space, which is doing you no good. You're not living in your attic, you're not watching TV in your attic. So, making sure you don't have disconnected ducts or collapsed ducts is going to save you money in the long run. Check it out, guys.

When considering your attic and insulation, one thing to double check as well is make sure that your ductwork is sealed properly. Older homes, especially with older ductwork, they can have issues with maybe the ductwork's falling apart in some way, shape, or form. Maybe insulation it was good 10 years ago, but maybe the sealants have corroded in some way, shape, or form, and it's now compromised where you're now leaking the air conditioning that you're paying for and you're air conditioning the attic space because it's not sealed well. You want to make sure your ductwork's well connected, and so making sure that money that you're paying is going towards comfort in your home, not the attic space. Your HVAC tech would thank you, but your energy bill would not. So, make sure that air flow is going to your living space and not your attic space. Please and thank you.

when you have air flow restrictions your uh blower inside your furnace has to work really hard it'd be like going for a run and try to breathe through a straw so you always want to be sure your system is bringing enough air to condition that air and being able to expel that air to all the rooms and and rooms in the house so that's going to be a really important issue to look at we've been in business for over 35 years give us a call for any of your heating cooling or plumbing needs

You know, in some cases, if you're telling us that you got some some airflow issues, we'll be looking and checking to see if your ductwork is sized properly. If there's any air leaks in the return ductwork that's bringing that attic heat, typically in Oklahoma, that attic heat into your system and warming that air up before it actually hits your evaporator coil. Or if it's leaking air on the return side, it could be causing your blower wheel or your evaporator coil to become dirty and then need a bigger service on it. And so, that's one side of it. On the supply side, you know, if you're leaking air into the attic, if you've got a duct that has come off, anything along those lines, you know, we're looking for that and we're going to recommend that to be repaired. Your home >> [music]

Uh we found a 14-in supply duct uh under this house in Oklahoma City that had completely disconnected and didn't have enough slack to reconnect. Thankfully, we ran brand new duct work and uh got the system fully connected with better air flow than before. Uh while we were there, we washed backyard package unit to improve efficiency as it was uh it was pretty dirty. As always, great work by our team taking care of this customer. [Music]

We want to make sure that there are no air leaks, no air gaps in the plenum itself. Because if your system is working and it's pushing cold air through the house and it's trying its darnedest in the peak summer days to make sure that you're comfortable and we're conditioning a 140° attic, we're burning money. I mean, you might as well just take this and, you know, toss it to the side. It's It's useless. You're conditioning a space that shouldn't be conditioned and we're losing it in places that ultimately you're never going to feel. So, what we want to do is make sure that the plenums, meaning the two boxes that are attached to our air handler or to our furnace, both supply and the return side, are taped up, sealed up, have proper mastic, are properly sealed, have proper ductwork collars on all the runs, so that we're not wasting any of our precious cold air to go warm in the summertime. Because we're warm all the time. So, you need cold air in the house and you don't want to be wasting it in the attic.

hey guys colby arbor over in blanchard oklahoma today um if you are upgrading the insulation on your home please keep clear your service walkways to your hvac system um if you cover it up with insulation it makes it very very difficult to walk to um and it makes it not safe and so drifting through this mess it's not fun and uh i don't want to fall through a ceiling so another tip is if you're adding insulation to your house please make sure you do not fill up your emergency drain pan with insulation that's also a no-no uh it'll clog very quickly and you'll have more problems than you want so think about us whenever you're improving your insulation in your attic thanks

hey guys good afternoon or good morning from south oklahoma city i have a unique situation i want to share with you guys um so this homeowner has some airflow issues in their house and it's not because they don't have enough ductwork it's actually that they have way too much and so the size of the ductwork that's coming off the plenum is well oversized for what the system is actually designed for um and so what's happening is is you can have low velocity uh in your in your airflow uh and so it's kind of like think of it this way if i gave you a candle i said i want you to blow this candle out but the only way you can do it is by yawning it's not gonna happen no matter how long you've gone you're not gonna blow that candle out so you're not gonna get rid of that heat source and so in the same way you don't you want to make sure that your ductwork size properly for the house that it's not oversized and it's not undersized you want to make sure that's just right so have a great day

So, dirty blower wheel is something that we've seen pop up a little bit more consistently here lately. I can't explain why, but when your blower wheel gets dirty, it decreases your airflow. It puts more strain on your blower motor. And could cause a failure. A tenth of an inch of dirt on your blower wheel will decrease your airflow by 20%. That's not my numbers. That's science. And I've been doing this for 15 years. Keep blower wheels clean. But, you know, when we're out there doing maintenance and we we open up that furnace or air handler and and we see that dirt on that blower wheel, we're going to recommend it to you. Your home >> [singing] [music]

hey guys I'm up in the attic and I noticed um something peculiar um on your furnace or your air hammer or whatever you want to call it um the the cabinet doors and they're supposed to enclose it or put on backwards this door is supposed to be here this homeowner has been pulling in attic air and you can see from all the dust that's accumulated their utility bills were probably pretty high so get your AC and furnace checked please [Music]

Welcome to Sidewalk Conversations with Will. So, you've got rooms you never use. So, you close those vents to, you know, honestly save a little bit of money. I'm going to go ahead and tell you to open those back up, okay? I'm going to tell you why and then tell you what to do instead. Okay, guys. So, your blower motor has zero idea that you closed those vents. Its whole job is to push against a set amount of resistance. So, if you close those vents, that resistance is going to spike. Now, your blower is straining like it's breathing through a coffee straw. Your duct leaks are leaking harder because of all the trapped pressure and your coil's losing the airflow it needs. So, you starve that coil long enough and it's pretty likely that it freezes into a block of ice in July. Just to be honest, that's not a lollipop that anyone wants or is asking for. So, the five bucks you saved closing some vents, you spend it on a strained blower motor and like some weird gross coil lollipop thing. So, now if your real problem is one room's an oven and another room's an icebox. Guys, we don't fix that with vents either. That's a balancing problem or a zoning problem. You know, if you want that solved for good, there's a right way to do that and, you know, we can honestly do what you're trying to do. So, do it the right way, give us a call and we'll get you going in the right direction. Have a great one.

the EPA decided that they wanted to get into the HVAC business. What that resulted in was you have systems that use less electricity to operate. However, components are smaller. Uh they have different specifications. You have blower motors that have changed. You have outdoor [music] units that have changed. Uh but over time, there really wasn't a conversation about duck work on those older systems cuz those older systems did not care about a special term we'll call static pressure. [music] High static pressure, it's kind of like having high blood pressure. If you have high static pressure, it's going to cause some strain on the equipment [music] uh down the roads. [singing]

Think about it like a heart. If your ductwork is not sized appropriately, it's kind of like having high blood pressure. And so, you can operate, you can do things, but over time it's going to cause some wear and tear. So, you want to make sure that you keep your ductwork the correct size and your blood pressure down. So, make sure you have the the the ductwork sized correctly for the home. Your home. >> [singing] [music]

duck work does not last forever unfortunately the ductwork inside this home was an older plastic material and it is just Fallen apart over time as you can see Ben is carrying out the duct work it's in really really bad shape this material just falls apart due to UV infiltration in the Attic it is best to get it replaced because the insulation will fall off and it'll make the house less comfortable and hurt your utility bills

I would highly recommend even if you're going back with a single stage system, I would highly recommend looking into the air flow and making sure that it's sized appropriately for those units because what we're finding in homes, we're having to correct return air, so the the intake about 80% of the time uh because they're under size even with for single stage system. And that can result in premature wear and tear on blower motors and premature wear and tear on the system itself because if it's not able to breathe, it's going to have a hard time operating. It's all relative what to what's there now. So, if the duck works in terrible shape, then getting the duck work updated, increased, replaced, whatever needs to be done, uh, can make a huge difference in in your utility bill and your comfort level within the house. Because at the end of the day, I want you to be comfortable. [Music]

Look at the supply vents without over adjusting them. Homeowners sometimes close vents in unused rooms thinking it saves money. You know, and in many homes that can create pressure problems and reduce system performance. Yeah, if a room is uncomfortable, closing random vents is usually just not the best way to fix it.

Oh my gosh, there's a cat. [laughter] Oh man. Okay. All right. So, a cat has gotten into uh the ducks up in an attic and has, you know, had some fun. It was, you know, cats love love getting into stuff. And ducks are prime places for cats to go, I guess, if you've got a cat in your attic. So, yeah. Um I mean, an easy way to mitigate this is don't let a cat up into your attic. [laughter] >> [singing]

Whether we're heating or we're cooling, none of this really matters if we can't move the air properly and efficiently. You could have a rocket ship of an air conditioning system, but if we can't move air from point A to point B, it doesn't really matter. And that is where duct work comes in. >> [music]

Your return vents are honestly, they're the large grills in your house. They're usually in the ceiling or the hallway. The whole point of them is to pull air back to the system. If furniture is pushed up against them, if the rug is covering one, or a closed door is blocking the only return in the room, the system isn't breathing. Again, restricted airflow means reduced cooling capacity and a higher risk of a frozen coil. Check every single return vent in the house before you call anyone. Make sure there's at least 6 in of clearance all around them. Guys, this is a $0 fix and honestly, it accounts for more service calls than you would like to believe.

so on this return duct right here you can see it a 16in so this duct will accommodate 1,000 cubic feet of air so we have a 16in over here I bet we have a 16in right here got to get around this one I'm almost positive it's a 16in but I just want to verify just those two ducks alone allow for 1,000 cubic feet of air each so a 5 ton system is going to be pull in 2,000 so that's great pretty rare to go into a house and then the the return is size just right A lot of times the return air which is the air coming back to the system is undersized and the supply ducks are oversized we've been in business for over 35 years give us a call for any of your heating cooling or plumbing needs

Doesn't matter how fancy of the system you buy. If your if your duck work is not sized appropriately, that new system or the existing system is going to struggle to run an operator. It is the delivery system that brings you comfort when you need it the most. And if your duck work is not sized appropriately, then you're not going to be comfortable in the way that you need to be comfortable.

hey guys Colby arrow with your arms since heating and air conditioning I am in Blanchard Oklahoma it's really important to get your AC system checked here's something that can happen doesn't happen super often but when it does it's a nuisance for you guys so anyways we'll make sure that your ductwork's connected [Music]