You Need Tight Ducts to Keep Heat Inside Your Home

Everybody knows where to find the furnace in their homes. Ductwork, however, isn’t located as easily and is often forgotten until it requires emergency repairs. Here are some suggestions to help you recognize whether your ducts are working properly:

• If your register is blocked by furniture or other objects, warmed air cannot enter the room. Try moving the furniture away from the register to permit air flow.
• Are your registers clean? Small objects can block the flow of heated air. If you are unable to see anything in the register, try cleaning it with a vacuum cleaner’s hose.
• Do you hear loud rattles from inside your registers? Tight ducts are silent, but loose or broken segments create loud noises while the air is circulating through the heating system.
• Do hear something like breeze through the registers? Air circulating through ductwork sounds this way when part of the duct is blocked. These sounds can also be heard when the ducts are too small to heat your home.
• Is the heating uneven in your home? Do you have cold and hot spots? Heating systems should keep all of the rooms at approximately the same temperature. If you measure the temperature in several rooms and note a substantial difference, you probably have leaky ducts.
• Did your heat bill suddenly increase with no clear cause? When you don’t have tight ducts, heated air leaks from the ductwork without raising the temperature in your home to increase.

If after reading this list you believe that your ductwork is faulty, the next step is to contact an experienced HVAC technician. While hiring somebody may require more money initially, sealed ducts require the training and professional grade materials, such as fiberglass, sheet metal and mastic, that a technician provides. Attempting to repair it yourself is unlikely to save you money and may end up costing more in the long run.

At Energy 1 Heating & Air Conditioning, we take pride in our unbeatable customer service. If you have any questions about your ductwork, give us a call.

Our goal is to help educate our customers in Lorain, Ohio about energy and home comfort issues (specific to HVAC systems). For more information about ductwork and other HVAC topics, download our free Home Comfort Guide or call us at 440-201-2959.

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