Top 3 Air Conditioning and Heating Filter Myth

Air Conditioning and Heating Filter Myth 1: Need to change air conditioning and heating filter every three months.

• Every household is going to be different when needing to change out your air conditioning and heating filter. Your environment will determine how often you need to replace your air conditioning and heating filter. For example, I change mine every month due to kids, dogs, and the outside doors constantly opening and shutting. However, we have customers that have no kids or animals and they change their air conditioning and heating filters out every three months. Check out these tips below to help establish your replacement of your air conditioning and heating filter.
  • Tip 1: The best way to determine how often you need to change your air conditioning and heating filters is to check it every week until you establish what is best for your house.
  • Tip 2: To help with the reminder to change your air conditioning and heating filters is to add a reminder on your phone or alarm. This tip I personally use and it helps with remembering during our busy schedule

Air Conditioning and Heating Filter Myth 2: I must have allergy or hepa ac and heating filters because they are the best.

• Yes the allergy or hepa ac and heating filters are good filters, when used in the right application. One problem that someone may run into is not having enough return air to support allergy or hepa ac and heating filters. If there is not enough return air for the allergy or hepa ac and heating filters it could potentially be harmful to you air conditioning and heating system. In most cases we would need to enlarge or add return air in order to support allergy or hepa ac and heating filters. We often find there is barely enough return air for the basic non pleated filters.
• If you are using the allergy or hepa ac and heating filters, below are some simple ways to determine if you should stop using them or have more return air added.
  • Allergy or hepa ac and heating filter make a banging noise when the unit comes on and off
  • Allergy or hepa ac and heating filter is bowing
  • The return air is noisy when the unit is on

Air Conditioning and Heating Filter Myth 3: A better filter will help with the dust in my house.

• In most cases having the “best” ac and heating filters will not help and in some cases it will make it worse. Below are a few reasons that causes a house to get dusty.
  • Bad duct system
  • Leaking duct system
  • House leaking (ex: windows, doors, attic access)
• The better filter may in some cases may mask one of the above causes but does not solve the underlying problem.
  • Example A: A bad designed duct system can put your house under a negative pressure that will pull outside air in your home causing more dust.
  • Example B: A leaking duct system especially on the return air side will pull attic air which will add to poor air quality.

Ask your Quality Comfort Air service tech during your next a/c maintenance, a/c service or a/c repair with any questions or concerns you may have.