August 10, am. Another question: how much refrigerant does your unit need to cool your home? It can be really tricky. Since most of the homeowners are not very knowledgeable about this matter, we have some pieces of information to guide you in getting the answer to your concern. However, this general rule of thumb may depend on different variables. The size of your air conditioning unit significantly affects the amount of refrigerant needed to produce cool air.
Of course, the bigger unit needs a larger liquid line on the line set, thus requires greater capacity. Length and Size of Copper Line Set. The greater the distance between the evaporator and condenser coils, the more refrigerant is needed. Air conditioning units come from the factory with the right amount of refrigerant which complies with the distance between these two crucial parts.
Size of Evaporator Coil. Its main responsibility is to absorb heat from your indoors and carry that heat out of your home. If your cooling unit is low on refrigerant, the cooling process will not work. So, when is the right time to refill the refrigerant? Unlike what many HVAC contractors may tell you, you do not need a refill every few months unless your system has a leak. The best time to check refrigerant levels is during an annual checkup. If the levels are low, your HVAC technician can top it off for you.
Before we tell you how much it will cost you to recharge your air conditioner, you need to understand what happens when your AC is low on refrigerant levels. As mentioned above, the refrigerant that flows through your cooling unit absorbs heat from the air indoors and releases it outside.
Needless to say, if the unit does not have enough refrigerant, it will not be able to remove heat from your house effectively. Listed below are a few of the problems that you could face:.
This will invariably lead to very long cooling cycles that will slow down the rate at which your unit can cool down your indoors. Warm Air: If the air coming out of your air conditioners supply registers is warmer than usual, it could be due to low refrigerant levels. This will make your home feel stuffy and uncomfortable.
Your cooling unit will have to work longer and harder to cool your home. This will lead to a spike in your utility bills. Frozen System: Low levels of refrigerant can also cause your evaporator coils to freeze. R was meant to be a transition until a new type of refrigerant could be developed to take its place. But through the transition, air conditioners using R were still being installed due to a loophole. This left a lot of units out there still needing R So the simple reason for high air conditioner refrigerant costs is supply and demand.
There is more demand than there is available supply. The price of R has soared and often runs 3 to 5 times the cost of RA. And if you think it costs a lot now, just wait. Typical residential air conditioning units hold from 5 to 15 pounds of R Even more, according to the EPA , production and sale of R be cease completely by Should you need R for your air conditioning unit, your best best is to work with Fixd authorized HVAC companies to find the best price.
It will also depend on what these companies paid when they purchased R, so prices will vary. Be sure you ask if this cost includes the cost of service charge and labor. To see if you are getting a fair price, you can always look at the current price on Amazon and other online sites.
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