The filter on your air conditioner is an important component which serves a couple of vital functions. For one, it can help to clean the air that you breathe every day, trapping contaminants so that they cannot cycle through the ducts. But another purpose it serves, which many people are not aware of, is protecting the air conditioning unit from damage.
In fact, this is what the filter was designed to do in the first place. If larger debris and dust were to get sucked into the air handler, it could damage fan blades or negatively affect the motor. The blower fan sucks in air from your home before conditioning the air to send back to you through the vents. Thankfully, there is a filter in place to safeguard the unit—but this can only work if you remember to change or clean it every one to three months.
The Trouble with a Clogged Filter
While a filter that is clogged with debris will continue to keep contaminants away from your air handler, it may also become too clogged to suck in enough air. Your air handler is designed to take in a certain amount of airflow with each cycle, but dirt in the filter will interfere with this process. The problems that may result in air conditioning repair include the following.
- Trouble with the blower fan motor: The fan may not be able to draw enough air into the unit to run properly, but it will still attempt to do so. As the fan continues to work to try to suck in air, the blower motor may become overworked.
- Frozen coil: The evaporator coil in your unit cools down as heat transfers to the refrigerant in the system. But without enough warm air to blow over the coil, it may freeze. Although ice on the coil may not seem like such a huge issue (shouldn’t ice help to cool down the home?) it will keep everything from functioning properly and you may have water dripping into your system or into your home.
Call the experts at Advantage Air Conditioning in case you do need air conditioning repair in Port St. Lucie and Palm Beach County, FL, and remember to change the filter every 1-3 months. Consult our technicians for more information.
