Filters play the starring role in your home’s HVAC system when it comes to keeping you warm or cool. Ensuring they are fresh and clean enough to do their job is one of the easiest ways to keep your home comfortable (for less $$) during any time of year. Changing your standard filter every three months is a good routine for an Indiana winter. Switching that up to monthly during the summer months is also important. Here’s why:
Your System is Working Harder
During the winter your system kicks on and off several times a day to keep you toasty warm. In the heat of summer your air conditioner does double and even triple duty cycles, longer and more often to achieve your comfort nirvana. This results in more air being pushed through those trusty filters each and every day, which can clog all those little fibers up in a hurry. Something as simple as a plugged filter can shut down your entire system.
Humidity is Not a Filter’s Friend
Your hairstyle isn’t the only thing that suffers during a humid Indiana summer. That excess moisture trapped in the air can become trapped in your filters as well. With that moisture comes mold and mildew and all sorts of undesirable muck that can clog the air passages and prevent your filter from working efficiently. Moist filters will not trap and cleanse as desired.
Summer Air is Full of…
Allergens, dust, grit, mold spores, pet dander, pollen…the list goes on and on and on. Every time you open your doors or windows you let in more of the big beautiful microscopic world and send it to through your trusty filter. A good filter does its job in trapping those undesirable little bits, but it can reach capacity quickly.
How Can You Tell When a Filter Should be Changed?
It depends on all of the factors above, but a monthly visual check should get you on the right path towards best efficiency and air quality for your home. Take the filter out and look for telltale signs that it has done its job and is ready to be retired. Dust on the surface, a fuzzy appearance, dampness, or mold growth are all indications that it is time for a replacement.
Keeping your filters fresh will keep your HVAC unit humming along nicely and allow your home’s air quality to remain high.