Hello! Welcome to 2025! Last year flew by for Epps HVAC Company. It was a wonderful year meeting so many new people and helping them with their HVAC systems. I feel very lucky to have so many of you trust Epps HVAC Company to keep your HVAC equipment running through our growing maintenance program, fix your equipment when they were broken, or get them replaced if it was time to do so. Thank you. I also feel very lucky that so many of you were proud to recommend Epps HVAC Company to your friends, families, neighbors, coworkers, church friends and the many other forms of word-of-mouth referrals that got Epps HVAC Company noticed by an entirely new group of clients. Thank you.
Having the doors opened up to new clients will allow Epps HVAC Company to continue to ensure we are able to provide our service area with comfort through education. I am excited for what 2025 has in store for Epps HVAC Company as we continue to grow many of the partnerships and relationships created in 2024. Our growth within the community allows Epps HVAC Company the ability to help the community we serve prosper into 2025 and beyond.
As we start 2025, I would like to take a minute and remind everyone that although it was 60 degrees on NYE, it is indeed wintertime in beautiful North Carolina. Wintertime temperatures may return at any time and may stick around for an extended period of time. Now, is a great time to get your heating system checked out is and have any questions answered. Furnaces and heat pumps should be checked and cleaned twice per year to extend the life of your system and prevent break downs. Having the components inspected can prevent unnecessary downtime during extreme temperatures. Call or text (704) 917-9014 to schedule an inspection of your equipment before the winter temps arrive!
There are a few things you can do as a homeowner to help your system out.
The most important thing is to make sure your filter is clean! Set an alarm on your phone every 30, 60 or 90 days depending on the needs for your home and the type of filter you have as a reminder to make sure your unit is getting clean air over the indoor and outdoor coils for a heat pump or across the indoor unit (furnace and indoor coil) for a gas furnace with a split system air conditioning system. A dirty filter will cause a gas system to cycle on and off on high temperature limit which shortens the life span of components like the igniter and limit switch. A dirty filter will cause a heat pump system to cycle off on high pressure which can cause the system to go into a lock out period where the blower is running but the compressor is not moving refrigerant through the system as a protection to itself. The high pressure lock out will typically self-clear which could appear as an intermittent issue if not addressed by a licensed HVAC Contractor. If this lock out period occurs during a time of day or night where the house is now losing more heat that the HVAC equipment is putting back in (known as the balance point), the home will begin to get cold, and your electric heat may run more than necessary causing higher power bills.
The second most important item for furnace owners is make sure your CO detectors are working properly. IF the CO alarms in your home are older than seven years, they should be replaced.
I also recommend knowing if your gas heating system is an 80% or 90% furnace. 90% furnaces create water in the wintertime and can experience issues with drain lines freezing up which cause water to back up into the furnace preventing the unit from operating correctly. Knowing where your unit is located, if the drain line is insulated, where the unit drains to (inside or outside of the home), and ensuring the drain is clear, not buried (if it goes outside) or is insulated if there is potential for the drain to freeze in the space that it is in. Drain lines are made from 3/4 PVC materials. When drain systems are located in attics and the temperature is below freezing for several days at a time, there is potential for these to freeze. Knowing this as homeowner gives you the opportunity to check out them and thaw if needed. If you need help determining any of this information, please contact Epps HVAC Company to schedule an appointment.
If your home utilizes a heat pump system rather than gas, there are two items of note.
First, due to the colder outdoor temps the unit will need to run forced defrost cycles. This is because the temperature of the outdoor coil has gotten cold enough the unit is starting to freeze over outside. This happens because the outdoor coil in heating mode is the evaporator side of the system which is the "cold coil". Running a coil at below freezing saturation temperatures will cause moisture to freeze to the outdoor coil which will need to be defrosted. On warmer days (above 45*) the unit does not run enough to require forced defrost cycles. However, during colder temps (below 45*), especially during extreme cold temperatures, the unit will need to utilize a forced defrost cycle. The defrost cycle for a heat pump involved three things. First, the outdoor fan will shut down. Second the reversing valve will switch back to cooling mode (this happens so the hot gas from the compressor can be used to thaw the outdoor coil, rather than give off heat inside the home) and the final thing that happens is the defrost control board send a signal to the electric heat strips to come on to help temper the air (since the unit is running in cooling mode during defrost, weird right?) There are several different methods to terminating the defrost cycle which I will not bore you with the details of (unless you want to know, in which case I recommend scheduling a service call for your home with Epps HVAC Company!). Once the defrost cycle is completed the call for heat strips from the defrost board will terminate (although the strip heat may still be running from the thermostat calling for W1/W2/W3 depending on your heat stages), the outdoor fan will come back on, and the reversing valve will switch back to heating mode. There are sometimes strange noises from the equipment during the defrost cycle and these noises can be louder the lower the outdoor temperature is. In fact, the outdoor temperature in the wintertime can change the sound of the heat pump even during normal operation!
The second item to note is that the AUX heat coming on to assist the heat pump during extreme cold temperatures is completely normal! The heat pump is only designed to maintain 70 degrees inside the home down to 24 degrees outside the home (in the Charlotte NC area per Manual J). Once the outside temperature drops below 24* the heat pump may not be able to maintain the balance point of the home (the home is losing more heat that the heat pump alone is supplying back to it). At this point the supplemental, often called auxiliary heat strips will assist the heat pump in maintaining this balance point.
The heat strips running is a necessary evil during cold temperatures but there are a few things you can do to help prevent them from coming on unnecessarily.
1) Understand your thermostat settings and operations. This can help prevent you inadvertently turning the unit into emergency heat which causes the heat pump to lock out.
2) Avoid running large temperature swings either manually or in your programmable schedule. Most thermostats are set up to call for auxiliary heat when the set point gets further than 2 degrees from the actual room temperature. Some of the newer thermostats have more advanced algo rhythms which prevent the heat strips from coming on in certain situations.
The heat strips are expensive to operate and heat pump owners should expect their electric bills to be considerably higher during months where the average daily temperature is under 45 degrees in the daytime and under 20 degrees at nighttime. It does not happen often, but please be aware the possibility is there. If you have questions about your thermostat or would like information on a new thermostat, please call or text (704) 917-9014 to schedule an appointment
I hope this information is helpful to you. I am always available and love to discuss HVAC. Please do not hesitate to reach out if you have questions, need service, maintenance, repairs, diagnostics, design, installation or retrofitting of your existing HVAC. Epps HVAC Company is here to provide Comfort Through Education.
Don't forget to change your air filters, located your drain lines, CO Detectors and Smoke Detectors!
To a blessed and happy 2025. Cheers everyone.
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