• Will you be safe with the worker around you, your kids, your wife, your friends, relatives, and so on?
• Will the workers treat you with courteous?
• Will the workers cuss, smoke, and be over-all disrespectful?
• Will the workers keep your home clean or leave you with a filthy home.
• Will your wood floors, tiles, carpet, paint, stair rails, and landscaping get trashed?
• Will he worker leave screws, scrap metal, and other debris lying in your home, garage, driveway and which could give you a flat tire?
• Will trash and debris be left all over the outside of your home?
• Do the workers do drugs, or drink?
• For more on companies workers, see (“BEFORE YOU SIGN ON THE DOTTED LINE”)

 

• The installation is critical or the compressor inside of the air conditioner will fail, sometimes in as little as 2 years.
• Yes you have a warranty, but do you want your “BRAND NEW AIR CONDITIONER” to be constantly worked on?
• Isn’t the whole idea for installing a new system so it will be reliable, efficient, and to avoid being inconvenience with constant repairs?
• The more a system is broken into, the more chance the system will be contaminated and have repeated failures.
• So how to you get it done right the first time? Hire a competent contractor.
• Here’s just a few of the many critical steps required to assure a sound air conditioning installation.
• First the most important steps.
• When replacing an existing air conditioning system, if using the existing refrigeration lines; these refrigeration lines must be cleaned out and purified with a special solvent.
• Why? Because there’s oil’s in the refrigeration lines which came the from the old air conditioning system and the oil’s in the new air conditioning system is not compatible with the oil’s from the existing system.
• The two different types of oil’s would be like mixing oil and water.
• Oil and water do not lubricate the compressor’s moving parts very well. Hence pre-mature compressor failure. 
• When the copper refrigeration lines are joined together by a method known as brazing, there is oxygen inside of the copper tubing.
• If the oxygen inside of the copper tubing is not purged with nitrogen before brazing, copper oxides will form inside of the copper tubing and contaminate the air conditioning system, which may lead to pre-mature failure of the air condition’s compressor as well. 
• After brazing all of the copper tubing joint, this tubing must be pressurized with at least 300 pounds of pressure to assure a leak proof system.
• When installing and connecting the air conditioner’s copper tubing, the bends and joints need to be kept to a minimum to assure a higher quality and more efficient system.
• Trabuco Air uses special tubing benders which reduces the amount of brazed joints required.
• The typical air conditioning installation will have between 14 to 25 brazed connections.
• Trabuco Air’s typical air conditioning installation practices reduces the amount of brazed joint connections to between 6 to 12 connections.
• Once all of the connections or joints in the copper tubing are completed and the tubing has been pressure check, then a special device called a “vacuum pump” must be used remove all of the air and moisture from inside of the copper tubing.
• This negative pressure, “below the atmosphere’s pressure” needs to be at lease 500-700 microns and measured with a micron gauge
• This is very important and is almost never done by most contractors and I can’t stress this enough!
• If any air or moisture is not removed from the copper tubing, acid will form in the air conditioning system.
• Why is this so important? The air conditioner has a compressor inside of it, that’s the component that pumps the refrigerant through to system.
• This compressor has an electrical motor that is sealed inside the compressor shell.
• The compressor motor what is known as windings? Basically a whole bunch of wires which are protected with varnish so these wires do not come into contact with each other.

 

• First the vent piping, all modern furnaces need a metal vent.
• Usually a vent type called type “B” vent.
• If you’re current furnace has a vent that looks like a white clay pipe, it’s called Transite.
• This vent is made of Asbestos and will not work with any new furnaces.
• Furnaces which are 90% in efficiency or greater require either and ABS or PVC type vent materials.
• PVC is of a much higher quality than ABS, which is most commonly used for drain piping in our homes. 
• Next the furnace must be sealed to the base or platform to prevent carbon dioxide from entering your home. 
• The gas piping to the furnace must be hard-piped before the gas line enters the furnace.
• Hard-piped refers to having black metal gas pipe entering the furnace body and not the flexible gas connector.
• The gas flex should ¾” in size as required by code, and not all building inspectors check for this.    
• Regarding the electrical to the furnace, the circuit breaker must match the rating, the electrical needs to match the breaker size.
• Some cities require the furnace to be hard-wire. Irvine, Huntington Beach, San Clemente, almost of LA County and the inland Empire.
• A furnace must be strapped down in an attic.
• When connecting the furnace, a/c coil, and the sheet-metal or plenum, the components must be cleaned first.
• Many times there is paint on the existing plenum where the furnace and/or a/c coil components are joined
• The paint must be scraped, sanded, and dusted off of off the existing metal or plenum.
• If this is not done prior to the furnace, and/or a/c coil installation the sealant tapes will come loose
• This will allow air leaks and lower efficiencies of both the heating and air conditioning system
• Adjusting the furnace blower motor fan speed is a crucial step for correct operation of the heating  system
• Every home has a different rate of air flow and the furnace must be fine-tuned based on this.
• Furnaces have what is known as the temperature rise specifications tolerances.
• The temperature rise is the air temperature entering the furnace, compared to the air temperature leaving the furnace.
• If the temperature rise is not is not correct, the furnace will provide unsatisfactory performance.
• If the air temperature rise is below the furnace rating, the air will feel cold and drafty to you.
• If the temperature rise is beyond the furnace rating, then the furnace is less efficient and use more energy 
• Both of these conditions may lead to a shortened furnace life.
• This list just covers the most basic requirement and touches the surface.

The Ducting

 

• The ducting is basically the pipe that distributes the air flow throughout your home to provide the comfort that your HVAC system offers.
• The ducting is just another piece of the puzzle to your HVAC system and is very important as well.
• Why? This is because this ducting must be sized properly to allow for full efficiency and longevity of your entire HVAC system.
• If the ducting is sized smaller than necessary, your HVAC system will have a reduced efficiency directly related to the reduced and improper air-flow.
• So if you’re HVAC ducting system requires 100 units of air-flow and your ducting is only 50% of the rated air-flow, then your HVAC systems efficiency is reduced by 50% and your energy bills double.  
• Let’s use another scenario, let’s say that your HVAC system requires the same 100 units of air-flow and you have 0% air-flow.
• That translates to 0% of efficiency or a 100% of nothing.
• Now if new ducting is being installed, this ducting must be sealed to allow for no air leakage.
• The ducting should be installed as straight as possible to allow for peak efficiency of your HVAC system.
• If the ducting is installed in an attic, the ducting should be hung and strapped properly from the roofing joist.
• If the ducting is just thrown on top of the attic floor, this ducting may become damage by workers on future projects. 
• Examples are; the cable guy, the electrician guy, the plumber guy, and so on.
• These are all valid points which customers don’t know to think about.
• Most contractors do not hang the ducting from the roof joists.

 

• There are too many short-cuts to list them all here, so we will touch on just some.
• Not flushing the existing copper refrigeration tubing, this will cause the Air Conditioner’s Compressor to fail.
• Not using a vacuum pump to “PULL” down or (‘VACUUM”) pump the copper refrigeration tubing, this saves time
• Using glue to join the copper refrigeration tubing instead of “SILVER” brazing materials, this saves money and time.
• Using smaller diameter copper refrigeration tubing than required by the manufactures specifications, this saves money; copper is very expensive today. Short cutting this step may void the equipment warranties.
• Not leveling the air conditioner, this will make the air conditioner noisier, may cause refrigeration leaks to form in the air conditioner, and possible void warranties.
• Not sealing or (“CAULKING”) the air conditioner’s fuse-box to the outside wall, this will allow for water intrusion into the home’s walls and may lead to a mold and mildew conditions.
• Using the smallest size or (“GAUGE’) wire for the air conditioner that the contractor can,  and still pass code, this saves money by the least costly of materials and not necessary the best materials; again copper wire is expensive.
• Using a low grade of wiring from the breaker panel to the air conditioner, most contractors use a wire known as (“ROMEX”), romex costs less than (“STRANDED”) wire and is much easier and less time consuming to install. 
• Doing over-all sloppy work.

 

 

• This is where the contractor can save money.
• See the examples below.
• Using thin wall copper refrigeration tubing.
• Piece together scrap pieces of copper refrigeration tubing.
• Not flushing the existing copper tubing with solvent as described under air condition installation.
• Not using nitrogen when brazing the copper refrigeration tubing.
• Not pressure testing the copper refrigeration tubing.
• Not vacuuming the copper refrigeration tubing, this saves time.
• Not using the proper tools necessary to perform a quality installation.
• Using a cheap ducting and less efficient ducting.
• Using a cheap wiring for the air conditioner.
• Using a low quality builder grade thermostat.
• Using thin gauge sheet-metal.
• Using low grades of sealant tape.