< 1 2 3 > Originally Posted by lifelongMOgal You likely have an 8 - 10 SEER system. Going to the minimum standard of 13 SEER would be a 30 - 62% increase in efficiency. Of course it's hard to say how much that would save you but generally the warmer the climate, the longer the AC runs, and the larger % of your power bill comes from the AC. Generally 70% of your power bill is for HVAC system. So if your power bill is $100/month then about $70 is from your HVAC system. Let's just say you chose a 13 SEER system and you previously had a 10 SEER system. You would expect about a $21/month savings. Over the course of 10 years using 6 months out of the year as your cooling season you'd save $1,260. Doesn't seem like much, huh? But what about the other scenario? You have an 8 SEER system (or less) and you go to the minimum 13 SEER system. Your power bill is $200/month. Your savings, all things being equal, would be $5,208 for the 10 year period. I'm assuming you're in MO and your cooling season is probably a little longer than 6 months but those were just for the examples I provided.

Originally Posted by mscrash It can't hurt to have your coils and fan blades cleaned and to have a checkup for things like voltage drop on your contactor and the integrity of your capacitor tested. Older units because of lack of efficiency standards and general manufacturing practices were built like tanks and tend to be made with more material than today's units. Those are signs of a lack of proper airflow. Believe it or not the temperature drop actually increases as the volume of air going over the evap coil decreases at the same time overall capacity decreases. You can have the coils cleaned or you can clean them yourself if you're somewhat handy. I wouldn't recommend you cleaning the fan blades yourself unless you're comfortable tearing the system apart and putting it back together correctly. It also could be a failing fan motor which a technician can evaluate. I would take the other's suggestions and start looking now. Start saving money for the replacement and if you can wait until you're in between seasons and the HVAC company is hurting for work.

You'll also want to get lots of bids and use guidelines like this to make your evaluation: 1,289 posts, read 2,165,956 times 433 posts, read 884,540 times A new A/C unit and the insulation job cost approx the same, There is no way in any portion of the world or underworld that insulation would cost as much as a new AC system!!air handling unit schedule You should be looking at $400-$600 max. ac unit won't coolUNLESS you are trying to get the latest and greatest Icynene insulation, (which you can STILL do it yourself! just google "do it yourself spray insulation")cheap used window ac units The other poster is right. Just get a few friends and have them help you blow some insulation in. Give them the opportunity to drink the RIGHT fluids (ie water, Gatorade, etc ) before hand and the right Fluids after they are done.

(then also give them the option to try other fluids when they have rehydrated! ) 14 posts, read 31,033 times All I would say is that your condensing unit may be an 81' model. This doesn't mean that the heart of it ..the compressor hasn't been replaced 6 times. Fans go bad and are replaced. If the coils and tubing are good, then other than efficiency concerns, let her be. Now granted, today especially if a compressor goes out an entire new cond. unit is generally recommended. Depending on the service companies prices you might opt either way. BTW, if he really added a "little" freon and it really needed it...did he fix the leak? Did he charge extra for this little squirt of freon? No need to answer..... just questions to ponder.Investigators say that a man’s headless body was discovered inside an office building air conditioning unit after he fell 1,400 feet from an airplane when the “undercarriage he was clinging to opened,” reported the Mirror. On June 18, 2015, 29-year-old Carlito Vale, who is believed to be one of the children taken to an orphanage during the Mozambique civil war, was travelling on a British Airways flight from Johannesburg to Heathrow when the undercarriage he was clinging on to had flung open, sources say.

Headless body of an African stowaway was found in an office block air conditioning unit after plummeting 1,400ft… https://t.co/EZ3aiEQgDU — missmaybell (@missmaybell) April 28, 2016 Vale fell 1,400-feet to his death, landing on the air conditioning unit on the rooftop of an office building, where an online shopping store called “Not on the Highest Street” was located. The stowaway’s headless body was later found by the office manager Michael Bentley at approximately 9:45 a.m. after receiving complaints about the air conditioner. Bentley stated that “at around 8:44 a.m. I received an email from colleagues claiming the air was stuffy and that they were falling asleep at their desks. I went up to the roof to check the air conditioning unit. I saw what I can only describe as a bone sticking out of the smashed aluminum.” “At that point I thought I really hope that’s not a body up there as it could only have come from a plane. I looked in and saw a foot, then a leg, then saw it was a human face down inside the unit.

I emailed my manager and said ‘I think I’ve found a body on the roof.’ He said, ‘what do you mean?’ I said ‘no jokes, there’s a body up there.'” The office manager’s boss, Jason Weston, released a statement saying that he “would describe the body as wearing some sort of Converse trainers; I only saw one foot and a leg that was wearing some sort of blue or gray trousers.” “All I could see was lumps of matter and bones that had smashed the metal housing of the air conditioning unit.” Gunnie Mooneesawmy, who was the first officer on the scene, stated, “I got onto the roof via the skylight. I was directed to the aluminum box at the end where I could see lots of blood and body parts and two human legs stuck up in the air.” Another officer, Steve Lemon, described the gruesome scene, saying that when he “got to the roof I saw a gentleman’s lifeless body in the air conditioning unit. It appeared the body had fallen from the sky at great height.”

“Due to the height it had fallen and the force on the landing of the body, it was completely decapitated and had smashed through the metal panels.” “There were no other buildings at that height and no other way for him to get up there as the security door was intact,” Lemon continued. “There was no identification on the body. Colleagues at Heathrow Airport informed me there was a stowaway found in the landing gear of BA flight 056 that landed at 5:20 a.m. from Johannesburg and he was in a critical condition.” According to Times Alive, Vale’s body wasn’t identified until his bag, which was left at the Johannesburg airport with a “Mozambique passport and an out-of-date US visa,” was found. It was later discovered that another stowaway, 24, fell from the plane as well but survived the fall. He was discovered after the fall and treated at a local hospital, where he is listed in critical condition. However, it was reported that the stowaway disappeared after he was discharged from the hospital.