How the Carrier Company Got to Be the World's Largest HVAC Manufacturer

Willis H. Carrier, an engineer from the east coast, invented modern air conditioning in July of 1902. According to the website American Inventor, this came about after his employer assigned him the task of reducing the level of humidity in its printing shop. This was crucial as the intense summer heat caused bleeding and running of the company’s ink.

Although many other engineers attempted to solve this dilemma, Carrier finally did it by first developing a mechanical humidity controller. The controller moved air through a filter and the air then traveled to a set of coils containing a coolant fluid. Cooling engineers use this same basic design when creating air conditioners over 110 years later.

Carrier's Growth Through the 20th Century

The cost of the first air conditioner was so high that the average American citizen or business could not afford it. It wasn't until the 1910s that Willis Carrier came up with an assembly line system to mass produce air conditioners that more people could afford. Only window units were available from 1902 until the early 1970s.

Willis Carrier started his own company in 1915. By the 1930s, air conditioners were available in 99 different countries around the world. From its earliest days, homeowners and business owners alike have come to see the Carrier Company as an innovative leader in the HVAC industry. It is often the first HVAC manufacturer to invent new products and set energy efficiency standards for the rest of the industry.

Modern Carrier Air Conditioners

Today, Carrier's main product line for air conditioners are the Infinity, Performance, and Comfort Series. Its Infinity Series offers some of the most energy-efficient air conditioners on the market today with SEER ratings up to 21. SEER, which stands for Seasonal Energy Efficiency Ratio, is a rating system to help consumers determine how much they are likely to pay to operate their unit for an entire cooling season.

If you are considering purchasing a new Carrier air conditioner or own one that needs repair, Complete Heating and Air Conditioning Services is available to help.

Five Signs That You Need Heat Pump Repair

With winter in full swing in British Columbia, you rely on your heat pump to keep your home warm and everyone inside of it comfortable. Like all types of heating and cooling equipment, heat pumps occasionally need repairs to operate at peak efficiency.

Most heat pumps don't just suddenly stop working one day. Instead, they give clues that something must be fixed. It is important to schedule heat pump repair with Complete Heating and Air Conditioning Services promptly if you notice any of the following:

• If you are unable to switch the unit from cooling to heating mode, it usually indicates a problem with the reversing valve. 
• If you stand by your heat registers and don't feel anything coming out, the reversing valve may be stuck, the board may be faulty, or the indoor blower need to be replaced entirely. It could also indicate a problem with your thermostat.
• When your heating bills are higher than you expected, it could mean that one or more parts of the heat pump needs to replaced, or the refrigerant system may need to be recharged. 
• Worn out parts cause your heat pump to work harder to achieve the same result. The extra work by your heat pump means a higher heating bill for you. Rather than just accept the higher bills, have a professional HVAC technician look at your heat pump to determine which parts need to be repaired or replaced.
• It is not normal for your heat pump to make loud or strange noises. If you notice this, call for a repair appointment right away. The noise could be caused by problems with the compressor or a part that has become loose inside of the unit.

Don't Attempt Your Own Repairs

Although it may be tempting to troubleshoot and repair your own heat pump, doing so may do more harm than good. A service technician from Complete Heating and Air Conditioning Services is uniquely qualified to determine what the problem is and fix it on the spot. This minimizes your family's discomfort and ensures that the heat pump lasts as long as possible before you need to replace it.

Download an Owner's Manual

     A very common request that we receive is for copies of lost Owner's Manuals. Over the years they get misplaced or damaged, and sometimes the furnace installers forget to leave the manuals with the equipment owners. We've searched online and found it difficult to locate manuals, though we did get a lot of Google hits from sites claiming to have them available. What we most often found out was that the manuals were not actually available - they were being used a means to lure homeowners into their websites.

     In response to this we have developed an Owner's Manual page on our site that lists a variety of manuals in an easily downloadable PDF format. Manuals will include residential and commercial HVAC equipment, thermostats and other miscellaneous equipment. We will be adding approximately 20 additional manuals per month as we build our online resource library.

Service manuals and installation manual are available upon email  request by licensed contractors.

Please contact us if you would like to have a particular manual uploaded to our page.

Getting the Most From a High Efficiency Furnace

 Lennox G71 MPP 95% Efficient Furnace

    

     If you've ever shopped around for a new or replacement furnace for your home, you know how confusing it can be. After all, how many times during your life do you replace your furnace? Once? Twice, maybe? Gone are the days of 50% efficient furnaces when half of the energy consumed by the furnace heated your home and the other half heated the great outdoors. Also gone are the days that you could replace your furnace for under $2,000.

     For today's technology, with furnaces reaching nearly 98% efficiency, replacing your furnace can cost upwards of $7,000. If you're spending that amount of money, shouldn't you make sure that you're getting the efficiency that you paid for? Of course. So here are some tips to ensure that your furnace investment does what you want it to.

A Lennox G61V high-efficient
furnace. Notice the two white
plastic pipes on the right
hand side of the furnace - the
intake and the exhaust.

 Tip#1

    Ensure that you get a 2-pipe system. By this I am referring to the vent pipes attached to the new furnace. One pipe is for the exhaust, the other is for air used by the furnace for the combustion process. With a two pipe system, the furnace draws cold, unheated air from the outside to burn with the gas then exhausts the waste products back outside through the second pipe. With a one pipe system, the air used by the furnace for combustion is drawn in from your home - that's air that you have already paid to heat.

     Remember, the efficiency rating of your furnace only refers to the efficiency of the internal operation of the furnace itself, and not to the overall efficiency of heating your home. You're wasting a lot of heat and money without having the second pipe. A 92% high-efficiency furnace with only one pipe can cost you nearly as much in energy costs as a mid-efficient furnace.

Tip #2

     Do not over-size your furnace. Bigger is not better. In fact, it can be worse when it comes to efficiency. If a furnace has excessive much heating capacity it can heat the home too quickly thereby never running long enough to reach its proper operating temperature. Think of this in terms of how your car operates before the engine is fully warmed up on a cold morning.

     Many times we have seen installers sell the highest profit furnace instead of the most suitable one. Here is a rough formula that you can use yourself. Every furnace has a rating plate on it stating the BTU input. If, for example, your furnace's rating is 80,000 BTU and has an efficiency of 50%, then the heat input into your home is 50% of the 80,000 BTU's, or 40,000 BTU's. If the new furnace you are considering is 95% efficient and has an input rating of 50,000 BTU's, then the 50,000 BTU input results in 47,500 BTU's of heat input into your home (50,000 x 0.95). That's comparable to the old, 80,000 BTU furnace.

     This is a rough guide only as it does not take into consideration other home upgrades such as new windows, added insulation or draft proofing having been done that will reduce your heat loss and lower the required furnace output.

     If you are being offered a furnace that does not have a BTU output calculation that is relatively close to the BTU output numbers of your current furnace, make sure that you get a logical answer as to why. Sometimes there are valid reasons for this and a qualified heating mechanic will be able to explain his reasoning.

Maximizing the Efficiency of Your Air Conditioner

    

     One of the most common mistakes made when installing a central air conditioner is assuming that the higher the SEER, or Seasonal Energy Efficiency Ratio (this is the effeciency rating posted on the outdoor condensor unit), the higher the efficiency of the system. Not so fast. Yes, the higher the efficiency of the air conditioner condensor the better, however a factor of primary importance is the evaporator coil (indoor coil). Evaporator coils have huge efficiency differences between them, and the true SEER of your air conditioning system needs to be calculated in terms of the system as a whole. The outdoor unit is only one piece in the system.

Consider the following performance measurements.

     A Lennox 14 SEER air conditioner condensor combined with a C33-48+ evaporator coil operates at a combined system efficiency of 13.0 SEER. Yet that same Lennox 14 SEER air conditioner condensor combined with a C(A,C,D,E)36C34+ evaporator coil operates at 13.5 SEER. Again, that same 14 SEER unit will only reach 14 SEER with a A(A,B)W364+ evaporator coil or something similar. SEER ratings as high as 14.5 and 15.0 can be achieved if this air conditioner condensor is used in combination with a variable speed DC blower motor.

     This variation in real efficiency holds true throughout all makes, models and brands. The Lennox 14 SEER was used solely for illustrative purposes - I could have chosen any unit from Carrier, Amana, York, etc., and had the same differences in efficiency. The effects on efficiency due to coil type are even more pronounced in heat pump systems than on air conditioners.

     So why would an air conditioning installer use a lower efficiency coil? There are a few factors, the main one of which is that the higher the rating of the evaporator coil, the larger its physical size. A bulkier unit can be more cumbersome to install and is often not used because of this reason.

     If you're considering installing a new air conditioning system or replacing an old one, ask for a high-efficiency coil. They only cost about $45.00 to $100.00 more and you'll save your money back within the first few months.

TXV

     Two other ways to increase the SEER of your air conditioning system are to have a TXV and TDR installed. A TXV, or thermostatic expansion valve, modulates the flow of refrigerant gas inside the cooling system. A TDR, or time delay relay, controls the timing of the indoor blower fan to maximize cooling and efficiency. Many manufacturers build TDRs into their furnaces, while good quality thermostats also have them included. Just make sure that your a/c installer sets them properly.