If you are concerned about the air you’re breathing or about saving money this summer, then air conditioner cleaning should be at the top of your To Do list.
DIY AC cleaning is an important part of air conditioning maintenance and is actually pretty easy, especially when you have a few tools.
Keep reading to learn how to clean and air conditioner yourself, or simply reach out to the Denver HVAC experts at Blue Sky if you have any questions, or need to schedule service!
(303) 625-6225
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Before you start, make sure you have a fin or a coil brush, for cleaning out your coils or fins (depending on what type of air conditioner you have) and a coil cleaner. You can buy all of these at your local hardware store.
1) Comb the Fins
Open up your air conditioner. This usually involves removing nuts and bolts, then carefully removing panels or even the entire top of the unit. Once that is off, locate the fins. These are a series of thin metal pieces, usually running vertically. Most of the time, you’ll notice that some of these look bent or out of place.
Make sure your fin comb is a match to the type of air conditioner you have. The spacing of the fingers on the comb should be the same as the spacing between the fins. Place the fingers between the fins at the bottom and comb upwards. Wear gloves to avoid getting cut.
2) Clean the Coils
Vacuum all of the debris that you can see off of the coils. Make sure you use a soft brush on your vacuum and gently insert it into as many of the nooks and crevices that you can reach. The more dust and debris you can remove this way, the less you will have to pull out by hand after you use your cleaner.
If your coils have mats of debris built up on them, you might want to carefully remove these with your hands. Gently ease them free and remove them as intact as possible so you don’t create more debris for yourself to vacuum up later.
3) Apply a Cleaner
Apply your home AC cleaning solution according to the instructions on the packaging. Most of the time, you will spray the cleaner onto the coils, brush it into them with a nylon-bristled brush, then let the cleaner sit to penetrate any grease.
Different DIY AC cleaning solutions will need to sit for different amounts of time. Once the solution has worked, remove it with a gentle stream of water from your hose or another source. Take care not to blow your fins out of place again.
4) Clean the Fan
If you can access the fan on your AC unit, clean off the blades with an ordinary household cleaner and a cloth. You may also want to pop a few drops of grease into any motor parts that are covered by rubber or plastic caps.
5) Reassemble
After that, reassemble your air conditioner because your home AC cleaning is done. If your air conditioner cleaning helped your unit to blow cooler, that’s awesome! If it didn’t, call us at Blue Sky and we’ll send out a Denver air conditioning expert to figure out what needs to happen to get it working well for you again.
(303) 625-6225
Book Online
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