A heating and air conditioning system is essential in ensuring that your home is comfortable. Without it, your home wouldn’t feel as comfortable, and indoor air quality would decrease. An air conditioning system generates just enough warmth or cold, ensuring your indoor space has the necessary temperature levels. The heating and air conditioning system also removes the humidity from indoor air and eliminates contaminants to ensure high indoor air quality. To achieve all this, regular air conditioning service is required.

However, what makes the heating and air conditioning system an essential appliance can also make it deadly. Heating and air conditioning systems are among the main causes of home fires. You may do many things to prevent these fires from arising. It includes occasional duct cleaning from a professional. This is a great step towards preventing AC fires. Further, with the report that you have been cleaning the filters and air ducts, you have proof that you’ve meticulously followed an air conditioning service. Therefore, you will be better placed to win compensation from your home insurance policy provider.

Although getting compensated will ensure that you are up and running within no time, it is better to prevent the risk from arising. It can be hard to replace some items or objects of monetary and sentimental value once they’ve been damaged in a home fire. Hence, this article will address the most common causes of property fires to ensure that you can take the required steps toward preventing them. These reasons include the following:

Storing Flammable Items Near a Heating and Air Conditioning System

Some homeowners don’t see the need for having an air conditioning service provider install their HVAC systems. After all, they can follow an installation tutorial on YouTube and do it themselves. These homeowners assume that provided the cooling and heating system is placed at any position in their home, they are guaranteed conditioned air. Unfortunately, this isn’t the case. How you place your air conditioner plays a critical role in your air conditioning system’s operation and output quality. Placing the unit too close to easily flammable materials such as gasoline, paper, and even outdoor debris considerably increases the unit’s risk of catching fire. Rather, it is recommended that you have a licensed air conditioning service provider send a technician to help you install the unit. The professionals will leave enough room around the air conditioner to avert any risk of a fire outbreak at your Flagstaff, AZ, home. You also should ensure you have routine HVAC maintenance to ensure that all the dirt and debris around the unit is removed.

Motor Issues

The other reason your heating and air conditioning system could catch fire is motor problems. There are several motors in your system that ensure that it functions effectively. Without a blower motor, for instance, your air conditioning system cannot effectively pump air to different parts of your home. When the motor overheats, it might cause a fire outbreak. But what causes a motor to overheat? Below are some of the reasons:

Voltage Problems: A motor requires electrical power to run. However, if the power supply is experiencing surges resulting in a high or too-low voltage, the motor might overheat and cause an HVAC fire.

Accumulation of dirt: Dirt may accumulate within and around the heating and air conditioning system’s motor, making it overheat. This is because the dirt will act as insulation, preventing heat dissipation from the motor to the outside. A routine air conditioning service includes cleaning the unit and helping avert the fire risk.

Insufficient lubrication: The motor in your heating and air conditioning system is a mechanical component. Therefore, lubrication of its bearings is required. Otherwise, the bearings might tighten and eventually wear out. When the motor is dry, the bearings heat up because of friction and may eventually catch fire.

As you might have noted, a routine air conditioning service can easily address the motor issues above. Therefore, ensure that a professional comes to your home for a maintenance visit regularly to ensure you aren’t exposed to the risk of an HVAC fire.

Dirty Heating and Air Conditioning System

The other reason you may be exposed to HVAC fires is air conditioning hygiene. A dirty heating and air conditioning system is a looming risk of various issues, from system malfunctions to fire outbreaks. Without regular cleaning by an air conditioning service provider, grime, dirt, debris, and other waste will accumulate in the unit’s interior components, including the filters, air ducts, fins, coils, and the outdoor condenser unit. Hence, normal airflow into your home will be inhibited. It also affects the

air conditioning system’s efficiency, meaning that your home will not be cooled effectively or humidity removed from the air. It also results in the back-drafting of air into your home through the heating and air conditioning system, causing an imbalance that could ignite a fire. Do you use a furnace to heat your Flagstaff, AZ, home? Then cleaning it should include the chimney. This is to prevent an accumulation of any combustible creosote that might ignite and cause a fire.

Electrical Problems

Damaged, loose, and old electrical wires that connect the various parts of your air conditioner also can generate sparks that could ignite a fire. Usually, this is the case if debris that might catch sparks and ignite an HVAC fire is in or near the unit. Routine air conditioning service could help avert these problems. When the technician comes for a maintenance visit, they inspect the unit for any loose or uninsulated wiring and make the necessary fixes. Hence, you’ll be less exposed to heating and air conditioning fires.

AC fires are avoidable. You only have to enlist a professional for routine air conditioning service. Do you need a reliable AC repair and maintenance company in Flagstaff, AZ, that can help you avert these fires? Contact us at One Hour Air Conditioning & Heating of Prescott.

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