Your heating system is there to keep you warm even in the dead of winter. Unfortunately, your system itself might need a bit of protection when storm season hits. When it comes to heating your home properly, you always want to protect the external parts of your system from contact with ice, sleet, and snowfall. Don’t end up frantically calling a new heating installation annapolis just because your heater went on the fritz during a blizzard. To protect your heating system and your home, try these tips for keeping your system protected from the bad weather.
Use the Defrost Cycle
If you use a heat pump to heat and cool your home, you’re using the natural heat from the earth to filter into your house and create a warm, cozy environment. This heating method, however, comes with its own problems. Because your pump uses the ground as a heat source, it’s exposed to harmful outside elements like snow and ice. If you live in a place that’s known for its tough winters, you’re definitely going to be dealing with this issue sooner rather than later. In addition to keeping an eye on your pump each day to make sure it’s not suffering from any external damage, you should turn on the defrost cycle to make sure you don’t deal with a ton of buildup after a storm or a bout of icy rain. The defrost setting should be found on your thermostat. Once it’s initiated, your pump will go through a self-heating process that allows the outer coil to melt off any snow or ice buildup.
Manually Remove Debris
If you’re not sure how to use the defrost cycle or you simply don’t feel like there’s enough snow and ice to necessitate it, you can always check on your pump to see if you can manually remove snow and ice. While it might seem tedious to go out and check on your pump each day, it’s what every homeowner should be doing during the winter, as well as checking the gutters, drains, and roof to make sure nothing has been damaged by a recent storm or snowfall. If you’re noticing a buildup of ice and dirt, using a pick or a blunt tool to remove it could provide an easy fix. For more stubborn ice buildup, using steam or hot water to defrost the outer coil could also work. Even when the weather isn’t wintry, getting in the habit of checking and cleaning off your outer coil is a smart move if you want your heating system to last.
Call a Technician
If your defrost cycle isn’t working or you’re coming up against other issues with your heat pump, don’t try to fix them on your own. Instead, call a technician to take a look at the situation before it gets too crazy. You don’t want to wait through the whole winter to find out that your pump has suffered irrevocable damage due to being encased in ice. You also don’t want your heating system to suffer during the coldest winter months due to something you could easily get fixed.
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