Nothing strokes the feeling of calming indoors on a hot day with the coziness of your beloved air conditioner. However, sometimes you may feel hot or warm air coming out of the air ducts. If your unit isn’t functioning the way it used it, here are some reasons that may be producing this problem.
Reasons why AC Blow Warm Air
Your AC is not blowing cold air because while the fan is functioning, something is shutting down the cooling machinery. Causes comprise simple things like thermostat settings and deprived airflow, but also could be matters that can spell big distress, like electrical problems and refrigerant leakages.
We’ll start with the easy subjects you can fix, and let you know when you need the skills of a proficient to identify and repair a larger problem.
Thermostat Settings Errors
Let’s twitch with the basics, the thermostat. While this may seem like stating the understandable it’s worth beginning by taking a look at your thermostat settings to make sure it is set to the “cool” setting. The issue of hot air may just be the result of accidentally setting your thermostat to the “heat” setting.
Sometimes, a humble mistake at the thermostat can lead to an AC not providing enough cold air. If the blower fan is set to ON in its place of AUTO, it runs all the time – not just throughout a cooling cycle. In between cooling cycles, the air you feel from the openings can be warm.
Check your thermostat’s settings if you have an AC that’s blowing hot air. Ensure the fan is set to AUTO and the COOL setting is selected.
Refrigerant Leak Refrigerant is the material that flows through your air conditioning system and (to make a long story short) makes the cooling happen. It’s a closed-loop, so you should not need to enhance the refrigerant unless there’s a leak in your refrigerant line or the coils. When that occurs, your system misplaces refrigerant charge and cooling power. Depending on the size of the leak, the cooling loss can happen gradually or all at once, but ultimately your AC is blowing warm air.
Never allow anyone to add more refrigerant without fixing the leak! If you do, the problem will just occur again. Moreover, if your system uses the refrigerant R22 (also known as Freon)… which is likely if it’s older than 10 years or so… that refrigerant is being phased out as per the EPA come January 2020. That means it will get progressively expensive to fix, and you will need to think about an emergency shortly.
A Blocked Filter
Condensed airflow is one of the most mutual problems that can obstruct the cooling operation of your air conditioner. Strange though it may seem, your air conditioner needs warm air flowing over the coils to function appropriately. Your air conditioner’s filter is envisioned to remove dust and pollutants from the air flowing through the apparatus. However, an air filter that’s stopped with dust and wreckage can completely block air from entering the system. When that happens, the coils can’t remove heat. So your system’s fan just blows heat back into your space.
If you haven’t had your system preserved in a while and your AC is blowing warm air, the next step is to check your air filter and change it if needed.
A suitably sustained and well looked after air conditioning unit has a greater chance of working professionally. If it has been a while since you cleaned and swapped the filters, it may be the cause of your air conditioner blowing hot air. To evade this issue in the future, replace your unit’s filters once a month.
Loss of Power to the Outdoor Unit
Many air conditioning systems have an indoor evaporator/air handler unit and an outdoor abbreviating unit. (In areas like NYC where there’s not much access to outdoor space, your “outdoor” condensing unit may be in a mechanical room). If the air handler is working fine, the fan will still blow air into your space. But without the condenser unit working correctly, there will be no cooling; later, your AC blows warm air.
That situation can ensue when your condenser unit loses power, often due to a blown fuse or stumbled circuit breaker. If you discover that your outdoor AC unit keeps tripping the circuit breaker, read this to find out what to do next:
IMPORTANT: Never try to identify electrical matters yourself unless you are a trained electrician or HVAC expert. Live voltage is not something you want to experiment with!
There is one thing you can check, however: your emergency shutoff switch. It may have been accidentally shut off, cutting the power to your condenser unit and foremost to your AC blowing warm air.
Disconnected or leaky ducts
It’s also conceivable that you have airflow problems that you can’t see… in your ducts. If a duct has holes, cracks, or is disconnected, return air may not be making it back to the unit. Or cooled supply air may be receiving wasted in your walls, loft, or crawl space, and the AC is blowing warm air as a result.
If your ducts are available, you might want to take a look. It’s not uncommon for damage to occur during construction projects, or from birds or rodents getting into them. On second thought… This might be an area where you’re better off getting specialists to inspect the condition of your ductwork.
