Indian Air HVAC was just called out to a service call in Prescott, AZ for a cooling issue. The homeowner stated that she was having poor airflow into her spare bedroom and office. “Those rooms just don’t cool off,” stated the homeowner.
Our Indian Air technician ran some diagnostics on the unit and everything was running properly. He also checked the duct work, and everything looked good there too. While speaking with the homeowner, he discovered that the homeowner always keeps those doors shut so that the dogs don’t go in them. Ah ha! That was the problem.
Why shouldn’t you keep interior doors closed off from the rest of the house? Well, an air conditioning system is designed to have the supply air come into the rooms and mix with the room air. That mixture of air is then drawn into the return vent to be cooled. It is cooled by passing over the evaporator coils and water condenses out of the air. Next, it is delivered through the ducts and out to the supply again. This is how an a/c system keeps your home cool. Circulation is a very important step in the process. That air needs to be able to leave the room and return to the system to be cooled. If your door is shut, then that air is trapped in the room and has no where to escape. This leads to cooling problems due to lack of air flow.
Poor air flow/cooling to those rooms are not the only problems closing interior doors can cause. Because those rooms are not adding to the air being brought to the return, your system has to run longer to satisfy the set temperature of the thermostat. This can cause higher electricity bills. Also, the humidity level can be affected and humidity is a source of heat. The lack of airflow can also cause the outdoor unit to literally freeze up and stop working all together. Costly repairs could be required. All that extra work that you are forcing the unit to do, could also put strain on your unit causing it not to last as long as it normally would.
Our Indian Air technician suggested that the homeowner kept the doors opened and see how that works. He offered the suggestion of using baby gates to block the dogs from those particular rooms. A few weeks later, the homeowner called the Indian Air office to say thank you and that those rooms are now cooling wonderfully! She reported that the baby gates are also working great to keep her dogs out of the desired rooms.
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