How Often Should You Replace Air Filters?
If the air filters are dirty or clogged they reduce the flow of air inside the unit. The clogged filters make the AC unit to run for the longer time period and they put large amount of stress on the components of your system. So air conditioner filters are required to be replaced at regular intervals. Dirty filters are one of the most common reasons for the problem in your air conditioning system.
As almost 50% of our electricity bill is covered by the HVAC units, a clogged filter can increase this bill to a large extent. A clean air filter can reduce your HVAC unit bill by 10-15 percent. And also makes sure that air which you breathe is free of any kind of pollutants. Clean filters make sure that clean air is circulating inside the house.
When to change
Normally filters are changed at the start of the season when the air conditioner is forced to work hard to remove the heat. There several factors which tell us that how often filter must be changed.
• Life time of different filters are different some air filters run of shorter time period say one month, while some filters can run up to 3 months. Filters differ from each other in terms of thickness, material used and many others.
• Filters of low quality are to be replaced every month while a good quality filter can last up to 5 or 6 months.
• Whenever it feels like that your conditioner is not cooling properly or temperature of your house is too less than the programmed temperature, you should try to solve this problem by changing the air filters.
• If you have a pet like dog or cat inside the house then the filter should be replaced more often. As the pets have hairs which are spread in the entire house and reach the air filters which will block them.
• If your unit is consuming higher energy you should change the air filters.
• If there is construction site near your surrounding you should change your filters inside one month.
• If there are more members inside the house then filters are to be replaced more often because it will collect more dirt from the house.
• Dirty ducts, dirty supply vents or overheating of blower motor is also caused due to dirty air filters. If your filter is facing any problem of such type you will have to change your air filters.
Keeping the above factors in mind you should change your filters to make sure your unit runs efficiently without any problem.