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Single-storey, shallow attic, and a system that has never been measured
Most of the South Bay was built quickly in the same twenty years, which means the same three faults turn up over and over. All three are cheaper to fix than to replace around.
The calls we take most
No cooling, or no heat
Diagnosed and priced before anything is fitted, with the repair figure given separately from any replacement figure so you can compare them yourself. Combustion tested and the heat exchanger inspected on anything that burns gas.
The back room never cools
Airflow at that register against the others, static pressure, return capacity and the state of the attic run feeding it. In these houses the run is usually long, usually sagging, and usually the whole answer.
The system is loud
Nearly always the return. One undersized grille in a hallway, serving a whole house, is the commonest cause of air noise in this housing stock and among the cheapest things to put right.
A converted garage or an added room
Rooms the original system was never sized for. Usually a ductless head rather than an extension of the existing system, and always after measuring whether the existing system has any spare air to give.
Annual service
Coils, drains, filter fit, electrical connections, charge against the manufacturer’s target and combustion testing, with the readings recorded so this year can be compared with last year rather than remembered.
Before you buy, sell or let
What is installed, how old each unit is from its serial number, what condition it is in and what putting it right would realistically cost. In writing, quickly, because escrow does not wait.
What we find in these houses, in order of frequency
None of them is the equipment, and all three are found with the same instrument.
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1 — Not enough return
One grille, sized when the house had a smaller system, now strangling a larger one. High static pressure, a loud house, poor airflow everywhere and an early compressor failure. Adding return capacity is a day of work and it changes everything downstream of it.
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2 — Attic duct that has given up
Flexible runs sagging between supports, crushed where somebody crawled over them, pulled off a boot, or with the insulation fallen away. In an attic that reaches well over a hundred degrees, every one of those costs you cooling you have already paid for.
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3 — A size nobody calculated
Replaced like for like three times since the house was built, each time matching whatever was there. In a housing stock this uniform the original figure was often generous, and thirty years of matching has preserved it.
Numbers, and a note of what we did not do
Static pressure across the system against the equipment’s rated limit, airflow at every register, return capacity, refrigerant charge against the manufacturer’s target, temperature split, amp draw, and combustion where there is gas.
Written down with the date and the outdoor conditions, so that next year’s figures mean something and so that any other contractor can pick the sheet up and understand it. It is yours, and if you use somebody else next time, take it with you.
And a plain note of anything we could not check and why — an attic we could not safely enter, a unit we could not reach, a panel that was painted shut. A survey that pretends to be complete is worse than one that says where it stopped.
Four things we say to homeowners here
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Fix the return before you buy capacity
A larger machine behind an undersized return is louder, dearer and no better. It is the single most common mistake in this housing stock.
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Get the calculation, not the tonnage
If two quotations name different sizes, at least one of them did not calculate. Ask both, and read the assumptions rather than the total.
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Age alone is not a reason to replace
A system that holds its charge, moves the air it should and passes its safety checks works, whatever the year on the label. Age changes the arithmetic on an expensive repair and nothing else.
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A gas appliance with no carbon monoxide alarm is the one urgent item
Everything else on this page can wait for a convenient week. That cannot. Fit one, and have the combustion tested and the heat exchanger inspected.