The ducting system in central HVAC is how air from your air conditioner is delivered to the rooms. Making sure that your ducts are airtight is important because you want to make sure that all this expensive air that you are using so much electricity and fuel to create is not being wasted. Air ducts definitely have a few weak points, and you might be able to find and fix leaks very easily if you have some patience.

Mapping Out Your Ducts

First of all, you want to try and map out your duct system. In most homes, a large percentage of the ducting is going to be inside the walls and completely inaccessible to you. This article focuses on the ducting that you can actually see and easily access without having to do any extra work.

Exposed Ducting is Vulnerable

Obviously, there will be ducting connected directly to the furnace, where it leads to the wall. There will also be ducts in the roof of an unfinished basement, or along the ceiling joists of an open beam attic. If you happen to know where any more visible air ducts are, you should work on these too. If there is any ducting your can see, it is at a greater risk of needing to be maintained. The ducts that are not inside your walls are likely to shift around or even get moved by the homeowner. Even just bumping your duct can cause two pieces to lose the airtight seal along the seam. So, you can just look at your ducts and visually determine if they need to be resealed.

Checking Your Ducts

The only way to truly check your duct seams is to turn on your heat or air conditioner and inspect them by hand. You will feel a definite airflow if the seams are really loose. Even if you can't feel any airflow, it might still be smart to add tape to the seams. By adding duct tape to your seams, you're not only sealing them to prevent leakage, you're also making them stronger. This will protect the ducts from getting damaged in the future or getting dislodged. Taping the duct system is probably one of the easiest, yet most useful, DIY projects for homeowners who don't have the skills and tools to actually mess with the appliances. You can't really ruin anything and you don't need any special skills.

For more information, reach out to a company like Day's Appliance Repair Heatg & Air Condtng Co.