Here’s the standard way central air conditioners all used to work: the air conditioned by the evaporator coil is pushed into the ventilation system by the blower fan in the air handler, sending the air to every vent in the house. On the surface, this sounds like exactly what a central AC is supposed to do.
But consider this comparison: what if you turned on one light switch in your house, and instead of a single light coming on, all the lights in the house came on? That’s incredibly wasteful of energy. But this isn’t much different than turning on the air conditioner and having cooled air sent to every room, even if those rooms don’t need cooling because no one is in them.
This is where zone control HVAC systems make the difference. Zone control divides a house into different “zones” that can be cooled separately from the others. For example, there’s no need to cool empty bedrooms when everyone is gathered downstairs.
Southern California summers are wonderful—and sometimes not so wonderful when the serious July, August, and September heat waves hit. Air conditioning systems run often during the middle of the year, and the drain they place on electricity means higher utility bills throughout the season.
The first serious week of warm weather for the middle of the year in Southern California is a good time to watch carefully the performance of your AC. If the air conditioner is starting off with poor performance that doesn’t keep your home cooled down the way it should, you want to have the proper 
Air conditioning systems get to work early in the year in Southern California. Unfortunately, that means they’re also likely to start showing signs of malfunctions earlier as well—extra time for the stress to set in.
In our last post, we wrote about why it’s important to schedule air conditioning maintenance service before the summer weather arrives. There are many potential AC malfunctions a maintenance inspection can catch, and one of these is noticing that the pressure of the refrigerant in the air conditioner has dropped. This usually means a leak a sprung somewhere, allowing refrigerant to escape. If this is the case, your technician can patch up the leak and put in the amount of refrigerant that was lost to restore pressure. You can trust our technicians with these services for your 
At Saddleback, we offer membership in our Member Value Program (MVP). We offer different program levels depending on your needs: a Plumbing Value Program, an HVAC program, and the ALL STAR Value Plan for Comprehensive Heating, Cooling, & Plumbing System Coverage. Of course, we recommend customers take advantage of the extensive ALL STAR Value Plan so they can have three major home maintenance services taken care of annually.
The simple answer is: No. If you see ice forming on your air conditioner (probably along the indoor coils), turn off the system and call for repair services from our team right away. The AC needs to be fixed, and it’s a repair only professionals can correctly diagnose and perform.
We’re finally starting to get some overcast, cooler weather these days. That means that heating season isn’t far off. You may or may not have already scheduled preventive maintenance or repairs to help get your heating system ready for the upcoming heating season. You definitely should, but we’ll get to that in a later post. Right now, though, we want to talk about why you might not be done with your air conditioning system quite yet. If your air conditioner seems like it might be getting towards the end of its life, now is a prime time to replace it with a new one. Read on to find out why it’s better to replace it now, rather than waiting until next spring or summer. 
Air conditioning issues are pretty common during the summer, and it’s no wonder. Strain on the system is much higher when it’s being used for most of the daylight hours, making it more likely for the system to develop problems. If you’ve already had a professional perform maintenance on your air conditioner at the beginning of the season, then the system has a much lower chance of developing any kind of serious issue over the next few months. Still, you need to keep an eye out for any signs that your air conditioner is developing issues so that you can have them repaired as soon as possible. The following are some of the more common issues you may run into during the summer.