How to prepare your unit for the Perth winter

It’s official, Perth is here and it’s cold! It’s time to swap out the board-shorts with track pants and sweaters as well as switch the air conditioner from cooling to heating. Now you might be all excited to switch the air con back on after a few months, it’s important to do a little preventative maintenance to keep your unit humming along all year round - it also will save you on any headaches down the track. Keep reading below to find our most important tips.

We should note, all units we promote are exceptionally high quality and are built to withstand all kinds of conditions. We’ve just put the article together to get on top of your maintenance and make sure you get the absolute best of your machine.

Service

First and foremost - organise an annual service with an accredited and licensed technician. Using an unqualified technician can cause a lot more harm than good and an annual service is not an overly expensive bit of maintenance to put in the annual budget. Post-summer and autumn are the best times to organise this but it’s not too late so if you would still like a service, get in touch with us at Customised Air Conditioning.

In addition to a service, here’s the most important to-do’s.

Filters

After the relentless Summer heat we experienced this year, your filters well and truly deserve a clean. It’s very common for them to accumulate a ton of dirt so it will pay dividends to give them a clean or replace them.

Clean filters = clean air!

In addition to clean air, you also can expect to have the unit running more efficiently.

It depends on the model of how often you should clean them but it’s actually more often than most people think. Don’t feel bad if you didn’t realise, most people have never bothered to check theirs.

Clean

Keeping the filters fresh is the most important thing you can do but after that we can look to do a general clean. Give the internal unit a good wipe down and vacuum through the louvres to pick up any visible dust. Once you’re done there, head outside to the external unit and keep it clear of any leaves, bird droppings, dirt. Simple!

Correct Temperature

It’s certainly tempting to crank the air conditioner all the way up to 28°C on a freezing night - we really recommend that you don’t. Air conditioners typically perform their best around 21-22°C and consume significantly less energy in doing so.

Draft Proofing

You can have the best air conditioner with the best installation but it can all be compromised if you have big drafts coming through the house. Take the time to do an audit of your place and if you notice spots where cold air is coming through, try invest in some window seals and draft excluders. These simple devices can make the world of difference.

Of course, if you are in your home, having great insulation is a huge help. Consider upgrading if you feel you’re losing a lot of heat quickly.