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I LOOKED OUTSIDE MY HOUSE, ON MY CONDENSER, AND THE LINES ARE COVERED IN ICE. IS THIS NORMAL?
This is called “freezing up” and is much more common than you would think. There are many problems that can cause this, and sometimes it takes several trips to your home to solve the problem. Whenever you see ice on the copper lines outside, turn off your system. It isn’t cooling your home, and you are wasting electricity trying to run it with the ice on it. The ice outside is only a small portion of the ice that is present. Inside your evaporator coil, the one in your home, is considerably more ice and it usually takes about 4-6 hours to melt. It really needs to thaw out, because if a service technician comes to your home, and the system is frozen up, the technician will have you turn off your system, and in most cases, it will be either very late in the day, or the next day before anything can be done to correct this problem. It is much better to try to diagnose the problem with your system, if the ice is melted, so the technician can test each component of your cooling system. One of the best ways to avoid having your system freezing up, is to always change your air filter on a monthly basis. Dirty air filters cause the system to freeze up in most cases. And for about $5.00 per month, your system will work better, cool better, and SAVE you MONEY on your electric bill.
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