Proper Humidity Levels Contribute to the Comfort and Health of Your Home and Family

Most people don't give much focus to the humidity levels in their home, but indeed they should. Humidity levels contribute to the overall comfort and health of your family as well as to the well-being of your home. Incredibly dry air can have a variety of effects from increasing asthma symptoms and causing mold issues to ruining valuable artwork or even your home electronics.

With that said, the team here at JR Perkins Heating & Cooling wants to offer insight on the importance of maintaining proper humidity levels in your home and how you can accomplish this important task.

When you are faced with a moisture problem in your home, your first step should be to measure the current humidity levels with a hygrometer. If your levels come in at the 40 to 45 range, then your indoor air is satisfactory. If outside of these ranges, then you will need to give focus to resolving the problem at hand.

If the humidity levels are high, here are a few tips for you to follow:

• Repair any plumbing or roof leaks
• Ensure that your clothes dryer is adequately vented
• Minimize the number of indoor plants you have
• Install exhaust fans in your kitchen and bathrooms
• Schedule annual routine, preventative maintenance on your HVAC system.

If your measured humidity levels come in low there is an increased risk of dry skin, cracking furniture and wood floors, or increased static electricity that can damage your home electronics. If the levels are low, try these helpful tips:

• Add house plants to overly dry rooms
• Hang your clothes indoors to dry
• Boil water and distribute the steam with exhaust fans
• Install a whole house humidifier to control the amount of water vapors in the air.
Maintaining an adequate amount of moisture in your home's atmosphere will not only improve your quality of life, but it will help your family to breathe easier and healthier all year round.

For more information on how to combat humidity in your home, or if you are in need of an expert whole house humidifier installation, then we are the team for you. Simply give a shout out to the professionals here at JR Perkins Heating & Cooling today for your free consultation and estimate.

JR Perkins Heating & Cooling is the first heating and air conditioning company in the East Valley, servicing the Phoenix area, specifically Scottsdale. To learn more, please visit our website at www.JRPerkins.com.

What to Do About Moisture Around Your Air Conditioner Vents

If you start to notice water stains on the ceiling around your vents or even feel the vents and they are wet to the touch, you have a problem that needs to be addressed promptly. What you are seeing is condensation forming inside of your vents. Similar to a can of soda, the air inside your ducts is cold, but the air around it is hot enough to form condensation inside your vents. Not only can this cause water damage, water in your vents can also result in mold growth that can be even more difficult to deal with.

At JR Perkins Heating & Cooling, we often explain to our customers why this happens in the first place. Condensation inside of your air conditioner vents will typically manifest for two reasons:

1. The duct boot, or the part where the duct connects to the vent, is possibly not properly sealed. This means that air is leaking out and meeting warm air. Not only does this cause moisture, but it effects energy efficiency as well.

2. The second cause is because your ducts are not properly insulated. Insulation of your duct work serves to not allow the hot air outside of the properly sealed ducts to meet with the cool air inside as directly. Insulation is installed to specifically prevent condensation from forming. If you, for some reason, installed your own duct work and didn't use insulation because you thought it was only for cold weather, this is a problem and likely the reason you have wet vents.

Once you have discovered wet vents, it is important to call your JR Perkins Heating & Cooling HVAC service technician to fix the cause. If the cause is not immediately apparent, your technician can help you find it and fix it. They can ensure your ducts are sealed tightly and find signs of compromised insulation. Furthermore, your service technician can help you test and mitigate mold and mildew within your duct work.

JR Perkins Heating & Cooling is the first heating and air conditioning company in the East Valley, servicing the Phoenix area, specifically Scottsdale. To learn more, please visit our website at www.JRPerkins.com.