Believe it or not, even in sunny Tampa, air conditioners can and do freeze—especially in the middle of summer when we use them most.
Have you noticed that your home isn’t as cool? Or can you see ice on your AC unit?
Here’s why: Ice forms on your air conditioner because of 2 main reasons...
We’ll go into both of these causes and discuss what you can do to stop your AC from freezing over.
But FIRST, let’s look at what you should do if your AC is frozen:
DON’T turn your AC back on until you find the root problem. Otherwise, you may damage your AC.
Now that we got that preliminary caution out of the way, let’s look at what’s causing your AC to freeze...
Your AC system is constantly moving your home’s warm air to the evaporator coil where it uses liquid refrigerant to cool that air and return it to your home.
Now, if there’s not enough air flowing over the evaporator coil, the refrigerant will drop below freezing. Then, when the warm, humid air comes into contact with the cold refrigerant, the moisture freezes.
Some common AC problems that restrict airflow include:
If you have insufficient refrigerant in your AC system (caused by leaks), then the pressure drops, which lowers the refrigerant temperature even further. The colder refrigerant freezes the condensation on the coils.
When the ice finally melts, you may notice a significant amount of drainage around your indoor AC unit.
To know if you have a refrigerant leak, look for these signs:
A clean air filter vs. a dirty air filter.
If your air filter looks like the one on the right, it’s dirty and you need to change it.
A return vent.
A supply vent.
If none of the above DIY fixes work, you’ll need to call an air conditioning technician to check if you have these problems:
Contact Red Cap Air to schedule an AC repair. One of our air experts will get that ice off of your AC and fix whatever’s causing it to freeze so you’ll have a working AC in no time!