Weather experts are predicting a colder than usual winter for the east coast with occasional arctic blasts. That means colder temperatures for the Peach State in the months ahead. If your furnace has remained dormant through the fall, how confident are you that it will work well through the entire winter until things warm up in the spring? Here are some tips on how to stay warm this winter by showing your home and furnace some love.
1. Winterize Your Home
A good way to lower the amount of your monthly energy bill is to detect and close gaps where cold air can penetrate your home. The best place to start is with entry doors. Make sure the doors are closing properly. Check the weather stripping at the bottom of the door to make sure the door closes tightly over the threshold. Also, check the weather stripping around the frame of the door. From the outside of the house, caulk any gaps around the windows. If you live in an older home, your windows may not be energy efficient. Today’s new windows are double-paned windows with special insulated coatings that keep cold temperatures outside and prevent the cold from passing through the glass into your home.
2. Clean the Furnace
Furnaces need to be cleaned annually. As air is circulated through a home, it naturally sends lots of dust, dirt, and debris to the furnace. A quality air filter captures most of the dust, dirt, and debris. So, it is important to replace the air filter every month, but also wipe up any dust and debris around the furnace.
3. Unblock Registers
This is the easiest item on this list. Every room of your house should have at least one register in which heated air passes through and heats that room. Check each room to make sure nothing is covering the register, such as beds, dressers, furniture, or rugs. You want the registers to be fully open, so the heated air can enter and evenly spread through the room.
4. Get a Professional Furnace Check Up
If cleaning your furnace is not something you want to do, you can have a company specializing in heating and cooling in Snellville, GA, come to your house to clean the furnace. At this time, the company can run several diagnostics to test your furnace. The service call is relatively cheap compared to needing a heating and air conditioning repair mid-winter because something in the furnace has given out. And no one likes to live in a cold house for a few days while you wait to get things fixed.
5. Install a Smart Thermostat
If your home has a standard programmable thermostat, you could step up to a new smart thermostat. Because they are “smart,” these thermostats perform an analysis of your home heating and cooling and offer suggestions on how to be more energy efficient. The thermostats know when you are home and will heat the house only at these times. You can also control your heating and cooling equipment from your smartphone over your home’s wi-fi connection. Programmable thermostats are the next best thing to smart thermostats. Programmable thermostats will save you energy if you set the thermostat to come on at the right times of the day and night when you are home. There is no point in heating a house when no one is home. This will also help you save money on your energy bill.
For more information on learning how to stay warm in the winter, call Triad Mechanical at 770-682-0075.