AC Maintenance in Silver City, NM
Air conditioners here run from June through August, so May is the time for a tune-up. Tell us about your system, and a licensed contractor who covers Grant County will get in touch.
Tell us about the job
It takes about a minute.
Three months of hard work, then a long rest
Your air conditioner in Silver City works hard from June through August, when summer afternoons average 87°F, then sits idle the rest of the year. A system that sits that long can hide a problem until the first hot day asks it to run at full strength again.
Grant County has also logged 16 hail events and 46 damaging wind events over the past ten years, with hail up to 2 inches recorded. Hail can bend the thin fins on the outdoor coil, and wind can knock debris into the unit or loosen its connections. A tune-up before summer is when a contractor checks the coil, the fins, and the electrical connections for that kind of damage, before it turns into a breakdown in the middle of a 87-degree afternoon.
- 3 months
- June through August, your air conditioner is on duty
- 87°F
- the average summer afternoon it cools against
- 16 hail events
- in ten years, and hail bends the fins on outdoor coils
- 46 wind events
- in ten years, and wind drives debris into outdoor units
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
Book your AC tune-up in May, before homes here start needing cooling in June.
- Jan
- Feb
- Mar
- Apr
- May
- Jun
- Jul
- Aug
- Sep
- Oct
- Nov
- Dec
A tune-up checks the refrigerant charge, cleans the coils, tests the capacitor and tightens the electrical connections.
New Mexico requires HVAC contractors to hold a state license.
The Construction Industries Division tests contractors before they can hold this license, and the license belongs to the contractor, not to any single job. That means the same license covers the maintenance visit on your air conditioner as would cover a full installation, because what the state checked was the contractor, not the work order.
For a maintenance visit, that license is what stands behind the person in your home. If the technician opens the refrigerant side of your air conditioner to check the charge, they also need EPA Section 608 certification, which is a federal requirement in every state and applies on top of the New Mexico license, not in place of it.
Source: New Mexico Regulation and Licensing Department
- What does AC maintenance include?
- A technician checks refrigerant charge, cleans or checks the condenser coil, tests capacitors and electrical connections, and checks that the system is pulling enough airflow across the coil. They will also check the filter and drain line, since a clogged drain can back up and shut the system down. Anyone opening the refrigerant side has to hold EPA Section 608 certification, so that part of the check only a certified technician can do.
- How often does an air conditioner need maintenance?
- Once a year, before the weather turns hot. Here that means getting it looked at before June, since the cooling season runs June through August and there is not much room to lose a week of it to a repair that could have been caught early. Summer afternoons averaging 87°F put real load on a system that has not been checked.
- Is AC maintenance worth it?
- Yes, because most of the failures that leave a system down in the middle of summer trace back to something a technician would have caught earlier, a weak capacitor, a dirty coil, a refrigerant leak. A yearly check before June is the way to catch that kind of problem before the system has to run through the three hottest months. Ten years of storm records here show 46 damaging wind events and 16 hail events, including hail up to 2 inches, so a spring check is also a chance to have the unit looked over for storm damage before summer starts.