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Two real seasons, and equipment usually sized for one of them
The Panhandle gets long hot summers and genuinely cold winters. A system chosen for July and asked to do January is the commonest thing we find, and it is the cheapest to get right at replacement.
The calls we take most
No cooling, or no heat
Diagnosed and priced before anything is fitted, with the repair figure given separately from any replacement figure so you can compare them yourself. Combustion tested and the heat exchanger inspected on anything that burns gas.
A room that never settles
Measured, not guessed. Airflow at that register against the others, static pressure, return capacity and the state of the attic run feeding it. In this housing stock the run is usually the answer.
Dust after a windy week
Fine dust indoors usually arrives through gaps and duct leakage rather than through the filter. We measure where the air is actually coming from before recommending a filter you may not be able to use.
Bills that climbed with nothing changed
Duct leakage, a dirty coil, a restricted filter or a charge that has drifted. All four are measurable in one visit, and it is worth comparing the same month a year apart in units of energy before assuming anything.
Annual service
Coils, drains, filter fit, electrical connections, charge against the manufacturer’s target and combustion testing, with the readings recorded so this year can be compared with last year rather than remembered.
Before you buy, sell or let
What is installed, how old each unit is from its serial number, what condition it is in and what putting it right would realistically cost. In writing, quickly.
Why the heating side is worth calculating here
In much of Texas heating is an afterthought. On the Panhandle it is not, and the equipment frequently does not know that.
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The two loads are different numbers
A cooling load and a heating load are separate calculations with different inputs, and one cannot be inferred from the other. In a house with a large attic and a lot of glass they can be a long way apart.
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Backup heat is a separate system
On a heat pump the electric elements may not have run since last winter, and a failed element is invisible until the coldest morning. Measuring amp draw stage by stage takes five minutes and is skipped constantly.
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Wind changes the arithmetic
A house that leaks loses far more on a windy cold day than the same house on a still one. Air sealing does more for winter comfort here than most equipment changes do, and it is not our trade — which is rather the point of us saying it.
Four things we say to homeowners here
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Ask for the heating load, not just the tonnage
If a quotation names a size and says nothing about winter, it was written for half the year.
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A higher-rated filter is not free
It restricts more air. What your system can carry is a measurement taken with the filter in place, and it is specific to your system rather than to a box on a shelf.
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Age alone is not a reason to replace
A system that holds its charge, moves the air it should and passes its safety checks works, whatever the year on the label. Age changes the arithmetic on an expensive repair and nothing else.
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A gas appliance with no carbon monoxide alarm is the one urgent item
Everything else on this page can wait for a convenient week. That cannot. Fit one, and have the combustion tested and the heat exchanger inspected.