Air conditioners have come a long way in the past half a century, and they get more and more efficient every day. You’re probably aware we’re not blowing air over ice-water-soaked sheets anymore, but do you know how your air conditioner works?
How Air Conditioners Work
Air conditioners are basically similar to your refrigerator. They use electricity to take the heat from inside your home and send it outside to join the hot air out there.
The Evaporator Coil and the Condenser
This is where it all starts. The evaporator coil is responsible for cooling the air inside your house, and the condenser is responsible for releasing collected heat outside your home. They are both made of copper, snake-like tubing and surrounded by aluminum fins.
The Compressor
This is the item that connects the evaporator coil and the condenser coil. The compressor is a pump that uses refrigerant, responsible for transferring heat, between the evaporator and the condenser coils. The pump forces refrigerant through the tubing and fins in the evaporator and condenser coils.
Refrigerant
Inside, the liquid refrigerant evaporates in the evaporator coil, which pulls heat out of your home and cools it. The hot refrigerant gas is then pumped outside to the condenser coil where it changes back into a liquid, sending its heat into the already-warm outside air flowing over the condenser’s tubing and fins.
Air Conditioner Maintenance and Repair
There’s a lot more that goes into cooling and heating your home, but those are the basics — and as you can read it’s a far cry from our first attempts at cooling our homes.
If you’re looking for certified professional HVAC technicians to ensure your cooling system is running at its most efficient for the coming summer, or if you’re in the market for a new air conditioner, Shaw Heating & Cooling can help. Give us a call at Give us a call at 816-744-8402 or visit our website for more information.
