Did Your Duct Cleaner Do a Thorough Job: How to Know?
In a previous post, we told you How to Hire a Duct Cleaning Company, but once the work is done how do you know if the company you hired did a thorough job?
You can visually inspect the HVAC system on your own, and that will give you some clues since the reason most facilities call in a duct cleaning company is because of visible dust and debris buildup in the ducts.
But it’s imperative that the ducts are fully cleaned especially since that’s what your facility is paying for, and also because any leftover dirt accumulation shrinks the HVAC passageway, potentially lowering efficiency and raising your energy bills.
Also, dirty ducts, from dirt as well as mold growth, can harm your occupants by affecting the indoor air quality.
The first thing you should do is request a thorough visual inspection from the duct cleaning provider. Some duct cleaning companies have remote photography systems to show their customers what the inside of the ducts look like. When viewing the photography every part of the ducts should appear clean. If you can see any dirt or debris, the ducts are not sufficiently clean.
In addition to a general visual inspection, it’s crucial to focus on the care and cleaning of key areas. Fortunately, the EPA provides a handy checklist. You may even want to give the duct cleaning company the list before its employees begin work to make your expectations clear. After the cleaning is done, you can walk through the checklist with the provider.
Here are some of the things the EPA says you should look for:
- Did the company clean the entire HVAC system including the ductwork and all components?
- These key parts should appear visibly clean: heat exchanger surface, cooling coil, blower compartment, blower blades, return air plenum, supply air plenum, interior ductwork surfaces, registers, grilles and diffusers.
- Do the coils fins look straight?
- The filters should fit properly and be the proper efficiency.
- The registers, grilles, and diffusers should be tightly attached to the floors, walls and ceilings.
- After you turn on the system, it should function properly in both the heating and cooling modes, and there should be little air leakage around the access doors or covers.
You can read the full checklist here.
In the event your facility maintenance team decides to take on the task of duct cleaning, Goodway has all the equipment you need to clean ducts quickly and easily.
Goodway’s duct cleaning equipment can clean 4″-18″ round and spiral ducts and 4″-16″ rectangular/square ducts in a simple one-person operation. Some of the features available with our duct cleaners include flexible shafts, rotary brushes, reversible shaft rotation, adjustable speed control and a three-stage true HEPA filtration system.
Next Steps:
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- Stay up to date on facility maintenance tools such as chiller tube cleaners, boiler tube cleaners, hose/pipe cleaners, descaler systems, industrial vacuums, commercial pressure washers, and drain cleaners.
