Air Conditioning

The Three Most Important AC Parts

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All components of an air conditioner are necessary to ensure summer comfort, but three important AC parts are particularly critical. At its most basic level, air conditioning is actually the process of moving heat. The system extracts heat inside and disperses it outside. The result is cool, efficient indoor comfort day and night.

Here’s how three important AC parts do the heavy lifting to keep you comfortable all summer long.

Evaporator Coil

Located inside the indoor air handler, the evaporator coil is one of the most important AC parts because it extracts indoor heat from the air flowing through the home’s return ductwork. The coil incorporates copper tubing that circulates cold liquid refrigerant — typically about 40 degrees — under pressure. Coil materials are designed to transfer heat efficiently, and the refrigerant flowing through the coil passageways is formulated to absorb heat and carry it away.

After refrigerant passing through the evaporator coil extracts heat from the airflow, the cooled air is pulled into supply ductwork by the system blower and then dispersed to all rooms.

Compressor

After the evaporator coil, the refrigerant is now a warm, low-pressure gas that flows through a conduit to the outdoor unit housing the system compressor. The compressor incorporates a powerful, 220-volt electric motor to compress the refrigerant gas. The process pressurizes molecules of refrigerant very tightly, raising the refrigerant temperature up to between 120 and 140 degrees. This high-pressure gas releases its load of extracted heat very efficiently as it enters the condenser coil.

Condenser Coil

Hot, pressurized gas pumped by the compressor passes into the copper tubing of the condenser coil and rapidly depressurizes, releasing the load of heat energy. A fan blowing through the condenser coil disperses the radiated heat into outdoor air. As the heat is being released, the flow of refrigerant converts from a hot gas to a liquid state, then circulates to the evaporator coil to extract more heat.

The cooling experts at Air Assurance are ready to provide advice and professional service for the important AC parts that keep you comfortable this summer.