What Are Air Ducts and How Do They Work?

14344573_sBecause “Rug Buster’s” is the title of our company, many people don’t understand that we also specialize in the cleaning and maintenance of the air duct system in your home. In fact, we’ve discovered that most people don’t actually think about their air duct system much, or even understand how it works. Most homes today have a centralized heating and cooling system to circulate warm air and cool air throughout your home. The way the air circulates is through your air duct system, and that is made up of very large flexible tubing that’s also extremely long because it has to run all through your home. (you sometimes see big rolls of it at construction sites.)

Think of your air duct system as a very long, very large round tubing system running under your floors and overhead above your ceilings. Those tubes are attached to vents in both your ceiling and your floors. What people call “forced air” is the air that your centralized heating and cooling system “forces” through the tubing and the vents and into your room. Each vent is strategically placed in your home for optimum heating and cooling, and can be opened or closed to control the airflow into each room. The walls in your home will also include at least one or more “intake registers.” These registers sort of “inhale” the air in your home back through a different tubing system and deliver it to the heating/cooling system, which then heats or cools the air and blows it back through the other tubing system and into the rooms of your home. About the only thing most people are familiar with in terms of their homes ventilation system are those registers, because they’re generally large, square, grill-like grids that lift or open up, and that’s where the HVAC filter is installed.

Most people are aware that a home’s HVAC filter needs to be changed at least twice a year because it gets dirty; but changing the HVAC filter is extremely easy to do yourself and very inexpensive, and it’s one of the most important maintenance tasks you should do for your home. What many people don’t understand is that the system of tubing – or your air ducts – get dirty just the way HVAC filters do. But cleaning your air ducts yourself is virtually impossible because where they’re located and the complexity of the system requires both specialized tools and training, and that’s where one of our qualified technicians at Rugbusters will be happy to come out and do a free inspection and estimate for you. In fact, a lot of times we’re called in to clean rugs because people complain of a “musty” or unpleasant odor. Then, after we’ve cleaned the carpets, the musty smell is still there. If they do call us back with that problem, then we’ll suggest that it might be the air ducts.  And, in fact, once we take a look at your air ducts, that’s generally what the problem actually is. Yes, carpets can be the culprit in terms of musty odors or suspected allergens, but sometimes they aren’t, and when they aren’t – call us to come look at your air ducts – for free!

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