AC Maintenance in Greenville, MS
Air conditioners here run from May through September, so April is the time for a tune-up. Tell us about your system, and a licensed contractor who covers Washington County will get in touch.
Tell us about the job
It takes about a minute.
Five months of Greenville heat, and no real break for your AC
From May through September your air conditioner is the only thing standing between your house and a 91°F afternoon. It runs hard and it runs long, and there is no stretch of mild weather in between to give it a rest. That kind of steady load wears on the parts that keep it running, the capacitor, the contactor, the fan motor.
A tune-up before the season gets going checks those parts while they still work, not after one of them fails on the hottest day of the summer. It also catches what the weather here throws at the unit itself. Washington County has logged 21 hail events and 84 damaging wind events over the past ten years, and hail up to 2.75 inches can bend the fins on an outdoor coil enough to cut down the airflow it needs.
- 5 months
- May through September, your air conditioner is on duty
- 91°F
- the average summer afternoon it cools against
- 21 hail events
- in ten years, and hail bends the fins on outdoor coils
- 84 wind events
- in ten years, and wind drives debris into outdoor units
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
Book your AC tune-up in April, before homes here start needing cooling in May.
- Jan
- Feb
- Mar
- Apr
- May
- Jun
- Jul
- Aug
- Sep
- Oct
- Nov
- Dec
A tune-up checks the refrigerant charge, cleans the coils, tests the capacitor and tightens the electrical connections.
Mississippi requires HVAC contractors to hold a state license.
The State Board of Contractors tests contractors before they can hold this license, and it keeps a record of who holds one. That license belongs to the contractor, not to any single job, so the same license covers the maintenance visit on your air conditioner as it would a full installation.
For a maintenance visit, the license is what stands behind the person coming to your house. If the work involves opening the refrigerant side of your air conditioner, checking pressures or handling the coil, federal law also requires that technician to hold EPA Section 608 certification. That certification is separate from the state license and applies to refrigerant work in every state, not just Mississippi.
Source: Mississippi State Board of Contractors
- What does AC maintenance include?
- A tune-up covers checking the refrigerant charge, cleaning the outdoor coil, testing the capacitor, and making sure the system cycles on and shuts off the way it should. The contractor also checks the filter and clears the condensate drain, since a clogged drain is one of the more common reasons an AC stops cooling in the middle of summer. Anyone touching the refrigerant side has to hold EPA Section 608 certification, so that part of the job is never optional or improvised.
- How often does an air conditioner need maintenance?
- Once a year, ideally before the season it works hardest. Here that means getting it looked at before May, since the system runs from May through September with summer afternoons averaging 91°F. A unit that sits idle for months and then gets asked to run flat out in that kind of heat is exactly the kind that fails at the worst time.
- Is AC maintenance worth it?
- Yes, mainly because it catches small problems before they become breakdowns. A weak capacitor or a dirty coil does not usually fail quietly, it fails on the hottest afternoon of the year, which here means one of those 91°F stretches between May and September. The other reason is the outdoor unit itself. This area has seen 21 hail events and 84 damaging wind events over the past ten years, and a yearly check is when a contractor would spot bent fins or storm damage before it turns into a bigger repair.