AC Repair in Lake Charles, LA
Air conditioners here run from April through October. If yours quits, tell us what it's doing and a licensed contractor who covers Calcasieu Parish will get in touch.
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Seven months of Lake Charles heat wears on your AC
Your air conditioner runs from April through October here, with summer afternoons averaging 91°F. That is a long stretch of the compressor cycling on and off, day after day, trying to keep up. The wear shows up as warm air from the vents, a system that runs longer than it used to, or a compressor that finally quits.
Calcasieu Parish has also seen 77 damaging wind events and 45 hail events over the past ten years, some with hail up to 3 inches. Wind can knock debris into the outdoor unit and bend the fins that let it release heat. Hail that size can dent the cabinet or damage the coil itself, and a damaged coil cools poorly even when the rest of the system is fine.
- 7 months
- April through October, your air conditioner is on duty
- 91°F
- the average summer afternoon it cools against
- 45 hail events
- in ten years, and hail bends the fins on outdoor coils
- 77 wind events
- in ten years, and wind drives debris into outdoor units
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
A new air conditioner would cut about $70 a year off cooling for a typical Calcasieu Parish home.
Estimates for a typical Calcasieu Parish home, compared with an older unit built to the previous federal minimum, from EIA household energy data, Louisiana fuel prices and NOAA climate normals. Your home will differ.
Repair makes sense when a part like a capacitor or contactor has failed.
Replacement makes sense when the compressor has failed or the system uses R-22 refrigerant, which is no longer made.
Louisiana requires HVAC contractors to hold a state license.
The Louisiana State Licensing Board for Contractors tests and records the contractor, not the individual job. So the license tells you the state checked this contractor's qualifications at some point, and there's a record of them on file if something goes wrong.
For an air conditioner repair, that license is the main protection you have in Calcasieu Parish. If the repair involves opening the refrigerant side of the system, whoever does that work also needs EPA Section 608 certification. That's a federal requirement, not a state one, and it applies no matter where you live.
Source: Louisiana State Licensing Board for Contractors
- Why is my AC not blowing cold air?
- Most of the time the refrigerant is low, meaning the system has a leak somewhere in the coil or the lines. It can also mean the outdoor coil is caked with dirt and can't pull heat out of the house, or the compressor itself has failed. Running seven months a year here puts real hours on that compressor, so age matters too. A technician needs to check refrigerant pressures and the coil condition to know which one it is, and anyone opening the refrigerant side has to hold EPA Section 608 certification to do it.
- Why is my AC leaking water?
- Water around your AC almost always means the condensate drain line is clogged. Dirt and debris build up inside that line over time and back the water up until it overflows the drain pan instead of running outside. It can also mean the drain pan itself has rusted through, or the coil is icing up and then melting faster than the pan can handle. Clearing the line usually stops it, but a cracked pan needs replacing.
- Why won't my AC turn on?
- Check your thermostat first, since a dead battery or a setting bumped too high will stop the system before it ever starts. If the thermostat looks right, the next place to look is the breaker, since a tripped breaker or a blown fuse cuts power to the whole unit. Beyond that it could be the capacitor, which gives the compressor and fan motor the jolt they need to start turning. With 77 damaging wind events recorded here over the past ten years, a tripped breaker after a storm is common enough to check before assuming something bigger has failed.