AC Maintenance in Mobile, AL
Air conditioners here run from April through October, so March is the time for a tune-up. Tell us about your system, and a licensed contractor who covers Mobile County will get in touch.
Tell us about the job
It takes about a minute.
Seven months of Mobile heat wears on your AC
Your air conditioner runs April through October here, seven months straight. On afternoons that hit 91°F, it is not cycling off much. The compressor and the fan motor run long hours, day after day, with little rest between.
A tune-up during that stretch checks the refrigerant charge and the condenser coil before the heat finds the weak point. It catches a capacitor that is starting to fail or a coil that is too dirty to shed heat, the kind of thing that turns a long summer into a breakdown at the worst time.
- 7 months
- April through October, your air conditioner is on duty
- 91°F
- the average summer afternoon it cools against
- 26 hail events
- in ten years, and hail bends the fins on outdoor coils
- 155 wind events
- in ten years, and wind drives debris into outdoor units
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
Book your AC tune-up in March, before homes here start needing cooling in April.
- 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.
Alabama requires HVAC contractors to hold a state license.
The Alabama Board of Heating, Air Conditioning & Refrigeration Contractors issues that license, and it covers the contractor, not the individual job. The board has tested the contractor and keeps a record of who holds a license in this state.
For a maintenance visit on your air conditioner, a technician who opens the refrigerant side of the system also needs EPA Section 608 certification, a federal requirement that applies in every state regardless of Alabama's own rule. The state license tells you the board has tested and tracked this contractor. The federal certification is what specifically covers refrigerant handling.
Source: Alabama Board of Heating, Air Conditioning and Refrigeration Contractors
- What does AC maintenance include?
- A technician checks refrigerant charge, cleans the condenser coil, tests the capacitor, and checks the drain line so it isn't clogged. They also check the electrical connections and inspect the filter, since a dirty filter makes the whole system work harder. On a cooling system that runs from April through October here, that coil especially needs to be clean to shed heat well on a 91°F afternoon.
- How often does an air conditioner need maintenance?
- Once a year is standard, ideally before the cooling season starts. Homes here run their AC seven months out of the year, April through October, so the system gets more hours of work than it would somewhere with a shorter cooling season. Catching a weak capacitor or a low refrigerant charge before that stretch begins means the system isn't struggling through the hottest months.
- Is AC maintenance worth it?
- Yes, because most breakdowns start as small problems that a technician can catch early, like a failing capacitor or a coil caked with dirt. A neglected system runs longer to do the same job and puts more strain on the compressor. Mobile also sees its share of high wind and hail, so a yearly check is a good time to look over the outdoor unit for anything a storm may have damaged.