Your heating cooling and ventilation (HVAC) system is the most important appliance in your home. It keeps you warm during the winter, cool during the summer and helps keep your indoor air clean. Whether you are installing a new system or simply upgrading to a new one, you need to carefully consider where you want to put it (your basement isn’t the only practical location either). In many cases, the attic is an ideal location to have your HVAC system installed; let’s take a look at the reasons why it is a good idea to have your system installed in the highest room in the house:
Your HVAC system will be quieter
Most people are familiar with that loud, obnoxious sound HVAC systems can make when they’re booted up and forcing conditioned air throughout homes. Since the basement and all living spaces above it are being used, the system will make it difficult for your to hear yourself when installed on any of these floors. Since nobody goes into the attic very often, you can save yourself a noisy headache by putting your system there.
Your HVAC system is safer from water damage
Whether you live in a subtropical state that feels the wrath of hurricane season or a desert town as dry as the Mojave, your home can experience floods. This is because home flooding is often caused by plumbing leaks and overflows. Leaks and overflows on a given floor will seep through the floors to affect everything below it — including your HVAC system. Having it installed in the attic ensures that it is 100 percent protected from flooding caused by plumbing leaks and overflows.
Your HVAC system will require shorter ducts
Attic HVAC systems also require shorter ducts. Here’s why that is a good thing:
There will be less duct leakage
Sometimes air conditioned air will seep right through your ducts and become useless, instead of heating and cooling your home. ALL ducts are at risk for this type of leakage. Duct leakage causes a lot of problems, including less effective heating and cooling, and a more expensive energy bill. The less duct work you have to lose energy, the less you have to worry about those annoying duct leaks.
Your ducts won’t be exposed to the elements
Another way your ducts lose energy (reducing your HVAC system’s effectiveness and costing you extra money) is when hot or cold energy from outside air literally forces its way through your ducts, changing the temperature of your air. Your attic is the most susceptible room in the house for this. When your system itself is in the attic, however, you don’t have to worry about this, because your ducts won’t have to run all across the attic.
There will be a lower cost for parts
Since you’ll be using less material, shorter ducts won’t cost you as much as longer ones.
You will have more space in your home
An HVAC system can be an awful eyesore that destroys an interior design scheme, shrinks a room and minimizes your total storage space. If it’s in your attic, you won’t have to worry about this (you can use that basement closet for something else).
No matter where you want your HVAC system, have a real pro install it
Trying to install your HVAC system yourself in ANY room is a very bad idea — this is not a DIY job. Doing this can result in damage to your system, malfunctions, or even create a serious hazard. Make sure that you leave the installation of your home’s heating, cooling and air conditioning system to the pros.
