After I bought our first house, our dad provided myself and others a couple of books to help with home repairs.
One of the books was especially about repairs on the A/C system. My lake house Central A/C and a heat pump and I didn’t know the first thing about the equipment. My dad worked as a contractor, and he l received everything that he knows from studying books and having experience. He never had formal training. I tried studying some of the books, however I found them to be boring. I didn’t use them much at all until I had the first complication in the house. It turned out to be an issue with the central AC. I found the book on repairs and followed a list inside that included some simple areas I could check for problems. These simple steps included clearing the drain line and checking for buildup of mold and dirt, adjusting the air filter, and checking for problems with the evaporator coils. The handy list pointed myself and others in the right direction and I realized that the evaporator coils were really dusty and dirty. They needed to be cleaned. I used an seasoned toothbrush to carefully disinfect all of the evaporator coils. I l received that trick in the book too. I cleaned the coils, the unit works much more effectively. I called our dad later that night and I told him the story about the A/C unit. Since then, I typically try to figure out problems on our own before I contact a professional and spend a lot of cash.