How to know when to Repair or Replace your heating unit
To get the best answer to the question of when to repair or replace your heating system you would need to ask a certified HVAC contractor, but here are some guidelines to help you with your decision. The area of the country you live in, age of your unit, and how often you run your unit can help you determine if heating repair or replacement is your best option.
Heating repair may be the best choice if your unit is fairly new and the problem is straight forward and inexpensive to repair. This is especially true if you’re living in an area that has a moderate climate and you don’t need to run your unit at a high rate.
Replacing the unit may make more sense if a reliable contractor informs you that an expensive part, such as a compressor, needs replacing or something that can’t be easily fixed, such as a refrigerant leak, will be more costly to repair than actually replacing the unit.
Another thing to consider is the long term cost of servicing a system that uses old refrigerant. Older units mostly use a refrigerant, R-22, that is being phased out for more environmentally friendly and higher efficiency refrigerant, R410A. As the R-22 gets more difficult to access the cost will most likely increase.