Hey guys before we get to the video for more tips and tricks in the heating and air industry, please click that subscribe button. Thank you: hey guys, joshua griffin, air serving the middle peninsula and the northern neck of virginia and wanted to do a video, because i get one question more than any other question. It seems like i get this question on my facebook and my videos and everywhere, and that is what is the best brand who's good who's. Not and one common trend that you'll see across our industry is most heating and air guys can just about all agree that the brand matters less than who installs it so the installation or who installs it matters more than what brand you select.

Of course, we all have our preferences. We may disagree on who's the best, but ultimately we can all agree that usually the installer matters more than the brand that they install, and so the question becomes. I've actually gotten this question. What does that mean? What does it mean to have a bad installer versus a good installer, and that's what this video is going to cover? In fact, if you found this video we're going to do a series of videos where we're going to talk about bad installations, bad installers and some examples that you as the homeowner can sniff out and find, if you're getting a good installation or not so check out.

This video but check out the whole entire series and our goal is to arm you to help you figure out if you're getting a good installation or not stay tuned. In our last video, we talked about electrical issues and i'm going to piggyback off of that. In this video, when it comes to low voltage issues, so you have your high voltage and most residential systems, and then you have your low voltage, wiring and components, and so i'm going to go over some of those issues. One thing we see all the time is folks just throwing caution to the wind when they're installing their low voltage wiring, it's exposed to elements that it shouldn't be and because of that we'll see times when say someone's weed eating by the house and they nick the Low voltage wiring causing damage to the system, it could just blow a fuse, but it could also burn up transformers and other low voltage components and if they would just take a moment to kind of hide that wire install it in a manner that a weed eater Would not be able to nick that you wouldn't have to worry about that.

Another thing is cheap thermostats, not all thermostats are created equal. There are a bunch of different brands, but i would just say if you are buying a thermostat and it's too good to be true and you're spending less on that thermostat than you would for lunch. Then possibly you might be creating future headaches for yourself. Another thing we see with low voltage, wiring and cables is they're exposed to elements that they shouldn't be we'll see them just kind of hanging in the attic or in the crawl space they're exposed to the elements.

If you want to call it that and they're just making connections out in the open, i've even seen outdoor units where the low voltage wiring is hanging out of the unit and they just connect it right there. It's just not a good practice. Is it a safety issue? Maybe not, but it's still not good for your system. It's not a good installation and it's not a good practice.

Another thing with low voltage cables is a lot of thermostat. Wiring will have multiple conductors in the same cable. So, for example, one of the most common cables that we use is an eight conductor, cable that will run between the indoor and outdoor units, we'll see where installers did not strip the cable itself properly. They'll just take a pair of crimpers or wire cutters and they just cut into the sheathing and pull it off, not realizing they've, now nicked wires, there's a proper way to do it, you're supposed to actually separate the wires.

There's a stripper string in there to pull it back, allowing you to be able to strip back those low voltage, sheathings and not nick those wires. Another low voltage issue we've seen is holes in the cabinets we have seen. Outdoor units with literally have they'll have some sort of a hole in the bottom, and a worm can climb up in there ants other types of critters can climb up in there and cause issues. We literally had a high dollar board now.

Luckily, it was under warranty and the manufacturer went ahead and honored that warranty, but we had a board that was over a thousand dollars just for that outdoor board and a worm had climbed up in there and burnt up that board and i've kind of touched on It again before just sloppiness, just wires hanging, nothing cleaned up everything, just kind of thrown together wires exposed to the elements things just sloppy, and it's just not a good practice. We've seen wires being able to get up against things that they shouldn't, which then causes problems that you wouldn't have had had. They just taken a moment to clean everything up and go from there and then. Finally, one of my pet peeves is bypassing switches.

We see folks when they install their low voltage components, they'll bypass switches, float switches. I have probably seen more condensate pumps with the float switch on top, not wired in the float switch, not wired in than condensate pumps that have been wired in and installed properly. In my career hope that helps thanks for watching the last thing i'll say is if you're in the market for a new heating and air system and you're in virginia and the middle peninsula or the northern neck, give griffin air a call. We'll give you a free estimate and the best warranty in the area, but if you're not in our coverage area check out my new website, i've even got a little banner up here.

Newhvacguide.Com check out that site, because we've put so much information on there. It's as if i wrote a book telling folks, hey here's, the good and the bad avoid this or that i've even got a whole page called no knows things to stay away from, and so before you spend thousands check out that website and finally, for more tips And tricks in the heating and air industry click that subscribe button thanks for watching.