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This may have been discussed before but I couldn’t find anything in the archives.
I’m having a new oil-fired, forced hot air furnace installed next month. They suggest I have the ducts cleaned and gave me a brochure with pictures of ducts with 2 inches of mold and crap on the sides, obviously intended to scare me into it. They want $1100 to clean them. The house is 20 years old. It has a burned out electro-static filter and at some point had a humidifier going. I’m sure the ducts have never been cleaned since the previous (original) owners barely cut the grass!
Any thoughts?
Thanks.
Replies
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Hi Mark,
With regards to cleaning of ductwork, YES do clean them on a regular basis.
With regards to 1100 dollars (US I presume) WOW!
Get other quotes.
Gabe
*Last Sunday in the TV section of the San Diego Union Tribune, I noticed two ads for duct cleaning. One listed $59.00 for the whole house the other was something like $179.00. The only difference that I could tell was the number of registers. I think $1100 is totally out of line.My HVAC contractor says he spends a lot of time fixing ducts that have been screwed up by duct cleaners. Ducts are not plumbing pipes that can simply be reamed out. The joints tend to be fragile especially in older houses.
*$1100 is too much. Some of the cleaners just hook up a big vacuum to the trunk line and go around sealing/unsealing the registers one by one. We used a service that actually ran a snake down the ducts to loosen the "stuff" with air pressure more directly. At least logically, this seems like a better way to do it with less risk of imploding the ducts. I think the cost was a few hundred, based on the number of registers (quite a few because almost every room in our house has a return). Unless you live in a mansion, $1100 is too much. Be sure to ask exactly what service you're getting.From what I've heard almost universally, don't bother replacing the electronic air cleaner.
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This may have been discussed before but I couldn't find anything in the archives.
I'm having a new oil-fired, forced hot air furnace installed next month. They suggest I have the ducts cleaned and gave me a brochure with pictures of ducts with 2 inches of mold and crap on the sides, obviously intended to scare me into it. They want $1100 to clean them. The house is 20 years old. It has a burned out electro-static filter and at some point had a humidifier going. I'm sure the ducts have never been cleaned since the previous (original) owners barely cut the grass!
Any thoughts?
Thanks.