Duct Cleaning in Wilmington, DE
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It takes about a minute.
Seven months of heating pushes a lot of air through those ducts
Your furnace runs from October through April here, close to seven months of the year. On the nights that average 27 degrees, it is cycling on and off most of the day and night, and every cycle pushes air through the same ductwork. Whatever is riding in that air, dust, pet hair, anything tracked in and stirred up, settles inside the ducts a little more with each pass.
New Castle County homes have also come through 228 damaging wind events and 11 winter storms over the past ten years. A storm strong enough to knock out power stops the blower, but the house is still standing there with all that settled dust waiting for the system to come back on and move it around again.
- 7 months
- October through April, your furnace pushes air through your ducts
- 4 months
- June through September, your air conditioner does the same
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
- How often should air ducts be cleaned?
- There is no fixed schedule that fits every home, but most homes do not need it on a set timer. If anyone in the house has allergies, you have pets shedding into the return vents, or you just finished a renovation that kicked up dust and drywall grit, that is when to have it done. Your furnace runs seven months a year here, so whatever is sitting in the ducts gets pushed through the house for a good stretch of the year.
- Is air duct cleaning worth it?
- It is worth it when there is a real reason behind it, not just as a routine chore. If you can see dust kicking out of the vents, smell something musty when the furnace kicks on, or someone in the house has started having more allergy symptoms indoors than out, cleaning the ducts makes sense. Clean ducts do not lower your heating bill or fix a furnace that is running poorly. Those problems are usually somewhere else, like the filter or the equipment itself.
- What does air duct cleaning involve?
- A contractor connects a vacuum system to your ductwork and uses brushes or air tools to knock dust and debris loose from inside the supply and return lines, then pulls it out through the vacuum. They will also check the vent covers and the blower housing, since debris collects there too. A full job covers every duct run in the house, not just the ones you can reach easily.