Tag: Actuator

HVAC Dampers: Controlling The Airflow on Your HVAC System

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As long as your HVAC system is operating correctly, you probably won’t need to concern yourself about what a damper is, how it works, and how actuators make them control the flow of cold or hot air across your home.

HVAC technician working on a mini-split condensing unit

When it’s time to replace certain parts, like dampers and actuators, it pays to know what they are and what they’re used for. Let’s now discuss how the HVAC damper controls the airflow of your HVAC system.

The HVAC Actuator, Damper, and Other Related Subjects

Dampers, along with their actuators, help make a home or office much comfier by keeping the temperature just right at all times.

  • What is a Damper in HVAC Terms? A damper in HVAC terms refers to duct dampers or movable plates moved by actuators—devices that convert energy like electricity to motion—in order to help regulate or make consistent the temperature of your home, office, or building with an HVAC system and duct work installed.
  • Movable Plates That Move Air Around: To ensure the stream of cold air from the A/C or hot air from the heater goes through your ventilation in a regulated and consistent manner, the plates move and adjust accordingly. The dampers control the airflow to specific parts of the building to make hotter rooms colder or colder rooms hotter as needed.
  • Cooling Regulators: There are many parts of the HVAC system that can be considered “cooling regulators”, but in the case of dampers, they dampen or release the cold air to regulate the cooling or heating of any given area or room, usually by cooling zones.
  • Ensures Efficient HVAC Operation: In order to keep your HVAC system from overworking its heater or A/C from making things hotter or colder consistently, the dampers and the ventilation system mostly work in tandem to prevent the units from running constantly. Once it heats or cools the air, they can use and distribute that hotness or coldness across the home.
  • Inconsistency in Temperatures: You might want to know what a damper is once you find that in your home, it’s much colder downstairs or warmer upstairs. It’s especially important to put a damper on your ignorance about dampers whenever some rooms have differing temperatures. Your damper or actuator might be busted in such cases.
  • Control Airflow: You can close or open HVAC dampers like you would the vents of your ventilation system to control airflow coming from the duct work. Or you can have a programmable or smart HVAC control the airflow for you automatically until you decide to do a manual override.

Thanks to dampers, their actuators, and duct systems that regulates cooling or heating of the zones around a building, your HVAC unit doesn’t need to constantly turn on its heaters or air-conditioners to reach the ideal temperature.

Inconsistent Temperatures? You May Need a New HVAC Actuator

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The actuator converts energy into motion to manipulate a mechanism or system. The HVAC actuator, therefore, converts energy into motion to make the HVAC system work properly. They’re specifically responsible for closing and opening the dampers to direct hotness or coldness to the proper areas.

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Replacements for faulty HVAC actuators might be called for if your HVAC system has a tendency to produce inconsistent temperatures. Bad actuators don’t open or shut the dampers in time or as needed.

When is an HVAC Actuator Faulty?

Directing hot and cold area to the proper areas they’re needed the most require actuators to move the dampers when needed, like when distributing heater hotness in winter or A/C coldness in summer.

  • Inconsistent Temperature and Bad Actuators: If your HVAC unit and system produces inconsistent temperatures, one of the prime suspects of that symptom is a bad actuator. Actuators do wear out or develop cracks over time as they’re used. Check your actuator if your HVAC temperatures are all over the place.
  • Only Actuators Produce Inconsistent Temperatures? No. Inconsistent temperatures can also root from dusty vents or other broken heater or A/C parts, leading to rooms becoming too cold or too hot. However, it’s usually the actuator that does it if cleanup doesn’t solve the issue.
  • Strange Noises from Your Unit: Your actuator might be acting up if you’re hearing banging or clicking coming from your HVAC system. You can consider such noises as a cry of help from the actuator itself as it fails to convert energy to kinetic damper movement.
  • Thermostat Temperature Adjustment is Difficult: If you’re having issues adjusting your thermostat settings, it could be your thermostat acting up or it could be the fault of a faulty HVAC actuator, particularly if your thermostat isn’t really affecting hotness or coldness at all.
  • Inconsistent or Weak Airflow: If your airflow is absent, inconsistent, or otherwise weak and your vents are in pristine condition with zero dust whatsoever, then you might be faced with an actuator that’s incapable of moving the air consistently through vents, whether it’s hot or cold air.
  • Higher Energy Bills Overall: The actuator is such an important part of your HVAC system that it makes the whole unit work harder in order to cool down or heat up your rooms when it’s malfunctioning in redirecting air via damper movement. This inefficiency naturally results in higher bills.

At any rate, how the actuators move the dampers is also based on the thermostat settings. It can open or close partially to redirect hot and cold air depending on how hot or how cold the thermostat is set. Ditto if it’s an automatic or smart thermostat.