HVAC Again

HVAC proved to be a bit more aggravating than either electrical or plumbing, not because it was any more complicated, but because there were some pretty essential communication breakdowns.

It wasn’t necessarily anything intentionally deceitful as much as it was a lack of communication and follow through.

A proposal was submitted (a day late – first red flag, but they were the only ones who actually kept a second appointment of the HVAC companies we contacted so on balance there were points in their favor), scope of work agreed and a start date set.

Then we heard nothing. 

In response to my hounding there was finally a call from the owner of the company (who isn’t the guy that actually does the work) who’d had second thoughts and was concerned that dampers – that fit in the various ducts – were going to be sealed up in a ceiling made of sheetrock.

This is problematic because, as we all know, anything mechanical will eventually fail and the idea of ripping out a sheetrock ceiling to repair a damper motor was pretty unpalatable. 

Almost as much as putting a dozen little doors in the ceiling to give access to fix them whenever necessary.

That meant that we redesigned the system again.  This part wasn’t that bothersome, because after all the project wasn’t drawn out on blue paper with white lines (only electrical actually got a written plan). 

The issue, though, came when we didn’t hear from him again.

A modified plan was eventually  adopted, one that involved building new ductwork across the room in the Den and then putting the upstairs ducts on one side and the downstairs ones on the other so that they could create separate “zones” which had individual temperature controls.

This allowed us to go from lots of little dampers to just a couple of big ones that were accessible in the basement.

Makes sense, right?

Except that communication wasn’t flowing from the boss to the guys doing the work and every day was a new experience.  It was like I was speaking Swahili and they only understood French.

And we both had bad accents and poor grammar.

Add to that the fact that (a) nobody showed up one day (blamed on the main office supposed to call and tell me that someone was sick) and (b) that we’d go in to check progress and find out that the change orders from the day before didn’t seem to have happened and things were built under old specs, and then the guys who were actually doing the work were pissed that it had to be changed.

It was like every day was happening in a new world.

Then when things did get done, it was as if there was “malicious compliance” – the worker bees were thoroughly pissed over having to do something (or re-do it) and ended up just kind of slapping it together, often in a way that seemed haphazard.

The AC is finally finished, though, or at least is to the point that those guys are out of the way and we can either fix the last couple of things ourselves or find someone else. 

The house isn’t cool yet, because temperatures in the 90’s with a heat index that is easily 10 degrees above that don’t make for conditions that let the house cool down quickly. 

There is hope, though, if we can ever get enough workmen out of the house to actually close some of the doors most of the time.