Ductless
Mini-Split Systems
Ductless zoning for garage conversions, sunrooms and additions, sized to the room and charged by weight, with the readings written on your work order.
The room the ductwork never reached
A garage turned into a bedroom, a sunroom added after the house was built, a back room that never cools down once the afternoon sun hits its west wall: these are the rooms that send Conroe homeowners to a space heater in January and a box fan in July. The main system was sized for the house as it was drawn, so every new square foot borrows air from rooms that were already getting just enough. The tell is a space that sits several degrees off from the rest of the house no matter where the thermostat is set.
Texas houses rarely have basements, and the attic is already crowded with the existing air handler, flex duct and insulation. Pulling new ductwork to a converted garage means opening ceilings and walls, and a long branch run off a trunk that was never sized for it starves the room anyway. A ductless system skips that fight. Refrigerant lines and a condensate drain run from an outdoor condenser to a head mounted on the wall of the room itself, and that room gets its own thermostat and its own setting, independent of the rest of the house.
Not every cold room is a mini-split job, and we would rather say so at the walk-through than sell you one. If the room is uncomfortable because a damper is closed, a return is blocked or a flex duct was crushed in the attic, ductless is an expensive answer to a cheap problem. If the honest answer is a full system, the free estimate on a replacement happens on the same visit, and a mini-split can still be the right call for the one room the ducts will never serve well.
Condenser set in a tight side yard beside pool equipment
How a zone gets sized, run and charged
Sizing a zone starts with the room, not a BTU chart. Ceiling height, glass and which way it faces, what the walls and ceiling are insulated with, and what the room is used for all change the load. A garage with a single pane door behaves nothing like a finished addition. Too large and the head short cycles and never pulls humidity out of Gulf Coast air; too small and it runs flat out all afternoon without catching up. That is why our NATE-certified technicians look at the space in person before they put a number on paper.
The install is where a ductless system is won or lost. The outdoor condenser goes on a level pad, because a tilted pad turns into a noise complaint. The line set is run on a clean path with the length and rise measured, since both affect the charge and where the condensate has to drain. Every connection is pressure tested before any refrigerant is released, and the line set is evacuated so air and moisture are out before the system is opened. If the run is longer than the factory allows for, the extra charge is weighed in rather than guessed.
Commissioning ends with readings, and the readings get written down. The technician records the air temperature coming into the head and leaving it, which gives the temperature split, along with the suction line temperature and the compressor amp draw against the nameplate. The condensate drain is run with water and watched until it clears. Those numbers go on your work order, so if the room ever drifts out of comfort, the technician who comes back has a starting figure to compare against instead of a feeling.
What the first summer should tell you
A mini-split fails quietly and slowly, and the cause is almost always the same two things. The washable filter behind the front panel loads up with dust, which cuts airflow across the coil, and the indoor coil in a humid climate grows a film that holds even more. The head still blows, but the split narrows, the room takes longer to cool, and a musty smell starts when the unit comes on. Rinsing the filter is a homeowner job; cleaning the coil and blower wheel is not.
Skipped upkeep shows up as water. A condensate drain that clogs sends the water somewhere it was never meant to go, usually down the wall under the head or into a ceiling below, and a coil starved of airflow can freeze and then thaw all at once. Ice on the refrigerant line, a head blowing air that is barely cool, or water on the floor are the signs to call us instead of waiting for the weekend. We answer seven days a week, 7:30am to 8pm, across Conroe, The Woodlands, Magnolia, Montgomery, Spring and Willis.
Ask us to add the ductless zone to the maintenance agreement. Membership starts at $16.58 a month and covers two visits a year with reminder service, a 21-point inspection, priority status and no overtime fee, and pricing can be based on the number of systems in the home. The coil, filter, drain and electrical connections on a head get the same attention as the main system, under the same Texas HVAC licence, TACLA 20944C, and the same written guarantee on our work.
Licensed, bonded and insured. TACLA 20944C. Call (936) 703-2130.
The work order, not a promise
Readings a ductless visit leaves behind
One Google reviewer, Whocares33, described what a written split is worth on an air conditioning service call. The figures below are theirs, from their own review.
10
25
degrees of temperature split, before and after service
“My 3-ton unit started with only about a 10-degree temperature split” and, after service, “the temperature split improved to about 25 degrees”.
- Return air temperature at the head
- Taken before the coil. It is the starting line every other number is judged against.
- Supply air temperature at the head
- Taken after the coil. The gap between this and the return is the temperature split, and a narrow gap means the zone is not moving heat.
- Suction line temperature
- Read at the outdoor unit with the system running, to confirm the charge matches the line set that was actually installed.
- Compressor amp draw
- Compared with the nameplate rating, so a compressor working too hard shows up on day one rather than in August.
- Condensate drain flow
- Water poured in and watched leaving, so the first rainy week does not teach you where the drain goes.
Those same readings are why we can offer a same-day second opinion on an install quote, subject to scheduling and location. Keep them with your records and add the zone to the maintenance agreement so each visit has something to compare against.