If you’re recognizing a smell from your heat pump, it’s attempting to tell you that something is up. We’ve created a list of the most common six heat pump smells, what causes them and how you can correct them.
- Heat pump smells musty
- Heat pump smells like fish
- Heat pump smells like sulfur
- Heat pump smells like sewer
- Heat pump smells like burning
- Heat pump defrost cycle smells
1. Heat Pump Smells Musty
If your heat pump smells musty, there’s likely mold growing on wet evaporator coils or in the ductwork. This heat pump odor is often known as dirty sock syndrome. You can prevent this by scheduling regular heat pump maintenance and air duct cleaning.
2. Heat Pump Smells Like Fish
If your heat pump smells like fish, there could be a few things wrong:
- Motor is too hot
- Wiring issue
- Plastic components or coating is melting
- Other mechanical issue
Electrical problems are serious, so shut your heat pump system off right away at the breaker box and contact us at for heat pump repair.
3. Heat Pump Smells Like Sulfur
Normally when you are dealing with a rotten egg smell, you’re dealing with a gas leak. But your heat pump doesn’t use natural gas. If your heat pump smells like sulfur, a little animal may have crawled inside it for warmth and died. One of our Schraer Heating & Air Conditioning technicians can eliminate the smell by cleaning your heat pump.
4. Heat Pump Smells Like Sewer
As we mentioned above, your heat pump is electric, so any rotten egg smells are tied to a gas leak in another place. If your heat pump smells like sewer, you might have a backed-up or broken sewer line. We suggest contacting a company that does sewer line repair.
5. Heat Pump Smells Like Burning
You might be dealing with an electrical problem if your heat pump smells like burning, burning plastic or burning rubber. This burning smell can be due to melting plastic on electrical wires. Electrical troubles in HVAC systems are dangerous and could cause a fire. If you notice this smell, shut off your heat pump at the breaker and get a hold of us at .
6. Heat Pump Defrost Cycle Smells
Like we mentioned earlier, a dirty socks smell can happen when your evaporator coils need to be cleaned. You might notice this smell when your heat pump goes into defrost mode.
It’s ordinary for your heat pump to have to use defrost mode during heating season. When the air is much colder, frost can form rapidly on the coils from condensation and impede heating. During defrost mode, your heat pump shortly switches to air conditioning to get rid of the frost.
Having a Schraer Heating & Air Conditioning HVAC technician clean the coils will help get rid of the odor.
Depend on for Your Heat Pump Repair Needs
It can be confusing to troubleshoot your heat pump by all by yourself. Your comfort matters to us at Schraer Heating & Air Conditioning, so you can count on our specialists to support you when you need us. When you need heat pump repair in that you can depend on, call us at .