If you’re discovering a smell from your heat pump, it’s trying to tell you that something is wrong. We’ve put together a list of the most popular six heat pump smells, what causes them and how you can fix 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 called dirty sock syndrome. You can deter this by scheduling frequent heat pump maintenance and air duct cleaning.
2. Heat Pump Smells Like Fish
If your heat pump smells like fish, there could be several things wrong:
- Overheated motor
- Wiring problem
- Plastic components or coating is melting
- Other mechanical issue
Electrical problems are serious, so shut your heat pump system off immediately at the breaker box and get a hold of us at for heat pump repair.
3. Heat Pump Smells Like Sulfur
Normally when you smell 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 tiny animal may have creeped inside it for warmth and died. One of our Kapaun & Brown technicians can remove the smell by cleaning your heat pump.
4. Heat Pump Smells Like Sewer
As we reviewed above, your heat pump is electric, so any rotten egg smells are connected to a gas leak elsewhere. If your heat pump smells like sewer, you might be dealing with a backed-up or broken sewer line. We suggest calling 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 the result of melting plastic on electrical wires. Electrical issues in HVAC systems are serious and could cause a fire. If you notice this smell, turn off your heat pump at the breaker and get a hold of us at .
6. Heat Pump Defrost Cycle Smells
Like we talked about earlier, a dirty socks smell can happen when your evaporator coils need to be cleaned. You might experience this smell when your heat pump goes into defrost mode.
It’s ordinary for your heat pump to have to switch on defrost mode during heating season. When the air is much cooler, frost can form rapidly on the coils from condensation and restrict heating. During defrost mode, your heat pump shortly switches to cooling to get rid of the frost.
Having a Kapaun & Brown HVAC technician clean the coils will help get rid of the smell.
Trust Us with Your Heat Pump Repair Needs
It can be confusing to troubleshoot your heat pump by yourself. Your comfort matters to us at Kapaun & Brown, so you can count on our specialists to help you when you need us. When you need heat pump repair in that you can depend on, call us at .