HVAC Installation in Bloomington, IL
A new system here will heat from October through May and cool from June through September every year. Tell us about the house, and a licensed contractor who covers McLean County will get in touch.
Tell us about the job
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A system that has to handle both ends of the year
Bloomington asks a lot of a heating and cooling system. Winter nights average 20°F from December through February, and homes here need heat from October through May, eight months of the year. Summer brings afternoons averaging 84°F, with four months of cooling on top of that. There are almost no months where the system gets to rest.
Most homes here heat with gas, so the furnace carries most of that eight-month load. Whatever you install has to be sized for a 20°F night and an 84°F afternoon, not just the mild days in between. McLean County has also seen its share of winter storms and damaging wind over the past ten years, and in a state where 16% of households lost power for a day or more last year, it's worth knowing that most new furnaces and air conditioners come back on by themselves once power is restored.
- 8 months
- October through May, your system heats
- 4 months
- June through September, it cools
- 20°F
- the average winter night it heats against
- 84°F
- the average summer afternoon it cools against
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
In Illinois, HVAC licensing for homes is left to the cities and towns.
McLean County has no HVAC licensing office of its own, and Illinois does not license contractors at the state level either. That leaves no state record to check and no license number tied to this trade here. Whatever standard a contractor is held to comes from somewhere other than a state license.
For an installation, that somewhere is the local building office. Setting a new furnace and air conditioner or heat pump means running gas or electric connections and connecting to the ductwork, and most places require a permit for that work along with an inspection once it is done. The inspection is what checks that the gas line, wiring and venting were done correctly. That inspection, not a license, is the record this job leaves behind in McLean County.
Source: Illinois General Assembly
- When should I replace my HVAC system?
- Replace it when repairs start coming often, when it can't keep the house at 20°F outside without struggling, or when it's old enough that parts are getting hard to find. Your furnace runs eight months a year here, October through May, so a unit on its last legs gets tested hard every winter. If a contractor has been out more than once this year for the same system, that's usually the sign to stop repairing and start planning a replacement.
- Should I replace my furnace and air conditioner at the same time?
- If both are old, yes, it's worth doing together. A furnace and coil are matched to work as a pair, and pairing a new furnace with an old air conditioner, or the other way around, can mean the newer unit never runs the way it's supposed to. It also means one visit instead of two, since a contractor is already there to run gas, wiring and ductwork. If one system is much newer than the other, replacing just the older one still makes sense.
- What happens during an HVAC installation?
- A contractor removes the old furnace, air conditioner or both, and sets the new equipment in place, connecting it to the ductwork, gas line or electrical circuit it needs. The refrigerant lines get connected and tested for leaks, the gas connections get checked, and the system gets run through a full cycle to confirm it heats and cools correctly. Since homes here need heat or cooling all twelve months, the contractor will also check that the thermostat and controls are set up correctly before leaving. Ask the contractor what the job involves for your specific setup, since a furnace-only job looks different from a full system swap.