Services
Ductless mini-split installation and repair
Cooling and heating for rooms that have no ductwork: additions, attics, garages, and the older houses on the North Shore that were built around radiators.
Where they make sense
A room over a garage that never gets warm. A finished attic with one undersized register. A sun room added later with nothing run to it. A house heated by radiators, where adding central air would mean opening walls and ceilings for ductwork that would only ever be used four months a year.
In all of those, a ductless system is not a compromise, it is the straightforward answer: one outdoor unit, a small line set, and an indoor head in the room that has the problem.
Single or multi-zone
One outdoor unit can serve several rooms
A multi-zone system runs two to five indoor heads from one outdoor unit, each with its own thermostat. It costs less than several single systems and it puts one box outside instead of three.
The trade-off is worth knowing: if the outdoor unit needs service, every room it serves is affected at once. For two rooms far apart in a house, two single systems are often the better arrangement.
The details that make one look right
Most of what you will see of a mini-split for the next fifteen years is the outside of it, so that is where the care goes: the line set inside a proper cover rather than taped, run along a line the house already has, the outdoor unit on brackets or a stand clear of the snow line, and the condensate taken somewhere sensible rather than dripped onto the path.
Indoors, the head goes where it can throw air down the length of the room, not where the hole was easiest to drill.
Delivery morning, a Chicago alley.
Ductless jobs we have documented
Towns we cover
Northwest
- Wheeling 1 job
- Buffalo Grove 1 job
- Prospect Heights
- Lincolnshire
- Arlington Heights 1 job
- Long Grove
- Mount Prospect
- Palatine
- Barrington
North Shore
- Deerfield
- Northbrook 2 jobs
- Highland Park
- Highwood
- Lake Forest
- Glenview 1 job
- Winnetka
- Wilmette 1 job
Near north
- Park Ridge
- Skokie
- Chicago 2 jobs
Mini-split questions
How big a hole goes through the wall?
About three inches, sleeved and sealed on both sides. It is smaller than the hole a dryer vent needs.
Do they heat as well as cool?
Nearly all of them do, and the cold-climate models keep working well below freezing. For a garage or a sun room that is usually the point of fitting one.
How noisy is the indoor head?
Quieter than a fridge on its low setting. The outdoor unit makes more noise than the indoor one.
Do they need cleaning?
Yes, more than people expect. The blower wheel and the drain pan in an indoor head collect dust and, in a damp room, mold. It is a job worth doing every couple of years.
Request an estimate
Tell us which room, and whether there is a wall it could sit on.