Ductwork Replacement in Ann Arbor Township, Michigan

Houses in Ann Arbor Township that were built in the 1950s–80s custom homes on large wooded lots, with newer estates along Geddes and Earhart have ductwork from that era, and a good share of it has reached the end. Temprasure comes out to Plymouth Road corridor and anywhere else in 48105 with a manometer and a light, measures the static pressure the blower is fighting, walks the trunk and branches and returns, and tells you honestly whether sealing and a new return will get there or whether the system needs to come out. When it is replacement, we design it for the house as it is now, install it in a few days with the basement disruption spelled out in advance, and balance it with numbers you keep.

Ann Arbor Township houses and what that means for duct replacement

Almost nothing in Ann Arbor Township is a tract house, which means every service call is a little different. Barton Hills is 1920s–60s architect-designed homes, some with original boilers and radiators, others with forced air that was threaded through later, and many with both plus a separate attic air handler for the upper floors. The Geddes Road and Huron River Drive estates are 1950s–80s customs and 1990s–2010s rebuilds on walkout basements facing the river, frequently with three or four separate systems serving different wings. Along Earhart, Warren and Joy Roads, the township has 1960s–80s ranches and contemporaries on wooded lots, often with a furnace in a crawlspace or garage utility room and ductwork running through unconditioned space. Older farmhouses on Pontiac Trail and Whitmore Lake Road have Michigan basements and a chain of additions. Oversized equipment is common here because builders of large custom homes rarely bothered with a proper load calculation.

Two-story subdivision houses in Ann Arbor Township from the 1950s–80s custom homes on large wooded lots, with newer estates along Geddes and Earhart are the second most common replacement. The basement trunk is usually fine; the problem is the attic. Flex duct was pulled between the trusses in Plymouth Road corridor twenty or thirty years ago, and it has since sagged, kinked, been crushed by stored boxes, chewed by mice and patched with tape, and the single return in the upstairs hall was never enough. Past a point, patching is throwing money at it. We replace the attic system with a designed layout: shorter, straighter runs, rigid metal where a chase allows, insulated flex kept to the last few feet, and a dedicated return on the second floor. The upstairs of a Ann Arbor Township colonial in 48105 comes within a degree or two of the first floor when it is done.

We run duct work across Ann Arbor Township, about 18 minutes from our Ypsilanti shop, and the jobs cluster in the 1950s–80s custom homes on large wooded lots, with newer estates along Geddes and Earhart near Joy Road area, Plymouth Road corridor and Domino's Farms. Leaky returns in a Washtenaw County basement pull in moisture and dust; undersized supplies starve the coil in summer and overheat the exchanger in winter. Sealing and repairing what is there solves most of it. Replacing a trunk or rerouting a run solves the rest, and we tell you which your house needs after measuring, not before.

Local details we plan around in Ann Arbor Township

• DTE gas runs along the main corridors, but a surprising number of estates on Huron River Drive, Geddes and the northern roads heat with propane, and some have large buried tanks.
• Barton Hills has its own village government and architectural review, so exterior equipment placement there can involve an extra approval.
• Homes with multiple furnaces and air handlers in different wings mean a single thermostat complaint often turns out to be a zoning or balancing problem rather than an equipment failure.
• The Huron River and Barton Pond dominate the township's weather at ground level: homes on the bluffs and along Huron River Drive deal with fog, heavy dew and basement humidity that the city's higher ground does not. Thick oak and hickory cover across Barton Hills and the Geddes estates keeps summer cooling loads modest but drops leaves and branches on condensers every fall. North of M-14, the land opens into fields and takes the full winter wind.