AC Installation in Little Rock, AR
A new air conditioner in Little Rock will run from May through September every year. Tell us about the house, and a licensed contractor who covers Pulaski County will get in touch.
Tell us about the job
It takes about a minute.
Five months of Little Rock heat, every year
Your air conditioner runs from May through September here, five months straight, with summer afternoons averaging 91°F. That is a long stretch for a unit to carry the whole house.
Pulaski County has also logged 97 hail events and 178 damaging wind events over the past ten years, with hail stones as large as 2.75 inches. The outdoor unit is the part that takes that weather, since it sits outside the whole time. Any new central air conditioner installed now has to meet a federal minimum of 14.3 SEER2, so whatever goes in will cover those five months on less power than an older unit did.
- 5 months
- May through September, your air conditioner is on duty
- 91°F
- the average summer afternoon it cools against
- 97 hail events
- in ten years, and hail bends the fins on outdoor coils
- 13.4 SEER2
- the federal minimum any new unit must meet
NOAA nClimDiv, 1991–2020 normals
Going above the federal minimum saves little here, about $20 a year.
Estimates for a typical Pulaski County home, from EIA household energy data, Arkansas fuel prices and NOAA climate normals. Your home will differ.
Arkansas requires HVAC contractors to hold a state license.
The license belongs to the contractor, not to any single job, so the same license that covers a repair down the street covers this installation. Counties and cities in Arkansas cannot layer their own HVAC license on top of it, so the state's is the one that applies here no matter where in Pulaski County the work happens.
For this job, that license is what stands behind the person doing the work. In most cities and counties, an installation like this also needs a permit from the local building office, with an inspection once the work is done. That inspection is what checks the installation itself. The license is what tells you the contractor was allowed to do it.
Source: Arkansas Department of Labor and Licensing
- What size air conditioner does my house need?
- The right size depends on your square footage, your ceiling height, how much shade and sun your walls and windows get, and how well the house holds conditioned air. A contractor works this out with a load calculation, not a chart based on square footage alone. Going too big is as much a problem as going too small. An oversized unit cools the air fast and shuts off before it pulls the humidity out, so the house feels clammy even at the right temperature.
- Should I replace the whole system or just the outdoor unit?
- In most cases the outdoor and indoor units need to be matched, so swapping only the condenser can leave you with a system that runs poorly or wears out early. Age matters too. If the indoor coil and furnace or air handler are old, replacing just the outdoor unit often means paying to replace the rest again soon after. A contractor can check whether your existing indoor unit is a fit for a new outdoor unit before you decide.
- Do HVAC contractors in Little Rock need a state license to work on my home?
- Yes. Arkansas requires HVAC contractors to hold a state license to do this work. Asking to see it before any work starts is a reasonable step, and a licensed contractor should have no trouble showing it.