Heat Pump Repair, Done Right.
The heat pump is the Central Texas workhorse: one machine, both seasons, running nearly every day of the year. When it quits, it usually quits confusingly, blowing cool air on heat mode, steaming in the yard, or running the backup strips and doubling your bill in silence. We repair all of it, every major brand, with the diagnosis proven before a single part goes in.
Heating · Burnet & Central Texas
The Most Misdiagnosed Machine in Texas
Heat pumps get misdiagnosed constantly, and it costs homeowners real money. The machine reverses itself, defrosts itself, and leans on electric backup heat when it falls behind, which means half its normal behaviors look like failures and several real failures look normal. Steam rolling off the outdoor unit on a cold morning is a healthy defrost cycle. Lukewarm supply air at 40 degrees outside can be completely correct. A tech who does not live with these machines either replaces parts that were fine or reassures you about a system that is quietly dying.
Ten years of Central Texas heat pumps taught us the real failure catalog. Reversing valves that stick between modes and leave you neither heating nor cooling. Defrost boards that quit sensing and let the outdoor coil ice into a block. Dead outdoor sensors that lock the machine into backup strips, which keep the house warm while tripling the electric bill. Weak start components that give you the hum-click-silence routine. Each one has a distinct signature on the meters, and finding the right one is the whole job.
The repair visit runs on instruments, never vibes. Pressures on both sides, temperature splits across the coils, amp draws on the compressor and motors, board diagnostics read properly. You get the actual failure named, the fix and the exact price stated before work starts, and the machine verified in both heating and cooling modes before we leave, because a heat pump repaired in one mode and broken in the other is half a repair.
Local conditions shape this work more than most homeowners expect. Our summers stack week after week of hundred-degree afternoons, which means long compressor runtimes, drain lines moving gallons of condensate a day, and electrical components living near their limits from June through September. Lake humidity keeps the corrosion clock running even in mild months, and spring pollen packs filters fast enough to choke airflow in weeks. A tech who works this exact hundred miles every day builds all of that into the heat pump repair call: what to check first, which parts fail early here, and which settings survive a Texas cooling season instead of merely a laboratory one.
Heating
Heat Pump Failures We See Weekly
The same short list covers most of the heat pump calls this shop runs between October and March. Yours is probably on it.
Same crew, any hour.
The name is the joke, the 24-hour line is not. If this problem cannot wait, call now and the on-call tech picks up, quotes the visit straight, and rolls a stocked truck.
Why Off Duty
Repairs That Respect the Machine
A heat pump is the most instrument-dependent repair in residential HVAC, which is exactly why shops that guess do their worst work on them. Our rule is simple: the refrigerant circuit tells the truth, the boards tell the truth, and the amp clamp tells the truth, so we listen to those instead of hunches. When the failure is found, you get it explained in plain English, with the honest context: what caused it, whether it will take anything else with it, and what the repair does to the machine’s remaining lifespan.
And when a repair stops making sense, we say that too. A compressor failure on a fifteen-year-old R-22 unit is money thrown into a hole, and Bryce will tell you so with the replacement math laid out beside the repair quote, then let you decide without a sales pitch. Most repairs are worth making. The ones that are not deserve a straight no from someone who does not earn commission either way.
Here is how the visit goes. A call to (512) 925-3090 reaches a real tech, not a call center, at any hour. On site, the diagnosis runs on instruments until the cause is certain, and then everything gets laid out in plain English: what failed, what fixes it, and exactly what it costs, before work begins. When the heat pump repair work is done, it gets verified under load instead of switched on and waved at. If the pattern sounds simple, it is. It is also rare enough in this trade that people write reviews about it.
On pricing, the policy is the same as everything else here: out loud and up front. The visit cost gets stated on the phone before anyone drives anywhere. The repair price gets stated after diagnosis and before work. No packages with hidden contents, no commission-driven upsell in the truck, and no number on the invoice you did not already hear.
One honest note about timing. Problems in this category rarely improve on their own, and the price of waiting is usually a bigger bill: the weak part takes a healthy one with it, the small leak becomes a stain on a ceiling, the strange noise becomes a seized motor. Calling early is almost always the cheaper version of the same repair, and the phone consult costs nothing: describe what you are seeing and we will tell you honestly whether it can wait.
As for who shows up: this is an owner-operated shop, so the tech at your door is usually Bryce himself, a second-generation HVAC man with ten years on the tools, licensed, insured, and photographed doing exactly this kind of work in the job gallery. No commissioned salesman rides along, and nobody at this company earns a bonus for talking you into more than you need.
This service runs wherever our trucks do: home base in Burnet, the Highland Lakes from Granite Shoals to Buchanan Dam, down the corridor to Round Rock and Austin, north to Killeen and Temple, and out to the sixteen-county edge at Waco, Boerne, and Fredericksburg. The whole map lives on the service areas page, with drive-time honesty built into every window we quote.
Diamond Contractor
Mitsubishi’s top ductless credential, earned with factory training.
Second Generation
Raised in the trade, ten years on the tools before the name went on a truck.
Warranty Authorized
JB and Mitsubishi warranty work: we file the claim, you skip the fight.
Open 24 Hours
A real person answers the phone at any hour, every day of the year.
The Standard
How This Work Gets Done Here
Every trade job carries an invisible line item: the standard it was done to. On heat pump repair work, ours reads like this. The diagnosis is proven with instruments, because guessing is expensive and it is your money on the table. The parts that go in are parts we would put in our own house, matched to spec instead of whatever was cheapest on the shelf. The workmanship follows the manufacturer’s book and the Texas code book both, because shortcuts hide for exactly one season and then bill you with interest.
When the work is finished, it gets tested the way it will actually be used: under load, at temperature, with the readings written down. Then the area gets left the way we found it or cleaner, the old parts get shown to you on request, and the invoice matches the number you already heard. If anything acts up afterward, you call the same number and the same person answers. That is the entire warranty conversation most customers ever need, and it is why the reviews keep saying the same three things: honest, fair, showed up.
Heat Pump Repair Questions
Asked Before We Roll a Truck
The ones the phone line hears most for this service, with the answers given at full length instead of sales-brochure length.
Why is my heat pump blowing lukewarm air?
Lukewarm can be normal or a failure, and the difference matters. Heat pumps deliver supply air around 90 to 100 degrees, which feels cool against your skin even while it heats the house fine. But lukewarm air plus a house losing ground means trouble: low charge, a stuck reversing valve, or a machine quietly leaning on backup strips. The test is the thermostat: if the house holds temperature, you are likely fine. If it slips while the system runs constantly, call, because that machine is working harder and delivering less every day.
Is steam coming off the outdoor unit a problem?
Usually the opposite. In defrost mode the machine briefly runs backward to melt frost off the outdoor coil, and the melt flashes into steam on a cold morning. Dramatic, and completely healthy. The problem version is ice that builds and never clears, a coil encased in white for hours. That means defrost is failing, and every hour it runs that way strains the compressor. Steam that clears in a few minutes, relax. Ice that stays, call the same day.
Why did my electric bill explode this winter?
Nine times out of ten, backup heat strips. When a heat pump falls behind or fails outright, electric resistance strips carry the house, and they draw several times what the compressor does. The house stays warm so nobody suspects, and then the bill lands. A tech reads it instantly from amp draws at the air handler. If your winter bill jumped hard without a rate change, have the system checked before the next billing cycle repeats the damage.
Repair or replace at this age?
The honest math has three inputs: age, failure type, and efficiency gap. A capacitor or contactor on an eight-year-old machine is an easy repair. A compressor or reversing valve on a fourteen-year-old unit usually is not, because the new machine buys enough efficiency to help pay for itself and the old one has more failures queued up behind this one. You get both numbers, the repair and the replacement, with Bryce’s straight recommendation of what he would do at his own house. Then you choose.
Do you work on all heat pump brands?
Yes. Trane, Carrier, Lennox, Rheem, Goodman, York, and the rest of the fleet that heats Central Texas, plus the Mitsubishi ductless side where we hold Diamond Contractor status. Parts stocking follows what actually breaks around here, so the truck usually carries your fix already. If your system carries JB or manufacturer warranty coverage, we handle the claim paperwork too, which spares you the fight with the warranty office.
Related work: Heat Pump Maintenance · Heat Pump Replacement · Emergency HVAC Repair · see real jobs in the gallery
Get the Heat Back On
Describe what the machine is doing and get a straight answer about cause and cost. Prefer to write it out? Send the form and we call you back.
(512) 925-3090 Book a Free Look
