Eric Mele, Eric Kaiser, and John Oaks come on the podcast to talk about commercial PM best practices and what matters most.

Drain cleaning is a critical part of the standard commercial PM. You must assess the drainage situation (pitch, length, location, etc.) to plan your cleaning strategy and arrive at the best result: the entire drain gets cleaned. If you use chemicals, you need to be very careful not to let them back up into other units.

Condenser coil cleaning is another important PM procedure in both residential and commercial HVAC. However, you don't always need to clean the condenser coils. When you actually need to clean the coils, some best practices include splitting multi-row coils (on VERY dirty systems) and washing the coil against the airflow (usually from the inside out).

Lots of commercial equipment use belts, so HVAC technicians should know how to work on them. Unfortunately, many HVAC technicians aren't great at aligning and tensioning belts. Bryan is of the school of thought that many belts that are adjusted should just be replaced.

When working on gas equipment on rooftops, you can perform very accurate combustion analysis because the flue is in an ideal location for testing. Grilles are also very important in commercial HVAC, and the best practice is to check them for restrictions.

As always, you cannot underestimate the importance of visual inspection, "do no harm," and making sure the equipment is running when you leave.

The Erics, John, and Bryan also discuss:

• Drain pan cleaning tips
• Neutralizing algae in drains
• Clearing drains with nitrogen or shop vacs
• Transfer pumps
• Paperwork and documentation
• Environmental reasons NOT to clean coils needlessly
• Microchannel coils
• Quoting specific procedures
• Belt longevity
• Browning tools and literature
• Checking for phase imbalance
• Benchmarking equipment
• Maintenance people vs. technicians
• Communication