HIGH-PERFORMANCEHVAC TODAY TMIf You Don’t Measure, You’re Just Guessing!™hvactoday.comSEPTEMBER 2019A Day in the Life of an HVAC TechnicianTurn Disaster into Delight: Go Beyond the BoilerWhy Contractors Choose to Test, Diagnose, and Upgrade Systems IS YOUR BUSINESS Ready for Fall?SEPTEMBER 2019 3HVACTODAY.COMSEPTEMBER 2019 VOLUME 3 NUMBER 9HIGH-PERFORMANCEHVAC TODAY TMSERVICE:Turn Disaster into Delight: Going Beyond the BoilerContractor Tom Soukup turns a hydronics nightmare into a customer delight outcome. He explains the problems and his solutions.TECHNICAL:From the Field: A Day in the Life of an HVAC TechnicianIn a typical day, whenever an HVAC tech creates a scope of work, they should consider that for every action they take, there is always a reaction.MANAGEMENT:Why Contractors Choose to Test, Diagnose, and Upgrade SystemsRob Falke explains the advantages of differentiation in a marketplace riddled with dissatisfied consumers.12 DEPARTMENTSToday’s Word .........................................................................................5High-Performance Product Reviews .............................................6Contractor Spotlight: Jerry Kelly Heating & AC .......................8Photo of the Month .........................................................................19Member Update ...............................................................................20HVAC Smart Mart ...............................................................................21Ad Index ................................................................................................21One More Thing ................................................................................221714SEPTEMBER 2019 5HVACTODAY.COMTODAY’S WORDBy Mike WeilAs you read this, the crazy busy sum-mer season is starting to wrap up and Fall is peering out from those first few leaves beginning to change color. Is your business ready for the change in season?A lot of effort goes into getting ready. That in-cludes making the investment in time and money to keep your team’s education going.Yes, training, in all its forms, is an investment in the future. It’s an investment for the creation of good times and to protect your company during bad ones. It’s about learning how to do your job better, to keep your team’s skills sharp, and to find better ways to make your products and ser-vices more appealing to customers.Experts will tell you that training should be measured based on the business metrics you wish to advance. What do I mean? Let’s look at the example of taking that first step in Perfor-mance-Based Contracting™: how to properly in-stall static pressure test ports. Think about some results you could measure over, say, six months following training. You could look for increases or decreases in: zRevenue generated by trained participants and measured static pressures zError rate or system errors done by trained participants zCustomer satisfaction as it relates to trained participants zRetention rate of trained participants.Being able to measure the results you achieve through training is key to shifting your per-ception from it being an expense to an invest-ment in the growth and success of the business.We all know that technicians often are not too keen on classroom training, so it is import-ant to find ways to help them develop a desire to learn. That includes mixing things up by com-bining classroom and hands-on training. Your training can also include having them work with and learn about the amazing and cool test in-struments and tools necessary to conduct High- Performances services.By the way, there is nothing wrong with helping build technician pride by showing them how no one else in the market can do Air Upgrades. You can share customer kudos when trained techni-cians help them really see their comfort problems and resolve them.For you, training and certification offer other advantages including market differentiation, higher ticket sales, “more betta” problem-solv-ing skills, less personnel turnover, and they can even act as a magnet to attract new talent to your team.For example, take a look at Casey Contreras’ ar-ticle on a day in the life of a service tech (page 12 or at ncilink.com/DayInLife). He shows how training can make all the difference in a techni-cians day.Contractor Tom Soukup talks about how train-ing and technical expertise allowed him to move from being an HVAC company into a specialist in hydronics and how that changed his profitability. That’s on page 14 or at ncilink.com/hydronics.Also read Rob Falke’s article on how to get your techs on board by helping them understand the “Why” behind Performance-Based Contract-ing. This can lead to them becoming more en-thusiastic about their technical and soft skills training. Check that out on page 17 or at ncil-ink.com/Why?.When you change how you treat training — from an expense to an investment — you change the conversation and your bottom line. That is a win for your company, a win for your technicians, and most importantly, a win for your customers.So are you ready for the Fall heating and train-ing season? Mike Weil is editor-in- chief and director of communications and publications at National Comfort Institute, Inc. Contact him at MikeW@ncihvac.com.Get Ready for Fall: Keep the Learning Going6 SEPTEMBER 2019HIGH-PERFORMANCE HVAC TODAYbe connected at one time, minimizing testing time while increasing measure-ment accuracy. For larger commercial systems, you can use Fieldpiece’s Job Link smart-phone app to re-ceive data from additional psy-chrometers, if necessary. Using the Job Link app, you can enter airflow from AirMaxx and live Btu calculations are dis-played on the screen. This be-comes a powerful way to dis-play the operating efficiency of your customer’s equipment. For example, two probes can measure equipment heat-ing capacity in the heating season, and the customer can see improvements in capacity as you improve combustion efficiency.During cooling season, the probes can verify evaporator operation and in-dicate externally whether gauges should be connected to the system. Learn more about AirMaxx at ncilink.com/AirMaxx. It can be downloaded for free at both the Apple and Google Play stores.If you’re looking for a tool to speed up or discover new service opportunities, visualize performance loss to custom-ers, or ease the sales process by provid-ing more facts to the customer, then the JL3RH is the tool for you.For more information or to buy this instrument from the NCI Store, go to ncilink.com/FieldpieceJL3RH.– Justin Bright, National Comfort Institute Field Coach and InstructorFIELDPIECE JL3RH PSYCHROMETERGone are the days of racing around a house with a psy-chrometer trying to reduce the time between register and grille temperature mea-surements. Fieldpiece has cre-ated the JL3RH wireless psy-chrometer. In Fieldpiece’s efforts to respond to contractors input on tool design, the JL3RH is de-signed with flexibility and ease of use in mind. The flexible neck and sliding mounting magnet simplifies mount-ing and positioning the probe tip to eliminate room air entrainment that affects the readings. Several of these psychrometers can HIGH-PERFORMANCE PRODUCT REVIEWSWritten By HVAC Professionals for HVAC ProfessionalsSEPTEMBER 2019 7HVACTODAY.COMout of the way to use your balancing hood. The TSI/Alnor 801090 16” x 16” matrix has a leave-your-ladder-in-the-truck feature, using a pole that extends and re-tracts. Just like any other velocity measuring device, the EBT730 micromanometer (that’s used with the matrix) can be set up to display CFM (cubic feet per minute) on the screen. This saves you time on math calcula-tions. The device averages 16-point air volume/air velocity measurements and has an air velocity range of 25 to 2500 fpm (feet per minute).However, the velocity matrix has one downside. For those of you who mea-sure economizer airflow, it isn’t the best tool to use on windy days. Because the test ports are open with no protection, there could be large fluc-tuations in velocity mea-surements. When used to measure open-area air-flow, it works very well. All in all, it’s a great instrument.For more information or to purchase the 801090 Velocity Matrix, visit the NCI Store here: ncilink.com/VelocityMatrix.To learn more about EBT73 Microma-nometer, go to ncilink.com/EBT730.To learn more about how to use this manometer, NCI members can down-load a Tech Tip here: ncilink.com/EBT730TechTip. – By Casey Contreras, National Comfort Institute Field Coach and InstructorTSI/ALNOR VELOCITY MATRIX Watching my son while he plays takes me back to when I was a kid. I remem-ber how anything that was in the shape of a sword was the coolest thing ever! Well, you can get that feeling back while you’re at work. Become the air balancing Jedi that you deserve to be.The TSI/Alnor 801090 velocity matrix has always been my fall-back instrument when it comes to using other tools in undesirable locations. Like a ninja in the night, the velocity matrix increases your speed and accuracy.The velocity matrix is the same grid found in the bottom of balancing hoods. The difference is, it’s on a stick. This in-strument is extremely beneficial for mea-suring economizers, kitchen hoods, or if you are just too tired to move furniture 8 SEPTEMBER 2019HIGH-PERFORMANCE HVAC TODAYservice revenue was residential and 15% commercial. Replacement rev-enue came in at 95% residential and only 5% commercial. “Then I had to guesstimate what my opportunity loss was putting off pos-sible residential replacement customers for our commercial customers who mostly wouldn’t even use us if they did need new equipment.”His conclusion? He says, “In commercial work, most of the time you are dealing with a tenant-landlord situation where the tenant is responsible for maintaining equipment and making small repairs. “The landlord is responsible for equipment replacement. In our case, we had a relationship with the tenant, not the landlord. Realizing this, we de-cided to make the switch to focus only on the residential marketplace.”SEVEN-DAY WORK WEEKAt the time of Jerry Kelly’s retire-ment, the company was pulling in around $7 million in gross revenue and fielded eight to 10 service trucks and three or four installation trucks.Today, Jerry Kelly Heating is pac-ing to do around $12.5 million. Miles explains that they’ve gone to a seven-day-per-week schedule, so trucks get shared and today they have 16 to 18 service trucks on the road and sev-en installation trucks.The team now consists of 67 people. Steve Miles says when you go to a sev-en-day work week, you need to put on more personnel to cover the hours and keep them from burning out.When it comes to sales, the compa-ny has evolved from having just Jerry Kelly and Steve Miles selling, to hav-ing a professional team that includes a sales manager and two salesmen – all of whom report to Miles. They also have ‘selling’ technicians.Just three years ago they moved into a new 21,000 sq. ft. facility. It’s set up in a completely open format – no walls, only a few offices, lots of windows. Miles explains the idea was to create a more open, collaborative environment. The keyword here is collaborative.He is always on the lookout to find talented people, not necessarily from within the HVAC Industry, who have a mechanical aptitude and solid attitude. Jerry Kelly Heating and Air Con-ditioning is a family-owned business founded by Jerry and Janet Kelly in 1977. In those early days, the company had five tech-nicians who drove used trucks to jobs throughout their St. Charles, MO market area. Jerry has since retired and his son-in-law, Steve Miles has taken over. The fact is, Miles, who joined the company in 1994 as a dispatcher, has been general manager of the firm since 1998.When he first joined the company, Jerry Kelly Heating did mostly resi-dential service and replacement with a small percentage of commercial work.“We’ve always been into retrofit, re-placement, and repair,” says Miles. After my father-in-law retired some eight to 10 years ago, we went strict-ly residential repair and replacement. We had one or two legacy commercial customers.”Miles, whose background is in elec-trical contracting (he even owned an electrical contracting firm once upon a time), says he sat down and did an anal-ysis of the company’s business model. “Service drives replacement. You can make money at service, but the big dollars really come from replace-ment,” he explains. “So I analyzed how much of our ser-vice revenue was commercial and how much was residential. I also compared commercial replacement revenue to residential. I found that 85% of our CONTRACTOR SPOTLIGHTBy Mike WeilProfessionalism and PerformanceRequire Continuous TrainingSteve MilesWith a seven-day work week, the company needed to ramp up personnel and vehicles. Today the team consists of 67 people and 16 to 18 trucks to cover the hours.SEPTEMBER 2019 9HVACTODAY.COM“Then we train them to be mainte-nance techs, using Joe Cunningham’s Technical Arts Center (facebook.com/SuccesstrackNetwork) in Houston, TX, Ben Stark’s Go Time Success Group (gotimesuccess-group.com), Jimmy Hiller’s Total Tech (totaltechschool.com) and Ultimate Technician Academy (ul-timatetechnician.com). Those are the four schools we use regularly.”CONTINUOUS TRAININGMiles says their training program can best be described as creating career paths for his technicians. New hires go to one of the above-mentioned schools for two weeks, depending on the cours-es offered and given times. He describes his training program for new hires in three steps: zTwo weeks at one of the four out-of-town training schools zTwo weeks of in-house training to learn how we do things and how it translates to the real world zTwo to four weeks riding with a more experienced tech.“So now we’re into eight to 10 weeks of training. After that, they will go out and run their own maintenance calls under supervision. Gradually we give them more “rope,”’ Miles adds.“That is just for one season. When the next season rolls around, we re-peat the process. So, they get eight to 10 weeks of training each for the heat-ing and cooling seasons.”CONTINUOUS RECRUITING“I think our growth is really due to the type of people we have on our front lines. It revolves around finding and hiring the right people, training them well, and paying them well,” Miles says. “We also visit tech schools and mar-ket to ex-military people and so on. It’s difficult, but you have to keep after it.” To help, Miles says he is toying with the idea of hiring a professional re-cruiter. He adds, “We very seldom hire people with HVAC Industry experi-ence. We find in this economy, if they are in the job market, there is a reason. So, we try to recruit people from out-side the industry who have some me-chanical aptitude and a desire to learn. Jerry Kelly Heating has a large training room in the new 21,000 sq.ft. facility.Next >