Ductless HVAC and Mini Split Systems
A ductless mini split is one outdoor unit tied to one or more indoor heads. No ducts, no vents, no returns. It heats and cools room by room. If one room in your house is always ten degrees off, this is the fix. We install, repair, and maintain them across Clark and Floyd County.
Henry Brothers is two brothers, Justin and Nick Henry, running a residential heating and cooling company out of Charlestown, Indiana. Ductless is the work we do most. We have hung heads in garages, sunrooms, bonus rooms over garages, and old farmhouses that never had a duct in them. This page covers what a ductless system is, where it earns its keep in a Clark or Floyd County house, what it takes to keep one running, and what we charge to maintain it. Call (812) 994-1008 or schedule below.
What a Ductless Mini Split Is
Two pieces do the work. Outside, a condenser about the size of a large suitcase sits on a pad or a wall bracket. Inside, a head hangs high on the wall, drops into a ceiling, or sits low near the floor. Between them runs a line set: two insulated copper refrigerant lines, a control wire, and a condensate drain, bundled together and fed through a hole in the wall about three inches across. That hole is the whole demolition. No trunk line, no plenum, no returns cut into a ceiling, no soffit framed to hide a duct run. We can put a head in a finished bedroom on a Tuesday and by Wednesday the only thing different about the room is that it holds temperature. Every head carries its own remote and its own setpoint. The bedroom sits at 68 all night while the living room sits at 72 and the guest room sits off entirely. That is the part that sells people. You stop paying to condition rooms nobody is standing in. If the words are new, start with mini split and ductless HVAC in our dictionary.
It Is a Heat Pump, Running Both Directions
A mini split does not burn anything and it does not make heat. It moves heat. In July it pulls heat out of your living room and drops it in the back yard. In January it runs the same cycle backward, pulling heat out of cold outdoor air and carrying it inside. There is usable heat in 10-degree air, which sounds wrong until you have stood next to a unit doing it. The compressor is the difference. A ductless compressor is inverter driven, so it ramps up and down like a gas pedal instead of snapping on and off like a light switch. It runs long and slow at low speed, which holds a room inside a degree and pulls more water out of the air on an August afternoon. The ENERGY STAR air source heat pump guide walks the same ground from a neutral source. There is no combustion in the room either, so no flue, no gas line, and no carbon monoxide in that part of the house.
Where Ductless Wins in a Southern Indiana House
Ductless does not replace every furnace in the county. It wins when there is nowhere to run a duct, or when one part of the house has been wrong since the day it was built. These are the calls we take most weeks.
The Addition Nobody Sized For
Somebody added a room and tied it into the existing trunk line with one flex run. The furnace never had the capacity for it, so the room runs cold in January and stuffy in July. One head sized to that room ends the argument.
Bonus Rooms Over the Garage
Heat rises, the garage underneath is unconditioned, and the duct run to that room is the longest in the house. It sits ten degrees off in both directions. A single head on its own setpoint fixes it without touching the rest of the system.
Sunrooms and Three-Season Porches
Glass on three sides, thin walls, and no duct within thirty feet. A sunroom swings hard with the weather. One head turns a room you use two months a year into a room you use twelve.
Detached Garages and Shops
Your furnace was never going to reach the garage, and trenching duct out there is not a project anyone wants to pay for. One head handles most two-car garages, heat in winter and cooling in summer, off a line set through the wall.
Pole Barns and Workshops
Metal building, high ceiling, insulation in about half of it. We size for the space you actually work in and mount the head where the air lands on you instead of on the rafters.
Old Houses With No Duct Space
Plaster walls, balloon framing, nine-foot ceilings, and no chase anywhere. Cutting duct into a house like that costs more than the equipment does. Ductless goes in around all of it.
The One Room That Is Always Off
Every house has one. Back bedroom, office over a crawlspace, the far corner of a finished basement. If your fix so far is a space heater in winter and a window unit in summer, one head replaces both.
Whole-Home Ductless
Four or five heads on one or two condensers and no ductwork at all. It costs more up front than a furnace swap and it gives you a setpoint in every room. We run both numbers with you before anyone signs anything.
Justin on Line Sets and Where the Hole Goes
Justin walks the outside of the house before he picks up a tool. He is looking for the shortest clean path from the head to the condenser, a route where the drain falls the whole way with no trap in it, and a wall penetration that lands behind a downspout or under an eave instead of dead center on the front of the house. On the ranch houses all over Clark County the condenser usually ends up on a back corner, set on a stand so leaves and mower discharge stay out of the coil. He pulls a vacuum on every line set and then walks away from it. If the micron gauge holds while he cleans up his tools, the line set is dry and he opens the service valves. If it climbs, he finds out why before any refrigerant moves. Moisture left in a line set does not fail on install day. It fails three summers later, and by then nobody connects the two.
What Actually Breaks on a Ductless System
Justin starts a no-cooling call at the indoor head, not at the condenser. Most ductless repairs we run are not refrigerant leaks. They are water and dirt. The condensate drain on a wall head is a small line with a gentle fall, and Clark and Floyd County humidity keeps it wet from May through September. Algae builds up, the drain backs up, and the head either drips down the wall or shuts itself off on a float switch. The other one is the blower wheel. A mini split filter is a plastic screen, not a pleated filter, and if nobody has rinsed it in four years the wheel behind it is packed. The unit still runs. It just moves half the air it used to, and the room quits holding temperature. Both of those are maintenance items, which is why we push the visit instead of the part.
Sizing: One Head or Four
Head count is a calculation, not a preference. We measure the rooms, count the windows, look at what sits above and below the space, and ask how you actually use it. A 24,000 BTU condenser feeding two rooms that need 9,000 each is not a bargain. It is a system that short cycles, never dries the air out, and wears itself out early. Oversizing is the most common mistake we find on ductless systems other companies put in. The ductless mini split installation page lists what we check and what comes with the job.
What Install Day Looks Like
Most single-zone installs are finished in one day. Multi-zone jobs run into a second. This is the order it happens in.
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1. We Look at the Room
We walk the space, measure it, and ask what you do in there. No quote gets written off a phone call and a square footage number.
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2. You Get the Price in Writing
Equipment, line set, electrical, mounting, startup, and haul-off, itemized on one page. That number does not move on install day.
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3. Mounting and the Line Set
Bracket on the wall, head hung level, a three-inch hole cored and sleeved, line set run and secured. Outside, the condenser goes on a pad or a bracket up off the ground.
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4. Vacuum, Charge, and Startup
We pull the system into a deep vacuum and prove it holds before any refrigerant moves. Then we run it in cooling and in heating and take readings on both.
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5. We Hand You the Remote
We set it up, show you the modes worth using and the two that waste money, and show you where the filter screens come out.
Install, Repair, Maintain
Three things happen to a ductless system over its life. We do all three, and the same two people do them.
Ductless Mini Split Installation
Load calculation on your actual house, written quote, electrical and startup included. Single zone or every room.
Mini split installationDuctless Repair
No cooling, no heat, water on the wall, a blinking light and a code nobody can read. We diagnose first and quote before we fix.
Ductless repairClean and Check℠
Coil cleaning, drain clearing, filter screens, electrical check, and a performance test on every head you own.
Clean and Check℠When a Ductless System Quits
Call the symptom, not the diagnosis. Blowing warm, blowing nothing, dripping down the wall, ice on the outdoor coil, a light on the head flashing a count you cannot read. We come out, find the fault, and hand you a number before we open a box. Refrigerant work is not a homeowner job and it is not a handyman job either. Anyone opening a sealed system has to be certified under EPA Section 608, and the recovery equipment costs more than most people expect. Ductless repair covers what we check and what it usually turns out to be.
Ductless Maintenance and What It Costs
A ductless head lives in the room with you, so everything the room has floats through it. A Clean and Check℠ visit runs $99 and covers the outdoor unit plus one indoor head: coils cleaned, drain cleared and flushed, filter screens washed, electrical connections checked, refrigerant pressures read, and a temperature split taken at the head. Each additional head is $50 on the same trip. Two visits a year, one before cooling season and one before heating season, puts a single-head system at $198 for the year. Two Seasons Membership books both visits, takes 10% off every repair, and keeps track of the dates so you do not have to. The flat annual membership price is written for furnace and central AC systems, so ductless maintenance is billed by the visit instead. The ENERGY STAR maintenance checklist lines up with what we do.
$99 per visit
Clean and Check℠
The outdoor unit plus one indoor head. Coils, drain, filter screens, electrical, and a performance test at the head.
$50 each extra head
Multi-Zone Homes
Every additional indoor head on the same trip. Four heads still means one visit and one appointment to keep.
$0 trip charge
Coming Out Costs Nothing
Anywhere in Clark or Floyd County. We look, we measure, and the number reaches you before any work starts.
When Ductless Is Not the Cheaper Answer
If your house already has sound ductwork and a furnace near the end of its life, ductless is usually not the cheaper answer. Replacing what is there costs less than hanging four heads, and the duct you already paid for is worth using. If the duct leaks, the math changes fast. ENERGY STAR puts the loss in a typical house at 20 to 30 percent of the air moving through the duct system. We tell you which side of that line you are on before you spend anything. The other road is ducted heat pump installation, which uses the runs you already own, and all of our furnace, central AC, and heat pump work sits on its own hub.
Ductless by Town
- Mini Split Installation in Charlestown
- Mini Split Installation in Clarksville
- Mini Split Installation in Jeffersonville
- Mini Split Installation in New Albany
- Mini Split Installation in Sellersburg
- Mini Split Installation in Floyds Knobs
- Mini Split Repair in Charlestown
- Mini Split Repair in Jeffersonville
- Mini Split Repair in Sellersburg
- Mini Split Repair in New Albany
- Clean and Check℠ in Charlestown
Where We Work
Fourteen towns across Clark and Floyd County, Indiana, all inside about 20 miles of the shop in Charlestown. Houses, not rental portfolios. Every town has its own page on the service areas list.
Common Ductless Questions
What is a ductless mini split?
One outdoor condenser, one or more indoor heads, and a bundle of copper lines running between them through a hole about three inches across. There is no ductwork anywhere in it. Each head heats and cools its own room on its own setpoint, and the dictionary entry breaks every part down in plain words.
Does a ductless system heat, or only cool?
Both, out of the same equipment. A mini split is a heat pump, so in winter it runs the refrigerant cycle backward and pulls heat out of cold outdoor air. Nothing burns, so there is no flue and no gas line in that room. Our ductless HVAC entry explains the term without the sales pitch.
How many indoor heads does a house need?
That falls out of a load calculation, never a guess. We measure each room, count windows, and look at what sits above and below the space before sizing the condenser. Oversizing short cycles and leaves the air damp. The installation page lists everything we check before we write a number.
What does ductless maintenance cost?
A Clean and Check℠ visit runs $99 for the outdoor unit and one indoor head, plus $50 for each additional head on the same trip. Two visits a year puts a single-head system at $198. The Clean and Check℠ page lists the whole checklist.
How long does a mini split installation take?
Most single-zone installs are finished in one day. We measure, hang the head, core the wall, run the line set, pull a vacuum, and test heating and cooling before we leave. Multi-zone jobs can run into a second day. The Charlestown install page walks through the local version.
What usually breaks on a ductless system?
Water and dirt, far more often than refrigerant. A clogged condensate drain backs up and trips the float switch, so the head quits. A filter screen nobody has rinsed lets the blower wheel pack with dust until the room stops holding temperature. Ductless repair covers the rest of the list.
Is ductless cheaper to run than a furnace and central air?
Depends on what your duct is doing. ENERGY STAR puts the loss in a typical house at 20 to 30 percent of the air moving through the duct system, and ductless has none to lose. Where the duct is already sound, replacing what you have can still win, and the HVAC hub covers that side.
Can you service a mini split another company installed?
We work on every major ductless brand, whoever hung it. A good share of our repair calls are on systems we did not put in, and some of those turn into a fix for how the thing was mounted or charged in the first place. The Jeffersonville repair page shows what that looks like.
What do you charge to come out and look?
There is no trip charge anywhere in Clark or Floyd County. We come out, look at the room or the system, and hand you a number in writing before any work starts. The price we quote is the price you pay. You can schedule a visit online in about a minute.
One Room Off, or the Whole House?
Tell us what the room does now and what you want it to do. We come out, measure, and hand you a number in writing. Clark County. Floyd County. No trip charge.