Des Peres is a compact west St. Louis County municipality, 4.3 square miles with roughly 9,170 residents,, about 11 miles west of the Gateway Arch. It is about as close to all-houses as a suburb gets: Census tables put detached single-family homes at 98% of the housing stock, and its median home went up in 1976.
A mid-70s house and its cooling equipment
Builders in the mid-70s generally installed cooling at construction, so trunk lines were laid out to move summer airflow, a real advantage. The catch is that the outdoor unit has probably been swapped two or three times since, and each swap may have been matched to whatever coil happened to fit on top of the furnace. A mismatched coil and condenser pair can short-cycle, leave the basement clammy, and never quite pull humidity down in August.
Gas heat, electric cooling
Utility gas warms about 84% of Des Peres's 3,195 households, with electricity covering roughly 15%. For most owners that means the practical project is a new AC condenser plus a correctly matched evaporator coil mounted over a gas furnace that stays in place. Should that furnace also be worn out, doing the pair together lets blower output and coil capacity line up.
Is a heat pump worth a look?
Owners among that electric 15%, or anyone weighing a hybrid gas-plus-electric setup, can use a heat pump can handle summer cooling and shoulder-season heat while the gas burner covers January cold snaps.
Warning signs worth acting on
- R-22 refrigerant listed on the outdoor nameplate
- Ice forming on the copper suction line
- Rooms upstairs running several degrees warmer than the thermostat
- A condenser fan that hums but starts slowly
Ordering from us
Des Peres jobs are scheduled with west-county St. Louis crews; the equipment itself is sold manufacturer-to-homeowner by Furnace Direct, a DBA of Hamlin Mechanical LLC. Scheduling is simplest between December and April, well ahead of June humidity. Jot down the nameplate data from both the outdoor unit and the furnace, and ring (888) 762-1334 — Call for Pricing.
Figures above: Census Bureau ACS (2020–2024), Des Peres profile on Census Reporter.
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