The Air Conditioning, Heating, Refrigerating Exposition-Mexico (AHR Expo-Mexico), held Sept. 22-24, was an intimate affair. It had approximately 300 exhibitors in 40,000 square feet of space. But what it lacks in size, the Mexico expo makes up in status. All the big names were here, including Trane, Carrier, Lennox, Rheem, and York.

A bumper crop of new thermostats has hit the market this year. In addition, new controls and building automation products are taking the HVACR industry by storm. Some of the latest t-stats and controls are described in this feature.

Homeowners can save money on their heating-cooling bills by turning back their thermostat. With programmable thermostats, this can be done automatically without sacrificing comfort. New technology is on the way to make homeowners less intimidated by this type of thermostat.

In many parts of the country, people haven't switched off their air conditioners, but here at The News, we're already thinking about all the new boilers, furnaces, and heat pumps being offered by manufacturers. The News' annual Heating Showcase is here.

Every year, new and improved products flood the HVACR market. These run the gamut from new A/C and heating systems to innovative tools and software. The products highlighted here are just a few of the items that are new and/or improved for the industry.

When Universal Technical Institute (UTI) moved into its new facilities in June 2004, it did not want to take any of the equipment left from its now-defunct HVACR program. That was good news to cross-town "rival" Refrigeration School Inc. (RSI).

What do homeowners do when they move into a new house and discover that their HVAC systems are not keeping them comfortable? When these homeowners learned of the benefits of geothermal systems, they replaced their equipment with a geothermal heat pump.

Valeriy Maisotsenko told colleague Tim Heaton about his dream of implementing a new cooling method. Heaton saw the potential and a company was put together. Within a year, the firm had a product that could cool below wet bulb temperature without adding humidity.

Those in Phoenix have been asked to cut back energy usage, such as turning up the temperature on their A/C, until the replacement transformer is on-line. Since people haven't suffered consequences, most have slipped back into comfortable temperatures of 78 degrees to 80 degrees.

Payless Insulation recently started manufacturing patented cotton insulated semi-flex air ducts called Superior Air Ducts. Bonded Logic makes the cotton in these new ducts only for Payless. Ihe product is said to be a new generation of environmentally friendly, sturdy, higher-efficiency ductwork.