Repair & Diagnostics
The owner diagnoses your system personally. You get findings, causes and practical options — not a script.
Veteran owned · Tacoma & Pierce County
Your HVAC technician shouldn't have a sales quota.
Veteran-owned, locally owned residential heating & cooling for Tacoma and Pierce County. Honest diagnostics. Thoughtful system design. Practical options. The owner personally answers calls and personally diagnoses systems.
No heat? Call us.
Veteran Owned
Owner Operated
Residential Only
WA Lic. DREADL*742KG
Our approach
Repair first. Replace when it makes sense.
There is no commissioned salesperson between you and the technician here. No corporate replacement quota, no script, no one-giant-proposal routine. Recommendations come from what the system is actually doing.
Diagnose honestly
The owner performs the diagnosis and explains what failed, why it failed and what it will take to fix it.
Repair when repair wins
If a repair restores safe, reliable operation at fair value for the age of the system, that's the recommendation.
Replace when replacement wins
When the numbers favor replacement, you get a range of practical equipment and price choices — not a single take-it-or-leave-it number.
Residential services
Heating, cooling & hot water for Pierce County homes
Residential only — houses, not commercial buildings.
Heat Pumps
Ducted heat pump repair, installation and replacement sized to your actual home, not a rule of thumb.
Ductless Mini-Splits
Single- and multi-zone ductless systems for additions, bonus rooms and homes without ductwork.
Furnaces
Gas and electric furnace repair, maintenance and replacement. (We do not promote oil furnace work.)
Water Heaters
Gas, electric, tankless and heat-pump water heaters — installed and replaced for residential homes.
Maintenance & Tune-Ups
Annual maintenance that catches small problems early. A maintenance plan is coming soon.
Replacement & Retrofits
Furnace-to-heat-pump conversions and system retrofits, designed around your house and budget.
Cold-Climate & Electrification
Cold-climate heat pump options for Pacific Northwest winters and homeowners moving toward electric.
Equipment options
Equipment options from trusted HVAC manufacturers
We're not locked into one brand. We source equipment through professional HVAC distributors and match the system to the house, application, performance goals and budget.
- Bosch
- Coleman
- Daikin
- Evcon
- Fujitsu
- Goodman
Brand availability, model availability and program eligibility vary by distributor inventory, application and project. Manufacturer names are used for identification only and do not imply certification or endorsement.
System design
Designed for your house, not a sales target
Comfort problems usually trace back to design, not brand. We take the time to measure and match equipment to the home in front of us.
- Careful measurement of the home — envelope, ductwork, room-by-room load reality.
- Equipment matched to the house and to your budget, not to whatever is on a sales sheet.
- Airflow, static pressure and duct considerations addressed as part of the design.
- Practical options laid out side by side so you can choose, with prices attached.
- Permitting handled as required for the project.
- Dreadnought stands behind its workmanship, subject to project and equipment conditions. Customer-supplied, DIY or partially installed equipment is excluded.
How pricing works
Two kinds of work, two ways we price it
A price given before anyone has seen the home or the equipment is a guess. So we keep it simple and honest: service work gets diagnosed first, project work gets an on-site assessment first.
Service & repairs
We diagnose the system first, then give you the repair price and your options before any repair work starts. You'll know what failed, why, and what it takes to fix it.
Replacement, retrofit & design work
These get an on-site assessment before a firm project proposal. Real conditions change scope, and we'd rather show you an accurate number than a tempting one.
What can change the scope of a project
- Existing equipment — age, condition, capacity and how it has actually been performing.
- Ductwork, airflow and duct routing, including static pressure and distribution problems.
- Venting and combustion air, plus condensate drainage and where it can go.
- Electrical and gas requirements for the equipment being considered.
- Equipment location, access and clearances — how the work can physically be done.
- Code and permit requirements for the project.
- Prior work on the system that has to be corrected or worked around.
- Your goals — comfort, efficiency, adding cooling, budget and how long you plan to stay.
Design work is real work
Some projects require substantial measurement, load calculations, equipment and layout planning, or a full design-build package. For that level of detail, a design or consultation fee may apply. If Dreadnought performs the installation, eligible design fees may be credited toward the project, subject to the terms of the proposal — it isn't automatic. A normal consultation and proposal gives you enough information to make a confident buying decision; the detailed measurements, calculations, layouts and installation plans stay part of the paid design work rather than a free package for another contractor to build from.
What we value
A real person. A local company. Work we're willing to put our name on.
Family and community come first here, and the work reflects it. Craftsmanship, independence and long-term relationships with the people we serve are the reasons this company exists.
Family & community
These are our neighbors' homes. We do the work the way we'd want it done in our own.
Craftsmanship & independence
Resources go toward skilled work, good tools and real service instead of a giant sales organization.
Relationships that last
We're not trying to get the most out of one service call. We want to be the HVAC company you trust enough to call for years.
Trade partners
A local network you can trust
When a project needs electrical or other trade work, Dreadnought brings in trusted licensed, bonded and insured subcontractors — local people with local accountability, working alongside the same owner who diagnosed your system.
Clean energy
Electrification, efficiency & incentives
Heat pumps, cold-climate heat pumps and heat pump water heaters can cut energy use and add cooling to homes that never had it. We're glad to help homeowners move that direction when it fits the house.
We can help identify utility and program incentives you may qualify for. Eligibility varies by utility, home, equipment and program, so we don't quote guaranteed rebate amounts. Financing is not currently offered.
Real work
Real work from Dreadnought jobs
Every card below is reserved for a documented Dreadnought residential job — photographed on site, cropped and captioned by category. No stock technicians, no borrowed photos, nothing pretending to be a job we didn't do.
Project photo coming soon
Heat Pump Installation
Ducted changeout — Tacoma
Project photo coming soon
Ductless System
Mini-split head and line-set routing
Project photo coming soon
Furnace Replacement
Gas furnace swap and venting
Project photo coming soon
System Retrofit
Furnace-to-heat-pump conversion
Project photo coming soon
Water Heater
Heat pump water heater install
Project photo coming soon
Duct & Airflow
Return and duct correction
Owner
About Matt
Matt is a U.S. Navy veteran who served as a cryptologist. After his Navy service he drove commercially, then attended HVAC school and went to work in the trade — starting HVAC businesses of his own and working for established HVAC companies along the way.
Dreadnought Services is his third company. It exists because he wanted homeowners to deal directly with the person doing the diagnosis: no commissioned salesperson in the middle, no replacement quota, no script.
Matt is EPA certified and has training across refrigeration, gas and electrical work. Exact certification titles are being finalized and will be listed here once verified.
Questions
Straight answers
No heat? Call us.
Residential heating and cooling for Tacoma and Pierce County. The owner answers the phone.
We're not trying to get the most out of one service call. We want to be the HVAC company you trust enough to call for years.