I won't ruin your day then and tell you about my Lennox A/C, for which they settled a class action on (leaky evaporator coil), and still wouldn't honor warranty - twice. Both times were by a official Lennox dealer. They just shrugged their shoulders. Corporate wouldn't respond to a vm, or registered letter.
Anyone with an AC unit should locate the capacitor, take a picture of it and the numbers on it. Then order a spare on Amazon for <$20. Nine out of ten times that’s what goes bad and takes 15 minutes to replace. Lots of YouTube videos. Service call will cost hundreds even by an honest company.I'll chime in! About 2 years ago summertime heat and I turned on the AC, all operational sounds were normal, meaning the fan was blowing, then I realize that I was sweating bullets and things were not cooling off. I did the usual checks and noticed that the outside condenser motor was not running at all just the internal interior fan was blowing. Not knowing anything about HVAC systems I called a local company, and speaking with him they wanted 125 to do a service call evaluation and estimate if needed.
The service tech over the phone said since the condenser motor is not spinning it most likely is frozen since it was a 10 year old unit, and that would be in the neighborhood of 3400. That would include new motor testing the system blah blah blah blah.
I called another company same blah blah and spoke with a few local homeowners which knew less than I did at this point!
I proceeded to search the internet for more information as to why my condenser motor is not spinning. The long story short is that it came back to a faulty capacitor on the outside unit.
I did a simple home test with my voltmeter following the directions. And of course I was Ultra safe by powering everything off and I knew that capacitors from experience do hold a charge, so I tried to discharge the capacitor, but the immediate result was no charge and bad ohm reading.
Ordered the capacitor online for $14 and took a gamble that that was it.
That was the fix a bad capacitor and I lucked out and had cold air and still using the AC.
The more I read about AC HVAC units and like that YouTube video shows the sequence of operation gives a person added knowledge so when they do call the HVAC Tech, they at least know what they are talking about. Good luck
I agree, but there are at least 2 on a conventional system - one on the air handler, and one on the condenser. I also keep a spare contactor for the condenser as well. To your point, there all under $20 online. An AC contractor will want $200 plus labor.
This is just me, I'm no longer "shy" about double-checking things, car repair, any repair. I'd ask to see the part they're installing, and the one that comes out (I may even ask to keep the old part but maybe there's a core who knows), and take pics of them. Due to the ECM vs. PSC motors. I saw a YouTube where the channel had no shame in installing a PSC when an ECM came out. He said the homeowner will never even know the difference and this was the part that was available the soonest. Again the no heat bothers me (I can only imagine you) so hope you're back to normal in a couple of days!
Yes. I think the service man that was sent on the holiday callout was incompetent.
Well, any other HVAC company is just as capable of fleecing you as this one.
A good HVAC technician is like a good, honest independent mechanic. When you find either, treat them like family since they are worth their weight in gold and hard to come by.
I doubt that a PSC is an easy drop-in hookup for an ECM. But even if it was, he did the home owner a favor.
It took one of them to answer my question, “If the $8 (2018) filter worked from 2002 until this year, how come it won’t anymore?”
You either need to step up and be firmer with "helping" your parents when it comes to things like this or stay out of it. I can tell you this, our ~20 year old furnace (original to the house) had the main board get burned up. Our HVAC guy's first step was call the supply house about a replacement part. He spoke to them, then spoke to me and said "I've got good news and bad news. Good news is the board is available, bad news is it's $600." I asked him jokingly, "how much is a new furnace?", he gave me a ballpark #, and I said please order the part. He's done a few other repairs over the years, checks the refrigerant level, etc and has even bought a part for me to replace myself.
Which capacitors are these ?
I like to think we've got a good one. I recommend him all the time to others too.
