AC unit question

Cherokeekid88

Cherokeekid88

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jun 30, 2007
Location
High Point, NC
So just moved in our house a week ago. The wife noticed this afternoon that the house was not cooling down. T stat was set on 72 and inside temp was reading 80. I start to look around and turn the ac unit off then back on again and walk outside to the ac unit to find that the fan is not moving but I can hear the unit doing something, like humming....I know absolutely nothing about ac units and am just trying to figure out what's going on.
 
Sounds like the capacitor in the heat pump.
Should look something like this.
ImageUploadedByTapatalk1378512167.797838.jpg


Maybe more cylindrical shaped.

But I'm no AC guy. There's plenty of those on here. I'm just going by my experience.
 
If the fan isn't running, lay a box fan on top of the unit and duct tape around it. It'll get you through until you can get it fixed!
 
Had the problem of outdoor fan not coming on. Techs would show up, Watch it for up to an hour, working fine. They leave,fan goes off. Turned out to be a loose wire/connection, from the inside unit.
But 1 thing I did, outside unit had a switch similar to a well pump or compressor switch [twin contacts]. I wedged it in the ON position, & used the manual fan switch,on my thermostat, until I could get
the RIGHT guy here to fix it/find the problem.
 
Ok when you say heat pump....that's the thing inside the house right? Has nothing to do with the outside ac unit? And why would the capacitor failing cause the outside ac unit fan to come spin?
 
Money is on the capacitor. ~$10.
Only challenge might be finding an HVAC place that will sell you one. A lot are "protective" and only sell to HVAC guys.

98% of the time when they fail, it will have a big bulge where it blew out.
 
Cherokeekid88 said:
Anyone know of any places around greensboro/high point that would have capacitors on hand? And open on Saturday?
Click to expand...
May check out lowes, if not hit the yellow pages for eletric motor repair shops. They may have something... Also check electronics of nc on high point road(if they are still open) they use to have some...
 
I picked up mine from Ebay but it took a couple of days to show up.Make sure the connectors at the capacitor are in good shape.The connectors will burn out from time to time and cause the same problem.Last time I had to replace the capacitor.No doubt on it as it had poped the top.
 
If you have a meter that will read microfarad call me and I'll walk you thru how to check it. 704-898-7852
 
Can't see the bottom of the capacitor in the pics. Is it bulged out?
We've also had bugs get into some switch, short circuiting it. Maybes its that thing to the lower left of your capacitor.
These things are pretty simple...but I still just call the AC guy to come fix it.
 
you can try to spin the fan when the A/C is on & trying to work
IIRC the capacitor acts like a jump starter for the fan
if you try the sipn the fan it may start working & then you know the capacitor is bad but i would not run the A/C like that
i have a old A/C / heat pump unit & it has a good motor & capacitor you can have if it is the same as yours but i will not be off work until around 7:30 pm
 
It is prob the motor cause most of the time (not always) when dual cap goes bad both sides go bad. U said it was humming so compressor was running. They should change cap with new motor any way so still wouldnt hurt to swap it and see what happens. Up to you but I have a 35/5 440 cap if u want it. It is brand new in box.

Sent from my SPH-L720 using Tapatalk 2
 
For the minimal cost/effort of the cap, I'd try swapping it anyway. Even if it dosn't fix it, put the new cap aside b/c it WILL eventually fail anyway.

And - if you really are serious about being DIY on your house, you really need to buy a decent multimeter. After a good portable drill it's probably one of the most used tools.
 
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