Tuesday night, after Hick had gone to bed, I noticed that our thermostat read 75 degrees. That is unusual. It is set to hold at 74. Oh, well. Maybe the house had heated up with the setting sun on the front of the house all evening, and it was getting ready to kick on. But wait. It sounded like the air conditioner WAS on. Yet I didn't feel air coming out the vents. I turned it to HEAT instead of COOL. It went off. After a half hour, I turned it back to COOL.
I sat down to watch TV, with a semi-conscious ear on the air conditioner. An hour passed. Still running. Now it was midnight, and the temp was 74 degrees. But the AC didn't kick off. I had no choice, did I? I woke up Hick.
"I think something might be wrong with the air conditioning. It sounds like it's running, but the blower won't kick off. It was 75. I turned it to heat for about a half hour, so it stopped. Then I turned it back on. It's gone back down to 74 now, but keeps running."
Hick got out of bed and went into the master bathroom.
"It's blowing cool air. It's probably fine."
"Oh. Well. Sorry for waking you."
When Hick got up Wednesday morning, the first thing he did was go down to the basement to check on the AC. It was 75 degrees. Still running. Hadn't kicked off all night.
"Something's wrong, isn't it? Remember how every couple of years we have to get more coolant. I think they always say it's a slow leak that they can't find?"
"Yeah. It's froze up. It keeps blowing because it can't get no air across the coils. It keeps trying. Probably because it's low on coolant. I turned it off. You can turn it back on in an hour or so and it might work okay. It will have a chance to thaw out, the longer you leave it off. I'll call and see if I can get somebody out here."
Hick was gone to Illinois all day, buying merchandise for his SUS2.5 (Storage Unit Store 2.5). I didn't turn the AC on until 3:30. It was a cloudy rainy day, temps in low 70s outside. It cooled from 77 down to 75, but then quit blowing air out the vents, though it was still running. So I turned it off again.
Hick said he called his AC guy, who said he was just recovering from back surgery. He called his company for Hick, and they said they could have somebody here Thursday evening. Hick said he might look into getting a new unit, since this one is getting pretty old. But his AC guy said he'd wait at least a year, because the industry is switching to a new kind of coolant, and prices are really high right now.
I guess it behooves Hick to have an AC guy. And also to have a wife who knows what is wrong with the air conditioner.
You've got a good ear! Hopefully the temporary fix holds out for the summer.
ReplyDeleteIt was nice and chilly when I got home from town! The repair guy came at 3:00, instead of the scheduled 4:00 to 6:00.
DeleteMy aircon is a split system with the motor outside the building and the blower inside. It's been running perfectly for 12 years now. There was a funny smell one time and I called a technician, who said he rarely gets calls out for this particular brand and one other brand, asked me about how I was using it then told me after a cooling cycle instead of turning it off right away, I should run just the fan for a half hour to dry any remaining water off the coils. Now I do that and have never had any more trouble.
ReplyDeleteOurs has the outside part where the guy put in the coolant, and an inside unit in the basement in Hick's workshop. That's the extent of my knowledge, heh, heh! It does the heating and cooling. We set the thermostat for each, and let it run, figuring it has been programmed to do its job efficiently.
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