Sunday, July 7, 2013

Fixing Air Conditioner Condenser Unit

On July 4th our AC stopped working. I replaced the filter but the inside unit was working fine. It looked like the outside Condenser Unit was to blame as the fan was not spinning and it would only hum and buzz.

This is the Unit that stopped working. Its a fairly large unit as it services a 3 zone system.

Close up of the unit

Turned Outdoor disconnect off. (Inside unit is already off and breakers are off as well but to be sure)

This is what it looks like inside after I blew off some lady bugs and a few spiders. That capacitor is very similar to the ones inside my computer just much bigger. Like the smaller ones they should look flat and normal and not all rusted and bulging out like that.

This is a picture I took to bring inside and write down where the wires go. Before I change anything I take lots of pictures. After this I made sure the capacitor was shorted out. (I was told a good way to do this safely is to use jumper cables and short them out from far away. Its not how I ended up doing it but seems like a good idea if I ever have to do this again)
Here is the Label off the old Capacitor
Ryan wrote down my wiring notes.
Its about as big as a soda can. For size perspective.

 They did not have any 370vac 80uf/7.5uf capacitors in stock.
I could have ordered from amazon but wanted to fix today. They had a 80/10 which might have worked or might have killed fan. They also had 7.5uf separate unit. I purchased both. I jumpered the common off the big boy to the little guy and ran the fan off there. Nothing is hooked up to the 10uf on the big boy.


This is the 7.5uf label. (The little guy)

This is the soda can size one.

All wired up.


This is the top view showing the FAN on the big boy has nothing hooked up. (It is 10uf)





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