The customer asked me to figure out why the main breaker for their bar ac kept tripping now I never found the exact cause of the issue but I found a bunch of things could could have been the potential problems...
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I want to start this off really quick just to let you guys know, as you guys can see the chaos behind me. The stacks and stacks of shirts, the shirts are in stock now they're available on my website. Hvacrvideos.Com go check it out. One last thing too, pay very close attention to this video and also pay attention to the end of the video, because i'm gon na do a giveaway.
This video is brought to you by sportlin quality, integrity and tradition. Today we're working on a bar ac. So there's a little back story on this. I was here recently doing something else, and the customer had brought to my attention that the breaker keeps tripping on this ac and they said that they hit the breaker and then a few minutes later it trips.
So i came up here onto the roof, gave it a quick look. I didn't even open panels up confirmed indeed that the breaker was tripped, and i had another technician come out here yesterday, because this customer hadn't done any pm work in a while and had a technician. Um replace all the filters. Do a quick, coil cleaning replace all the belts get the restaurant basically in operational order.
You know somewhat, so we did a light pm. Nothing crazy! I didn't have them tear crazy into these things, so we know that our unit should be pretty clean and we're going to start there and see. What's going on great looking electrical panel, huh carrier doesn't do a very good job of making it easy to have clean wiring on these things, but still like this, isn't all their fault. People cut the zip ties and all that stuff and not put things back.
So we need to find a reason to for the unit to trip a breaker. That's what we're looking for. So i'm just doing some visual inspections. I haven't tested power, yet it should be off because the disconnect switches off contactors look a little burnt.
Just preliminary visual nothing's jumping out at me yet um, of course this is all low voltage. Well, not all of it, but most of this is low voltage wiring. This is high voltage uh. It's like a lot of this stuff like this was changed in 2013.
They did a great job with the wiring on that just sitting there going into the motor. That's nice, no bushing there to protect the wiring okay! Well, we're going to start with a meter and start toning. Everything out checking the ground, seeing if we have any shorts. I've shown this before i took over this restaurant a couple years back from another company, and this is the kind of stuff that i find so if you're used to these carrier units, the compressor should be the same zr61.
Zr57 yeah. It's close, but the whole point. I'm trying to make is you got to watch out, especially when you guys aren't paying attention to this kind of stuff? You put your gauges on here and it's just you know the the two stages just aren't running quite right, something's wrong. It's very common to see someone put the wrong compressor in a unit.
You know. Oh yeah it'll be close enough. You know oh yeah no big deal, but it makes for a headache when you're trying to troubleshoot weird issues, so you always want to watch out for that kind of stuff. All right. Let's go ahead and test three-phase voltage: a to b phase 208, a to c phase 209 b to c phase 208. Okay, so we've got 208 volts coming into the disconnect switch we're going to test each fuse, the bottom of the fuse to ground. We have no voltage coming through the disconnect it's working correctly. Disconnect is off we're gon na put our meter on tone and we're gon na test the fuses.
We have continuity for through that fuse. That fuse is good continuity through the second fuse. That fuse is good. No continuity through the third fuse.
We've got a bad fuse. Why do we have a bad fuse? Is the question? Let's go ahead and test to a ground, we're testing all three legs to ground. Nothing is grounding out we're going to need to get into the electrical section we're going to look for any obvious shorts that could potentially have caused a short to blow the fuse the contactors are not pulled in so theoretically, we could have a direct short on the Load side of the contactor and not know it, so what we're going to do is find a good ground here. It is right here we're going to test from the load side of each contactor, which one is the load side, though, should be this side there.
There there there there there nothing's, grounded test the line side, two for giggles, no direct shorts to ground. Okay, electrical's a mess: the ninja fan motors. Look okay! At this point, i'm not seeing any direct shorts to ground we're gon na have to change the fuses and fire this guy up just kind of see what happens test all the motors and everything okay. So we know, we've got no voltage here still going to use a fuse puller, though i've shown this a bunch of times it's just.
I got it from like home depot it's made by ideal. I think so, and i've got some new fuses right here. They're, usually a little bit harder going in these disconnect things are pretty loose, huh might have a problem there. Okay fuses are in they're just standard 60 amp fuses.
I always leave extra fuses too, so we've got three more for later. All right at this point. We're going to power this guy up and see what happens? I'm not going to put any panels on yet because i want to catch any potential problems. I want to see the blower motor start.
I want to see the condenser fan motor start then, once it's running for a bit i'll put the panels on, but i just want to see the initial start up and see if we see any major problems power's going on all right. So sometimes they do that. Weird little initial start-up we're gon na test to make sure we still have three-phase coming in yeah. We didn't blow any fuses or anything all right.
So let's go ahead and uh jumper the unit out and see what we can do here. So i'm going to test the indoor blower, i'm going to jump around r or i mean g to r, don't short it out on the unit yeah. I thought i blew the fuse or something, but i didn't because i touched the side of the unit. We still have 27 volts, so my indoor blower motor is not pulling in and it should really cool thing that most manufacturers do. If you want to know what's what, as far as the contactors go, there's typically a legend down here so right down at the bottom of the schematic, you see this schematic okay down here in the bottom, there's a legend and it says ignition control board. Igc ifc is indoor fan contactor and then you have c1 and c2 outdoor fan relay transformer and compressor lockout one and two just look at the the lettering so ifc and if you go up here to the legend it'll tell you ifc indoor fan contactor. So my indoor fan contactor is this guy right here we need to test voltage to see if we've got 24 volts going to the coil. If i can do this, we do not have 24 volts going to the contactor coil.
So we need to figure out where the potential problem is so we know, let's test from common to g. Oh it's weird! It doesn't have 24 volts. What's going on here, got 24 volts coming out of the transformer test up here so c to r. I have nothing to make sure that i didn't blow this fuse when i shorted out them yeah the little breaker's, not tripped.
So why do i not have 24 volts at the r terminal? I should have 24 volts right here and i don't that's weird huh where's. He getting lost at oh, i know where it's getting lost, that i probably blew the fuse on the board when i shorted it out yeah, that's what i did so if you guys come over here. So when i was going to put the jumper on, i uh, i accidentally touched the alligator clip to the wall and we've got a fuse on this board, but we've got 27 volts across the fuse. So i shorted it out it's one of the downsides to using jumpers.
Here's the fuse right here i blew the fuse when i was testing it, so i'm going to go grab a fuse from my van all right. I got two fuses one to put in the unit and one to leave is an end shot. So there's the indoor blower motor, so i went ahead and replaced the fuse and then left the spare for the next guy um indoor blowers running. It looks like it just cycled off, but we can jump it out for real now and hopefully not short out everything there we go.
Okay. Now we got a jumped out indoor blower um. We need to pop our head in here and see what this thing's allowed to run and we'll put the panel on and take a current draw. Reading on, the blower with the panel off the blower doesn't have any restrictions on it.
It really doesn't have um any pressure drop across it and the current draw is going to go up okay, so you don't get a valid current draw reading on a blower when the panel's off all right, so notice we're at nine 9.3. 9.4. Now i'm gon na put the panel on and we'll test. It then, all right now that i put the panel on look at the current draw 7.5. So you see how much it drops so remember when you're testing current drawn motors and stuff you need to have the panels on okay. So now it looks like we staged on first stage compressor. Both condenser fan motors are running. There's.
Definitely some massive shaking going on here, though here like something's, just rattling up the storm. Oh both compressors are running at the moment, so both compressors are running both condenser fan motors are running. I need to get a current draw on the compressor i mean on the fan motors and then uh. We need to get this panel on this.
Jumper really isn't needed anymore, because it automatically cycled on by itself. Okay, we're testing the condenser fan motors um. We have an aftermarket motor, that's allowed to run 3.2 amps, and then we have a factory motor, that's allowed to run 1.42. So this is the aftermarket it's running 2.6 and this is the factory it's running 1.4.
So the condenser fan motors are not over amping they're. Fine, whether or not the capacitors are good is a good question. We're just going to let this guy run for a little bit so far, i'm not seeing something that jumps out at me, everything's operating, but i don't like the vibration of the unit. It's shaking a little bit um, making a funny sound all right.
Well, i'm gon na watch it for a little bit longer all right. Everything is running so far. The condenser fan motors and the blower motor is not over amping we're going to check the contactors check. Voltage drop, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing! Nothing! So i don't have any voltage drop across my contactors.
You can get out the thermal imaging camera and see what they look like. I need to take the cover off of this one though it doesn't look bad inside these ones. Look burnt for sure and then, when we get the thermal image draw, we'll look at the disconnect switch too okay. We are operating.
Look at this contactor right here. It's definitely warm. Let's move on over to this relay for the condenser fan motors right, there's the relay! Definitely a hot spot down at the bottom. Okay, then we're gon na go to the compressor contactor right here i mean they're, all nice and warm.
I don't see anything too crazy. Just look at that board and realize capacitors or something and the board is pretty hot too all right. We're gon na go over to the disconnect, switch and see what that looks. Like pulled the protective cover off of the disconnect switch and uh everything looks to be running pretty evenly, i don't see any big temperature swings.
Anything, that's scaring me there. All right this unit is operating. Disconnect, looks okay. I don't like the vibration that the unit has, and it almost looks like those knives, aren't completely making contact, let's see if they move at all. No, sometimes when the disc i'm using an insulated screwdriver by the way, sometimes the disconnect knives don't make good contact. But i don't see a problem there um, let's test uh nothing's, loose everything's good, there's, no overheating wires. I still don't like the vibration that the unit has, though, but it's running and i'm not seeing anything i'm going to let it run for a little bit longer and see if we can catch any problems, i'm probably going to gauge up on it too. All right.
We've got a dilemma here: um first off we had a blown fuse. I don't know why the fuse blew okay, but just using you know, reasoning and looking at everything i don't like these contactors they're, all kind of burnt on the contacts kind of pitted charred. I'm not getting a voltage drop across them, but i just don't care for it. I also don't care for the uh, the vibration, that the unit has.
It's just got a really strong vibration and that vibration happens. When the condenser fan motors turn on this condenser fan motor is an aftermarket motor and there's a vibration in it that i don't like also there's a slight vibration in this motor too. In a perfect world. I'd like to change both of these condenser fan motors, replace all of these contactors and redo the wiring in here and eliminate these wire nuts, so basically come from the disconnect with a home run right into the top of the contactors.
I believe, number eight wire. This is too big. This is like six or four, and it doesn't need that big, it's just a 60 amp unit. Number eight should be plenty i'd like to come in with number eight and do that, but whether or not the customer is going to want to do that.
I don't know so at this point: i'm not going to change the contactors, because i'm probably going to quote a big picture repair here, replace both those condenser fan motors, go back with factory all three contactors and we'll change the connector fan motor relay. Also um. That's going to be my plan here, but we got to see what the customer wants to do. So what i did was i disconnected the jumper wire for the compressors and just left the indoor blower motor, and this thing still has a vibration.
It definitely intensifies when the condenser fan motors turn on and starts rattling the panels, but look at that liquid line, i mean it's still, vibrating pretty good. So we got a couple things going on here and this is actually rubbing against the discharge line back there or the liquid line. So that's a potential leak point but yeah it's in the blower motor too. This unit's just all beat down.
Let's open that up. It's probably i remember that belt was kind of wobbling. A little bit killed the power, so the belt is a little bit loose. It can certainly be tightened.
The pulley doesn't look bad though i mean it doesn't feel like it's, it's it's starting to fail, but i don't think it's time to change it. Yet, there's nothing wrong with that. It's not aligned, though, but like every carrier, they're never aligned and they never line up perfect either the motor plates always shift. It's always a pain in the butt to get these things lined up perfect, but i'm definitely going to tighten this guy up get in here. This blower wheel is caked with crap big old chunks of stuff in there nothing's dirty as heck. Look at that big old chunkers um. So in my quote, we'll pull the entire blower assembly out clean it and hopefully that balances it out and then, when we pull it out, we'll we'll uh line up the pulleys and all that stuff too. I'm gon na have to have a talk with my tech that was out here putting the belts on, but i got this guy snugged up nice and good you're, not gon na see the belt wobble anymore um.
I don't know if this is gon na intensify the problem, though, because if the blower wheel's out of balance, it's definitely dirty and we tightened up the belt it's gon na vibrate. More so we'll have to see yeah, it's still got a pretty mean vibration to it. Man, it's kind of a mess, so we're gon na have to definitely talk to him about that blower. We need to redo that i ended up loosening the belt back up.
So that way we can reduce the vibration a little bit. I'm torn, though, on what to do here, because it's a lot of work to pull that blower assembly out and we're gon na have a lot of man out or so. I'm gon na have two people here: we're gon na pull the top on the unit. It almost makes me wonder if it's just better to go ahead and have the blower wheel replaced we're gon na go through all the work to get it out.
I mean when you figure the labor is going to be the same, the amount of time. Well, i shouldn't say the materials, though, if i was to replace the blower wheel, though you change the bearings too, and you might as well change the shaft. So it's gon na be a considerable amount i'll i'll, basically leave it up to the customer. I could pull that blower assembly and have it rebuilt um that'd, probably be the best way, we'd save on labor that way too.
But i still don't like these condenser fan motors and i want to get rid of that aftermarket motor over there. I like to clean up this wiring replace those contactors. I just feel bad though, because but it's one of those things where my my ins and my gut starts making me feel bad because it needs to be done. The contactors need to be changed.
The wiring needs to be fixed, the blower needs to be rebuilt and we need the fan motors at least the one fan motor for sure, but they're both vibrating um, but i just hate spending all that money on this unit. But i shouldn't feel bad, though i mean my job is to tell the customer what's wrong. You know all right. This is my first stage.
It's not looking bad the superheat's a little bit high, but we'll dial that in when we get the blower assembly cleaned um. I mean the unit's performing pretty good, though got a decent split. Airflow is half fast, decent again we're going to change everything, so i just wanted to make sure there was nothing too crazy going on we're going to jump on the second stage. So the second stage, you know it's kind of looking about the same pressures are half-assed decent superheat's, still a little bit high. Everything else is going to stay the same, so i'm not too worried about the refrigerant charge too much. I might have a little bit of room to add or remove just a little bit but everything's looking pretty decent on this guy and again we'll make more changes once we fix the airflow and clean the blower assembly. You know i i don't have hopes that they're going to approve this quote, because the unit is operational, i mean they're, probably going to wait until it completely dies. This is one of those things where i can't give them an absolute.
You know this is why the fuse blew, but these are the problems that i found the refrigerant pressures. As i showed you guys, they don't look horrendous. I mean you know superheat's a little bit high on both stages, but compressors are functioning again, keeping in mind that those compressors are potentially the wrong compressors, so that kind of messes with everything but other than that i mean you know we're just going to give them A quote and see what they want to do, but that's it on this one. Well, they actually approved the repair um.
I modified my quote idea a little bit. So what we're doing is we're replacing we're, rebuilding the whole indoor blower assembly and then we're going to redo a bunch of electrical we're replacing the one condenser fan motor. That's an aftermarket fan motor we're gon na leave the original oem one right there. I basically told him that i couldn't find a reason for the breaker to trip and that my best assumption would be it had to have something to do with that vibration.
I told them we got to fix the vibration before we can go any further. So that's what we're going to do. I got another tech coming with me right now. I'm just disassembling the unit we're going to start pulling the top pulling the fan motors, pull the blower assembly, get the unit top off, got the blower assembly out um just going to start cutting away.
I confirmed that the the blower wheel is the same. So i'm going to just cut off the existing shaft, i have a little cutter that can hopefully fit in there. I picked up this little die grinder and i'm hoping it'll work in a situation like this. I'm hoping we'll see so my little grinder is not going to work, but i got my sawzall right here and we'll cut it.
But before you cut anything, you always double check the blower wheel's right. The shaft is right because once i cut that shaft we're done and then i have the bearing so all right, we're gon na give this guy chop baby steps got the shaft cut. The blower is gon na pull right out of the bottom of the blower assembly, but always pay extra close attention to what direction you took it out. You know that way. You don't have to think too hard um when putting it back in there. So just slide. The new one in same way, and then before i put the blower in um, we're going to clean this whole blower assembly. I've got a hose up, we're going to get it all rinsed out all right.
We built this slowly, um, i'm taking the adjustable motor pulley and i went ahead and matched the size closed it down and tightened it up. We're still going to amp the motor and make sure we're not over amping. But i try to match the exact size from everything that was on there. So that way we don't mess with the air balance.
This replacement pulley has a bushing in order to tighten these bushings on. What's going to happen, when you tighten it, it's going to pull the pulley onto the bushing, so oftentimes what you want to do now, i'm going to make my alignment with that pulley, because i can adjust it more but oftentimes what you want to do is you Want to push the pulley on a little bit further than you're comfortable with about an eighth of an inch sixteenth of an inch somewhere in there, because when you tighten the bushing, it's actually going to pull the pulley out to its final resting place. So again, being this is a carrier guys you never get these things perfectly straight. These things are always wonky, so i'm going to do my best, but i'm not looking for perfection once you get it where you want it.
What you're going to do is you're just going to tighten them down evenly a little bit at a time, so a little bit on this one, a little bit on this one and back and forth nice and slow. You don't want to over tighten them because you'll break the bolts off just until it's snug, all you're doing is pulling it tight up on the bushing. The key being in there is all going to clamp everything down on the shaft and it'll be all be permanent. As usual, i got way in over my head: well, not over my head, but just one thing turned into another as i'm undoing the economizer wiring.
I realized that the uh compressor lockout boards were completely bypassed. So i'm going to take a gamble and assume they're still good and we're going to wire them back in and then we're going ahead and getting rid of all that. I think it's number six wire, because that's too big for this, this thing, 60 amps. So it's got, i think, that's four or six coming in and we're gon na come out with a direct shot into the contactors, no more wire net um, but so i'm just going through trying to figure this wiring out.
First, uh simplifying these pressure controls because there's just a mess, we'll shorten them up wire, the lockouts back in then we'll start changing the contactors all right, we're just about done. Tidying up the electrical i ended up doing a home run from the disconnect switch. Now i was saying number eight wire and i was incorrect. I ended up using number six wire, okay uh. This does have 60 amp fuses in it, but it's not running 60 amps. The unit is only running like 53 amps, so i went ahead and ran number six wire direct here. I did have to use a wire nut for the ground because i didn't have the little fitting for the ground wire, but everything else there's no wire nuts goes directly into the contactors. I just change the orientation of the contactors to the lug style, so i think i did everything right.
We're gon na put the top back on wire in the condenser fan motors. We also went back to a dual run cap and we're gon na go dedicated, wiring right to the run cap. Now too. So all right, we got the top back on um, it's you know as clean as it can be.
It's not perfect in here, but i shortened the condenser fan motor wiring. So that way, it's not all long cleaned up the pressure control, wiring shortened, all that, hopefully i didn't screw everything up, we're trying to see if we have a connected fan motor relay right now. I don't know if i have one of those or not uh. We just got to put the disconnect back and get ready to fire this guy up.
So i'm going to start it up um, because i changed up the wiring and i don't have color coordinated wiring. I got to just go ahead and bump it and check the rotation of everything, so i disconnected the r terminal, so the unit won't fire up we're going to hit this guy right here. Hopefully it doesn't blow up nothing blew up yet we're going to do a double, take check, voltages and then uh, we'll just bump them one by one, all right: we're gon na check, phase rotation um. I was thinking about it and i can check it here.
So here's what we're gon na do line one and two is right here: okay and then it says, line three and it says line three two one. So our phase rotation is incorrect and we can verify it by bumping the blower i'm gon na bump it right now and that's the wrong direction. Blower should be running the opposite direction, so we are going to uh reverse rotation at the disconnect switch all right. Let's go ahead and turn the disconnect switch back on and we're gon na test phase rotation.
Again i went ahead and changed that condenser family to relay too so one two and then line three line. One two three phase rotation is correct. So if i bump this contactor, the blower should be turning counterclockwise and it is counterclockwise. Okay, so we're good on that now so uh now we just got to testify everything else, so i'm going to fire up a compressor and listen to it run.
That sounds incorrect. So we got a phase rotation issue there. Let's fire up the other compressor, that's incorrect, so i screwed everything up. So it's fine though we just reverse it right here and right here and then we should be good all right. Let's fire these guys up and listen much better much better. Okay, compressors are good. Indoor blower is good. We're gon na go ahead and wire this back up to r and then test all the functions.
I literally rewired this entire unit pulled out the economizer, so the odds of this thing working here is very slim. There's gon na be problems so so uh indoor blowers running we're allowed to run 10.2 amps for the indoor blower motor, we're running nine amps. So we're good on that we're gon na wait for first and second stage to call they should call here any minute and then we'll test the condenser fan motors and all that one of the condenser fan motors is running. One point four: two: that is the new one: it's right at run load and then the other one is running 1.3.
That's the old one actually, but they're, both within spec running properly we're going to let this guy run for a while and then i'll grab. The thermal camera and show the contactor difference now that i changed them all right. We are back up and running. It's been running for about a half an hour now um, let's scroll over here, we've got nice good even blow across that contactor.
That is uh. Compressor number two: i believe: okay, let's move on over there is my condenser fan motor relay. That is definitely calm down. Okay, compressor number two: this is the contactor and indoor fan contactor, looking uh pretty decent.
My this is my first stage my superheat's a little bit high, but i'm really not gon na mess with it, because everything else is falling in line pretty good. So i really don't want to mess too much more stuff. We've got a 20 degree td. This is the second stage now we're still running a little bit high on the super heat, but i have a theory behind that everything else is looking.
Okay. My head pressure is a little bit high on my second stage, but let me preface some things number one. This unit has the wrong compressors in it. Remember in the beginning of the video, i showed that it has the wrong compressors number two: the suction line, temperature uh, the suction line is not insulated and it gets hit by the sun.
So i'm not too concerned about that superheat i mean it's right there, but the the the temperature clamp for the suction line is literally in the shade i mean in the sun, because the condenser fan motor pulls everything else is looking half ass decent on this. I'm not gon na sweat this one right now, um my head pressure's a little bit high, but i saw the inside of the condenser. It's clean, i'm not gon na mess with it too much. You can see where we're moving the target's coming back right now.
So all right, the vibration in this unit is pretty much gone. Um i put that you can see that new condenser fan motor that i put in over. There is sitting in the shroud like it should be. I mean this unit. Has the slightest vibration i it's! It's so much better. We replaced all the contactors, the condenser fan motor relay rewired. The unit eliminated a bunch of bs made sure there was no electrical shorts um, it's so hot outside that i have to power it down and take off the panel or it just shuts off on lockout, but yeah. Both condenser fan motors are doing what they're supposed to be doing, but again, like i said one of those, if not both of those compressors are the wrong compressor.
Huh um, it's funny. They changed them like 3, 14, 17 and 4, 12 17, like right after each other silly um looks like they were having a hard time with that braze joint right there too, but i'm gon na wrap this one up, everything's, looking good the lines aren't shaking anymore. I tried to support everything. This is all safe and zip tied.
So that way, it won't rub up against anything. Indoor blower is good. Customer's gon na be very happy all right. We can't always be perfect in these videos.
I make mistakes. You saw that i shorted out the alligator clip. I blew the fuse. I never actually found the exact reason that caused the fuse to blow in the first place.
Okay, why the breaker was tripping and well. I know the breaker was tripping because we had a line. Three fuse blown control voltage was still being sent to the uh thermostat. The thermostat was still telling the system to turn on and then the unit would run and single phase and trip the breaker.
So that's why the breaker was tripping, but as far as why the fuse blew in the first place, that's a good question. I had to go to the customer with all the information and just tell them look. I didn't find the problem that jumped out at me, but here's a list of things, that's wrong with this unit and we have to fix these things first before we can advance any further in our troubleshooting okay. So with that being said, i found the vibration.
It was caused by the indoor blower assembly being out of balance, and the second condenser fan motor that was an aftermarket motor, was also causing a lot of vibration too. I talked the customer into letting me take care of those problems. We eliminated the vibration. Again.
I looked at everything you know with the customer's best interest at heart and i said: look it's going to take me so much time to pull that blower assembly out and put it back in. It seems like a waste to not go ahead and change that wheel, because what happens if the wheel was damaged - and i pulled the whole thing out - then put it back in and it was still vibrating and i wasted you know many many man hours for two Guys to pull that thing out and put it back in in my opinion, and i gave all this information to the customer, it was going to be in their best interest to go ahead and have me replace the blower wheel since i had it out. Put a new one in new bearings new shaft, then we were done with it and then we also went ahead and changed the condenser fan motor. I didn't like the wiring i didn't like the contactors. I went ahead and redid the wiring as best as possible, because the systems economizer was not hooked up. I went ahead and ripped out all the economizer wiring because it wasn't being used in the first place anyways if the customer ever chose to go back in and put a new economizer in, i would certainly just run new thermostat wire to it. Okay, so we got them operational. It was an extremely hot day that day too it was 105 or 108.
I can't quite remember, but it was ridiculously hot on the roof, so i was hurting at the end of the day, um. Also on that the uh indoor blower assembly, the pulleys, i went ahead and changed the pulleys, because i had it all out - and you know i just figured you know what i i'm gon na just go ahead and get those things on there too. They weren't completely bad, but they were starting to wear, went ahead and took care of that. Um changed the contactors because they were starting to pit and you saw the heat signatures they just weren't, quite even with those um.
The compressors were another thing. You know when i was showing the refrigerant pressures. I was basically like look this unit's not going to get too much better, because we knew that someone had put the wrong compressors in there now, which compressor is wrong. I don't know i didn't dig too much further in there.
I know that that's a 10 ton unit, so they're close but they're not 100 right. There, 400 btus off here a couple hundred btus off there give or take a little bit. It's always important to go back in with oem or if you're gon na do an aftermarket make sure it's the right unit, don't just slap in two different compressors, because there's gon na be a difference there. Okay, we often run into those kind of problems, and you have to know when you're having a lot of issues diagnosing or troubleshooting something you have.
I your videos, i find your work fascinating. Thanks!
one time i was doing a pm in the middle of the night testing units for function and did that exact thing blew a transformer… opening a supply house isnt cheap haha
Hi my name is Oscar can you help me in my new business in NYC run your business in NYC am here for you.
I love your video I would like to work with you.
Am from NYC looking forward to move In. Service area Orleans??
The bar "keep's" *what*? Snark, snark. It's hard to take a technical professional with this kind of grammar seriously. Are you in Barrhaven ?
Please check your disconnect voltage line and load side.
I almost got killed because some asshole wired it in reverse and fed from the load side, I checked for voltage and I was shocked to see it was reversed…
Hi i would like to know, where are located in south California? Are you in Kanata ?
Ser..there is a chance that the 3phase compressor pumping wrong acording to your vedio…
That unit had a spaghetti mess of wiring at the beginning. I like that you took the time to make it better than what it was.
Thank God you sorted out that wiring. It looked shocking. Literally!
Lower gauge wire is almost always better. Downgrading the wire because it is too fat is the only questionable thing I've ever seen you do (and I've watched a lot of your videos). Heavier gauge wire offers less resistance, especially when temps and amps get higher, not to mention distance; it also degrades less over time especially in high operational scenarios. If it means a splice can be eliminated then that would be valid or if the wire simply won't fit into contactor, etc. I wouldn't downgrade heavy gauge wire without a specific reason to do so…. What am I missing (OCD is probably a valid concern and I can relate). But that rats nest is bad and I do believe that messy wiring can affect efficiency, its the mindset.) I'm a jack of all trades, master of a few and I would never work a day if I worked for you (You never work a day if you love your job). I'd enjoy that kind of work.
Is it normal when testing the voltage of each phase to ground for one phase to show 0 volts.
You see so many problems with air conditioners I wonder what your build would be like if you designed one interesting to see what you come up with. Would you make them repair idiot proof. Or how about making the module in other words if something breaks down it would tell you you pull out the whole module and you put a new one in and fixes complete. What would be your design?
Seems like you'd buy that fuse popper device to use.
I've always been curious of HVAC work, I;ve worked in alot of various skilled trades but never this work, Ive learned a lot about it from this channel alone
Damn. Never considered that amp draw difference with the fan cabinet door closed. Glad I watched this.
in over your head? no, you got this. "can of worms" is more like it. but you fix things right, so just gotta find and fix things right, then all will be good.
my favorite moment is when you used the fuse puller to push the fuse in.. then used your hands… then went back to the fuse puller! like running behind a door with no walls around it to hide from a bear ๐ made me laugh i do this stuff all the time! love the vids! last time i had some fun we hit the breaker and had no volatage and at somepoint we had hit the wire and with the breaker being slightly broken the wire caught power and i went to remove the wire and fwoomped myself! didnt get hit but its been a while since iv emoved that quickly! had an electrician out that day to rewire the whole high volt for the main unit! ALWAYS CHECK VOLTAGE!!! had a guy somehow remove all of his disconnect cases from their respective places without hitting the breakers… to this day i pride that kid in how detailed he is!.. (was new and inexperienced so trust me when i say it was pure luck he didnt catch a fwoomp!) he didnt blow any breakers or catch any sparks! talk about careful worker! LOL Are you in Orleans ?
Gotta tell ya, itยดs somehow therapeutic to me to watch your videos, I can sit for hours watching you explain and fix stuff.. Thanks and keep on the good job
I like to see if I can diagnose before I see the video. Wire shorts are the obvious. Fans and blowers working too hard drawing current ie dirty filters and coils. Bad or undersized breaker. Lets see what happens.
Turns out it was Unicorns
KEEPโS Are you in Nepean ?
Iโm betting the fuse was blowing because of the second condenser fan motor was sitting outside/too low in the shroud and caused high head pressure on the wrong size compressors. What a mess you had! Great work!
Hi, is HITACHI scroll compressor 410 gas good ?
I really like that you don't remove your mistakes in the video, it really shows that in every work we will have minor mistakes….
This is one of the problems with carrier no phase monitors, you loose a phase or a fuse that doesnโt feed transformer contractors still pull in and youโre in big trouble! I had a facility where EVERY SINGLE blower motor burnt up after snow storm building lost a phase, you got lucky here breaker tripped, imho after decades of servicing these things carrier is one of the worst units one can buy like they could spend extra $20 to put phase monitors in them
Manufacturer nomenclature should be verified for amp rating of machine, Rated Load Amps
'I think I did everything right' -What you love to hear as a customer ๐
how could wire b to big
Maybe the fuse broke from vibration. I'see that happen with automotive fuses…melt strip cracks from terminal. In open air, 75 deg 8-AWG is food for 70A per NEC. But, on roof and in sun in California, bigger wire is better.
Wow those wires should be neatly into a conduit
good thing you know what your doing
great, honest and extensive work, not leaving tiny things out because "you could" big ups
So, when youre looking at thermals on contactors, youre looking for even heat (good) vs hot spots (bad) not necessarily a lower average temperature correct? I'm just a novice picking up little details here and there. Cool vid!
When I use the thermal camera, I compare the heat signature of the disconnect in question to other disconnects on the roof. If I don't do that, I can have three hot fuses in my disconnect, and because they are all hot, nothing stands out. A hot fuse can have a shorter life than one that runs cool. Why would fuses be hot? Because the spring clips lose tension over time, the contact point becomes a resistance heater, and the fuse gets hot. In a hot climate the fuse temp can really go up a lot. Just an observation.
Oh, and the contactor next to the indoor blower contactor is C1, not C2.
Imagine if he was sponsored by carrier. Lol Service area Ottawa??
Lmfao at that gas line
I wish there were techs like you where I worked when I got out of hvac school. Super informational and break it down so we understand. The techs where I worked didn't care and acted like I was less then them and not worth the time. Which killed my drive to work commercial/industrial or for another company for that matter. Guys like you really help us new guys out. Thanks man!
Typical parts changer.
You'd think a AC&R guy would be cool. well we are very cool. The problem is when something cool breaks your in the HEAT to fix it. 20 years in the navy and working in hot places I don't dig the heat anymore. I'll do electrical stuff in the winter esp attic work. I've binged your video's, good stuff man!
Some carrier units have different compressors for A&B circuits Looking at name plate could lead you to that but checking OEM specs would confirm. Assuming that they both should be the same can bite you Service area Nepean??
Come on now that blower comes out in 30 min
Excessive vibration can cause the internal fuse wire to vibrate too. This will eventually lead to the wire breaking, resulting in a nuisance trip. As far as different brands of fuses, it is important that you use only UL approved (or other compliance mark) fuses for reliability. Too many cheap fuses that are not UL listed musiance trip. This is especially true of those cheap generic brand Chinese fuses. Stay away from them. I would say the root cause of the fuse trip is excessive vibration leading to fatigue of the internal fuse link. Good job on trouble shooting. The fact that the AC unit is still working without a fuse trip would confirm that the vibration was damaging the fuse link. Also, pitted relay contacts can cause intermittent loss of phase anda high inrush currents, tripping the main fuse in the disconnect. So replacing the contactors eliminated that cause. Any and all of these factors were probably working together to cause trips.
Dont you hate making the wiring all nice and neat but you being the only one that cares and the customer never even sees it lol but knowing that you canโt sleep if you donโt but I like to think it is wat makes a good tech vs a shit one Are you in Ottawa ?
There is NEVER an issue with using 6 gage wire where the minimum code is 8 gage. One can use LARGER wire without ANY issue but can not use smaller wire. In fact, using larger wire reduces the resistance in the system itself (HEAT). As long as the device clamps (connectors) are rated for the size then leave it alone!!!
With regard to those wire nuts connecting the wires in the control panel: I do not like wire nuts for that purpose either. I would use Split bolt connectors, crimp connectors or a block style connector. Wrap with rubber tape and then with plastic tape and let it go. If you want to be really sure about insulating them you can wrap with duct seal then rubber tape then plastic tape. I thought is VERY strange that you would consider replacing those wires at all.
That original wiring on those things are really badly made. Just bunch of wires hanging. One would think companies would make things better year after year, but no.
I had a similar issue and the best solution was to knock the entire building down pull-up The Foundations relay the foundations with ,a layer of insulation then new brickwork. Then install new electrical wiring with adequate plumbing put a roof on with tiles replace the windows and a new front door and it seemed the problem had gone.
Only now is we can't find the cat so it looks like the owner might be getting some new foundations again. Service area Kanata??
Good job…. I was and engineering tech for over 27 years…. I use to chase my tail trying to figure out why a fuse blew. Sometimes I just had to resign myself to believing that the fuse just blew and it was really just a faulty fuse.
ARIZONA ?
You are dah bomb ! Really !
Awesome job ๐
My question is,when using the FLIR Camera,can you see the screen good enough on a sunny day to make a judgment, or do you record the video and analyze the footage later ?
If these portable FLIR GUNS can make my boss extra money, I WILL invest in one for sure .