I have been having this issue since last October, but with the winter and not needing the unit, the problem fell by the wayside but has crept up in the last few months.
Facts:
Unit is near-brand new, installed September 2020
Residential, 15.5 seer, five ton, Linux upper and lower
Upper is combination furnace and AC
2600 square foot home in Dallas TX
Scroll type compressor (so I’ve been told by the tech)
Issue:
Almost every time my AC kicks on, I hear the compressor try to “turn over” and fail multiple times before it finally gets going. It’s as if you pulled the cord on a lawnmower and nothing happened until the 4th pull. While the compressor has issues starting up, the compressor fan and plenum fan turn on just fine. I can monitor this all happening real time because I work from home due to Corona and my office is the wall it sits next to, so the noises are very obvious to me – in fact I have ran out to the unit while it’s having the issue, and the compressor fan is blowing cold air, i.e. the compressor is not kicking on like it’s supposed to. Note, when it finally successfully "turns over" and fires up, it seems to cool fine (although since it's a new unit I don't have a good feel for its baseline capability, for all I know its running at 80% or something).
I have had the installers (a local HVAC company) come out to look at the unit and Oncor (our local utility) come out to check the power source to the house. All tests come back normal, capacitor is working fine, and the power source is giving sufficient amps. Of course, like an IT problem, the three times that the HVAC tech has come out the unit starts just fine. I have even captured the issue on video and sent it to the HVAC company (using my work phone for video and using my personal to call for AC using the ecobee app while standing next to it), but because they haven't seen in person they say there is not much they can do. I am having to resort to calling them out as often as I can until it finally happens in person. It seems like it is more likely to do it when it hasn’t ran for a bit, leading to the tech to guess the scroll is causing itself friction when sitting for a while and resisting spinning up again. Note, that “sitting for a while” in TX is like 24 hours simply because we’re still in spring.
Here's where it gets weird – my neighbors unit, which appears very old, is doing the same thing, albeit less often. And, it's causing my lights to flicker ever so slightly when it does it. I feel like I'm going crazy, but again I am situated so close to both units I have no doubt what I’m hearing – it is very obvious when her unit stalls out and then finally is able to turn over after a few tries. I know it’s not my unit in those cases because my thermostat is not calling for it and my fans don’t kick on. I have walked out there as well and confirmed it's her unit.
Given all of this I am leaning towards an issue with the power, but not sure how to tell the power company to identify the problem, and curious if anybody has ever seen anything like this.
Of course, after a hellish experience with American Home Shield in the dead of summer with no AC for multiple days, I finally go around them, drop $$, and install a new unit - and still have issues!
TYIA!
Facts:
Unit is near-brand new, installed September 2020
Residential, 15.5 seer, five ton, Linux upper and lower
Upper is combination furnace and AC
2600 square foot home in Dallas TX
Scroll type compressor (so I’ve been told by the tech)
Issue:
Almost every time my AC kicks on, I hear the compressor try to “turn over” and fail multiple times before it finally gets going. It’s as if you pulled the cord on a lawnmower and nothing happened until the 4th pull. While the compressor has issues starting up, the compressor fan and plenum fan turn on just fine. I can monitor this all happening real time because I work from home due to Corona and my office is the wall it sits next to, so the noises are very obvious to me – in fact I have ran out to the unit while it’s having the issue, and the compressor fan is blowing cold air, i.e. the compressor is not kicking on like it’s supposed to. Note, when it finally successfully "turns over" and fires up, it seems to cool fine (although since it's a new unit I don't have a good feel for its baseline capability, for all I know its running at 80% or something).
I have had the installers (a local HVAC company) come out to look at the unit and Oncor (our local utility) come out to check the power source to the house. All tests come back normal, capacitor is working fine, and the power source is giving sufficient amps. Of course, like an IT problem, the three times that the HVAC tech has come out the unit starts just fine. I have even captured the issue on video and sent it to the HVAC company (using my work phone for video and using my personal to call for AC using the ecobee app while standing next to it), but because they haven't seen in person they say there is not much they can do. I am having to resort to calling them out as often as I can until it finally happens in person. It seems like it is more likely to do it when it hasn’t ran for a bit, leading to the tech to guess the scroll is causing itself friction when sitting for a while and resisting spinning up again. Note, that “sitting for a while” in TX is like 24 hours simply because we’re still in spring.
Here's where it gets weird – my neighbors unit, which appears very old, is doing the same thing, albeit less often. And, it's causing my lights to flicker ever so slightly when it does it. I feel like I'm going crazy, but again I am situated so close to both units I have no doubt what I’m hearing – it is very obvious when her unit stalls out and then finally is able to turn over after a few tries. I know it’s not my unit in those cases because my thermostat is not calling for it and my fans don’t kick on. I have walked out there as well and confirmed it's her unit.
Given all of this I am leaning towards an issue with the power, but not sure how to tell the power company to identify the problem, and curious if anybody has ever seen anything like this.
Of course, after a hellish experience with American Home Shield in the dead of summer with no AC for multiple days, I finally go around them, drop $$, and install a new unit - and still have issues!
TYIA!
source https://hvac-talk.com/vbb/threads/2228529-Compressor-stalling-out-on-startup?goto=newpost
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