Home A/C Problem-Question

[kilee]

We rent a townhouse and I know my landlord is thinking I'm a pain right about now. We moved here over the winter and it has central air. Which is a good thing because the master bedroom has stationary windows that do not open.

Anyhow, the a/c runs but does not blow like the heat does. We've changed the filters, we've cleaned the unit and the landlord has replaced the thermostat. Anyhow, in pretty much all the rooms it just leaks or extremely lightly blows cool air. The heat blew hard all winter through the same duct work. So I don't think it's a duct work problem.

He's dragging his feet on calling in a tech, but we just let it run again for 5 hrs-- STRAIGHT--- and it only cooled off the house 1 degree.

Any suggestions??

 

[antmaril]

I had this problem last year and my a/c unit needed Freon (sp?). It was not an expensive fix.

 

[lovemygoofy]

Did you look at the unit outside to see if the fan was turning? We had this problem recently and the fan had stopped working. It sounded on and you could feel air but it wasn't cold or really blowing out the vents.

 

[Art 1]

It may have iced up. After it runs for an hour look at the larger copper pipe that comes off of the cooling coil on the furnace. You may have to move aside some rubber that is over the pipe, see if there is ice. Usually the heat moves less air than the a/c, usually the heat runs on low speed and the cool on high, so you should feel more air flow on cool than heat. If it is iced that will block the air flow.

 

[dawson5]

On our old house (two houses ago) our furnace had a lever on the side that we would have to change from heat to ac. This was on one of the "tubes" coming off of the furnace.

That house was built in 1987. Our house now, was built in 1992. It does not have one of those levers. The old house did need freon once, the air blew but we didn't get cold air.

 

[Jestocost]

Unless you have some kind of weird set up, the same blower that blows your heat blows the same air through the same places as your A/C. The fan on the outside unit is there to cool the compressor and is not involved in moving the air through your home.

That leads me to believe what the PP has said and that the A/C coils are icing up and not allowing air to flow through that area. The most likely cause of that is that your freon levels are low. If you can open up the actual blower unit to see the coil area, you would be able to see ice formed around the coils. If you can't access that area, check the valve connecting the freon line to the outside compressor to see if there is ice forming on that. If so, that would be a good indication that freon levels are low. That can happen in a normally functioning system over time, but also can be an indication that there is a leak in the cooling system.

You'll need someone with the appropriate tools and expertise for that.

 

[mamamary]

I had this problem last year and my a/c unit needed Freon (sp?). It was not an expensive fix.

me too - i just had this last month