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Broken AC unit

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zexmarquies01

Member
Joined
May 27, 2002
Location
Ohio
Ok, i'm at a friends house right now, and he has a Window AC unit.

for a while, it was running just great. but recently, its not working correctly.

the AC part won't kick in anymore. it just stays in FAN mode.

a while ago, i tried holding the thermometer in my hand, and warming that up slightly, and then the AC would kick on. since that tells the AC when to kick on and off.

but now, when i try to do that, no matter what, it the AC part will not kick in at all. i'm THINKING its the sensor part, that tells it when to kick on and off, but i'm not 100% sure, but thats the most logical thing i can think of.

So, Anyone have any idea how to fix this? temporarily, or permanenty?. ( buying a new one at the moment, isn't to great of an option. He's thinking about it in the future, but we need a fix for this one untill then ). Anyone have any links giving me info on AC units?

is there a way to by-pass the Thermometer sensor, and just make it run in AC mode all the time, till you turn it on fan mode only? i know we'd have to tell it to turn the AC off manually, or if left on to long, it would freeze up, but thats not to big of a deal. We are just tired of roasting in the room, that has enouch electronics to impress a nasa tech. ( along with 2 pc's running too ).

Well, if anyone has any info, it would be greatly appreaciated.
 
You could buy yourself a thermistor and do the same thing with that.

Is this a mercury style sensor or a thermistor?

I think you could just connect those 2 wires that the sensor should connect when it gets hot enough...

Or just open the window. It can't be *that* hot in Ohio.

7
 
well, its pretty cool outside, but not as cool as we'd want it. Also, the AC has a filter built into it, so it filters out the air a bit. and my friend has alergies, and it kicks in around spring and fall, so if he opens the window, it will just make his allergies kick in even worse. plust with just random dust and crap flying into the window, we'd rather get the AC working instead.

ontop of that, i'm not sure if its mercury or not. we havn't taken it out of the window and opened it up yet. we wanted some more info about opening it up, and say disabling the thermistor switch, before we'd go through all the trouble of taking the thing apart.
 
may i ask who you are refering too?

besides that change the filter, i have found that by doing that the AC unit will detect air on a more accurate basis, also make sure that the AC is level, by not being level the freon distorbution will not work well and thus not kick in
 
oh, that was my dad getting on my name here on the forums. heh.

Also, the filter is changed. its dead clean.

and i would call home dad, but its long distance to call piqua from bradford.
 
If the thermostat is the problem on a Window A/C unit you can always bypass it, I did on the one I use for my room, I took out the wires from the temperature control knob, and then spliced then across so the A/C always runs when its in Cool Mode....very very effective in getting some cold temps :D Otherwise if it still doesn't come on I'd suspect refridgerant compressor failure, in which case, home depot has what you'll be needing, a new A/C unit. :D
 
zexmarquies01 said:
oh, that was my dad getting on my name here on the forums. heh.

Also, the filter is changed. its dead clean.

and i would call home dad, but its long distance to call piqua from bradford.

Why not use AIM like he suggested?
 
Couldn't you just wire say a toggle switch onto the two wires that need to be connected (via the thermal sensor, I would assume) and use it? Not sure... I'm not too educated with electronics.
 
well, it seems to work HALF the time now.

the AC will kick on for about 15-30 min. then turn off. it never seems to stay on. i noticed though, that the really cold days outside, it never kicked on. but the last couple days were warmer, and it has kicked on. maybe the outside temps are fudging with thermal sensor.

it all depends on what my friend wants to do now. he want to talk his mom into just buying him a new AC. if he does that, THEN we will work on that ac. but i don't think he wants this one to work now, so he can get a new one.

but once he gives me the ok, i'm popping that front panel off, and going to root around in there with a stick!!! heh.

oh, and to answer man_utd, i didn't get on aim, because my friend doesn't have MSN, yahoo, or aim installed on his second pc. he uses that for playing games Via lan, a cruncher, and a his online game server. and he was on his own pc, sooo i didn't have access to aim. heh.
 
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