Introduction
Don't neglect annual service and cleaning on your central A/C equipment. Are you an HVAC tech or installer? Give me 8 minutes, maybe you'll learn something new today!
#centralac #installation #mikeypipes
Let's Make The Trades Great Again & While Giving Back To The Community:
youtube.com/@mikeypipesphilanthropy
www.pipes4free.org
Our mission is to provide free or low cost plumbing, heating & cooling services to those in our community who can't afford to hire a professional. Mikey Pipes Philanthropy, Inc. is a IRS registered 501(c)(3c) public charity incorporated in the State of New York.
Donate on Paypal: www.paypal.com/donate/
Check out my podcasts on Spotify: podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/mikeypipes
#centralac #hvac #mikeypipes
What’s in your Veto? Here is mine:
Veto TP-XXL amzn.to/3zX10vg
Malco 5/16" & 1/4" 6" Driver tinyurl.com/MalcoDriver
Milwaukee M12 Fuel 1/4" Impact Driver amzn.to/3I9yLfI
Milwaukee PVC cutter: amzn.to/3sbrdUc
Mini Waterproof Storage bin: amzn.to/3yfgsEv
Wiha Allen Keys: amzn.to/33ipGmb
HIKMICRO B20 amzn.to/33iGklx
Furnace Switch amzn.to/31X89PT
Milwaukee Light amzn.to/3I38Lmh
Wagos amzn.to/34QoiaU
Milwaukee Set amzn.to/33vnQOz
Torpedo Level amzn.to/3no1oOk
Crescent set amzn.to/3GtZeV8
Wiha 7 piece set amzn.to/3rkISaK
Milwaukee step bit amzn.to/3I395Bv
Flare wrench amzn.to/3noJZ8s
Ridgid 10” wrench amzn.to/3GvRnqa
Fluke non-contact tester amzn.to/31VQgAQ
Klein drivers amzn.to/3qoe21W
Knipex Wrenches amzn.to/3trzFjS
Klein 11-1 amzn.to/3tpsPLD
12” crescent amzn.to/3A0CZ6S
Gerber Gear Pocket Knife amzn.to/3foaW7I
Yellow Jacket Hand Ratchet amzn.to/3nrDgup
Need a website for your contracting business? Check out Footbridge Media for their amazing special on not only a website but SEO services for only $249/month! www.footbridgemedia.com/
Tired of HouseCall Pro? Don't wanna be ripped off with ServiceTitan? Try ServicePal for free for 30 days! app.servicepal.com/account/signup
Check out my Uncensored channel: www.youtube.com/c/MikeyPipesUncensored
Oval raised silver stickers are from:
Armored Decal Company Inc.
35 Victoria St. E, Unit 9
Alliston, Ontario L9R 1T3
(p) 705-435-6665
(e) ken@armoreddecal.com
(Tell them Mikey Pipes sent you)
Please support this channel and Mikey Pipes and consider the following…
UPDATED: June 15, 2023
PIPE DOCTOR FLEX FIT HATS only $40 each shipped USPS! Or 2 for $70
Shopping on Amazon? Please use my referral link amzn.to/2PjjS4v
Sticker Requests:
Do you want a sticker to show your support of this channel? Email your request to me! mike@mikeypipes.com
Name
Address
City, State, Zip
Consider making a donation of $5.00, or ANY amount, to the postage fund! I literally mail out stickers all over the globe. I've sent stickers to HVAC guys in Afghanistan, New Zealand & all over Europe.
Donations Accepted:
PayPal: office@pipedoc.net
Venmo: @PipeDoctor
CashApp: $mikeypipesny
Zelle: office@pipedoc.net
Want to send a love letter, note or gift? Our mailing address is:
Mikey Pipes
C/O Pipe Doctor Home Services, Inc.
80 E Hawthorne Ave
Valley Stream, NY 11580
Video
What's going on, ladies and gentlemen.
Thank you so much for tuning in it's me, Mikey pipes with Peter Peter, Pan, Peter, Piper, just Peter, not late for work and not gone for eight weeks on a wedding vacation is having his wedding six hour, waiting turned into a six week wedding.
Anyway, ladies and gentlemen, here we are working on a central air system split system.
Uh, customer's complaint was you're.
Not gonna believe it customers complaints is that the central air conditioning system has issues.
It has issues I went up into the attic of a Cape Cod style.
Home we found one duck.
We disconnected so I fixed it.
Then we found a few that were crushed.
So I, uncrushed them, I wasn't gonna be like a Crusher, I, uncrushed them uncrushed.
And then they tell me that you know, the one bedroom was nice and cold all the old ones are not.
What do we find every single diffuser every single diffuser? One, two, three, four, five, five out of six diffusers counted in my head good like that? Right? Yeah, yeah.
Five five of six diffusers were closed.
Another.
You think the loud air coming through the vents of the razor red flag, yeah, you can hear the air wanted to pass through the closed louvers of the diffuser.
But it is what it is.
So here we have a Ameristar r410a let's, see what size tonnage.
This system is I, love, peanut butter sandwiches.
This looks like a 36.
Yep, 36.
We have a three ton Ameristar here that filter drawer I've seen better days.
At least the arrows, the right orientation.
They uh, I got a little creative.
There looks like electric tape.
All right.
Take a look at the coil so far so clean, but looks can be deceiving and then there's a little bit of dirt wouldn't, uh, wouldn't hurt doing a nice little cleaning of this unit.
So let's, uh, let's test.
The electrical oh look it's like one of the ones that we install.
Okay, power's off we're gonna test the resistance of the contactor coil we're going to check the capacitance of the capacitor and then we'll check amperage of the system when it's running.
And then we check the system temperatures and pressures of the refrigerant and clean coils happy.
Coil number five taking a peek inside our condensing unit compartment looks pretty clean looking good looking good.
So we tested the capacitor.
We tested the contact, uh, the two capacitors.
We tested the contactor and we're gonna do amperage upon startup [Music] 4.5 immediately, powered 8.6 nine.
But no, no Spike.
No there's.
Nothing very good now switch to the other line, the power there and see what that is.
Okay, same thing.
Same, same, uh, voltage.
I mean, same amperage, yeah, very good.
Okay.
Let's put the cover back on and then we'll test for uh, our temperatures and prices with our smart Bros.
All right, we have our Testo smart probes on the service, ports, high and low or two clamp on temperature probes.
We have 126 and dropping 123 on the low 307 and dropping on the high right now.
We have a sub cooling of 7.8 I believe we have a TXV, 40 degree.
Evaporator, 95 degree condensing coil.
My coil is a little dirty, but not terrible overall, not too shabby.
But we gotta clean before all right.
So let's, take a close.
Look at these numbers.
We have 121 and 288 we're going to now do a coil cleaning of the condensing coil I'm gonna turn the power off foreign we're going to remove the top condenser fan motor guard and motor put it off to the side and we're going to wash this coil from the inside out.
Then we'll, take a look at those pressures.
All right, we got our condenser coil cleaner soaked through the condensing coil.
We also did a little, uh, cleaning on the outside it's been sitting for about five minutes.
Now, Peter's gonna rinse from the inside out let's see what kind of dirt we got coming out of here.
So we've got a lot of doesn't look dirty.
But it is a nice good cleaning, rinse on this we're, using the new Calgon condenser coil cleaner.
This is the uh.
This is a micro Channel coil so we're using the tri-power each dig and once he's done with this we're going to take a look at those pressures again, all right condenser is clean.
We even scrubbed off the top of it a little bit up.
We missed some spots.
Peter, right there.
Excellent, okay.
Good, I know, some guys who use, uh, car wax I think that's a little bit.
Uh, oh, we should uh like rinse off the pad, too.
Yeah.
Let me turn the power on and then we're gonna let our pressure stabilize and see if we have a performance difference before.
And after all right, our condenser base is clean too.
Well as much as we can condenser is clean it's been running for about 10 minutes and uh, here's.
My real-time results here the results from before, um, obviously, the coil is still wet.
But um, my results are I have higher pressures now than what I had before I had a low of 121 and a high of 288.
Now I have a high of 130 slowly, dropping though and a high of 350.
when we first turned it on this was almost at 400 by the way 388.
And that was at 145-ish so she's slowly coming down.
So sometimes you need more than just a five, you know, five minutes or so sometimes you do need 15-20 minutes.
And this is a perfect example of that because our sub cooling, you know, we're still down into the single, you know, the one the one digit number one, one degree single single degree of sub cooling and a half, but um we'll check this out.
Let us sit for a little bit longer.
And uh, remember there's no rush here.
Ladies and gentlemen, there's no rush in the trades be diligent, uh, leave, no stone unturned and try to do one better than the last one.
FAQs
Why Central A/C Condensers Need Annual Cleaning? ›
Dust and oil that accumulate over time can create a blanket over the coils—one that, just like the blanket on your bed, impedes heat transfer and makes your AC less efficient and more expensive. Fortunately, the hardest part to cleaning air conditioner coils is remembering to set aside the time at least once a year.
How often do you need to clean your central air conditioner? ›Clean or replace your air conditioning system's filter or filters every month or two during the cooling season. Filters may need more frequent attention if the air conditioner is in constant use, is subjected to dusty conditions, or you have fur-bearing pets in the house.
Why is it important to keep the condenser clean? ›Not cleaning the condenser coil impacts the performance of your AC. Heat gets trapped inside and can't be effectively released when it is covered with dirt and debris. This will lead to inefficient cooling and increased energy consumption. It is important to have your air conditioner cleaned regularly.
Do AC units need to be cleaned every year? ›As dirt and dust accumulate on the evaporator coil, it acts like an insulator, and this will limit the coil's ability to absorb heat from the air. The coils on an air conditioner should be checked and cleaned at least once a year.
How often do you need to clean a condenser coil? ›To prevent dirt and debris from impacting the heat exchange process, your air conditioner's evaporator and condenser coils should be professionally cleaned on a yearly basis as part of your system's annual maintenance.
What happens if you don't clean your AC? ›Dirty filters restrict the flow of cold air which can cause it to build up inside the air conditioner. The final result could be the formation of ice on the coils. Anyone in your home suffer from allergies or asthma? A dirty filter can make their symptoms much worse.
Does cleaning AC coils really help? ›With HVAC systems accounting for much of the electricity used in your home, regular maintenance will help cut energy waste and lower costs. Cleaning the condenser coil is an important HVAC maintenance task that helps keep your system running efficiently.
What happens if you don't clean your condenser? ›What will happen if you don't regularly clean your AC condenser coils? Dirt and grime on AC coils make it harder for your equipment to transfer heat. That means it has to run longer and work harder to do its job, using more energy and causing parts to wear and break down.
Does cleaning AC condenser make a difference? ›Remember: that the AC condenser coils are a part of the outdoor unit. Not cleaning the condenser coil impacts the performance of your AC. Heat gets trapped inside and can't be effectively released when it is covered with dirt and debris. This will lead to inefficient cooling and increased energy consumption.
What effect will a dirty condenser have on an air conditioner? ›A dirty condenser coil with have a reduced ability to transfer heat to the outside air and this can lead to a less effective cooling system. A person that is using an air conditioner that has a dirty condenser coil may find that the unit no longer provides adequate cooling to the structure.
How much does it cost to get coils cleaned? ›
AC coil cleaning costs $100 to $400 on average, depending on the coil type, location, accessibility, and dirt buildup.
How many months should AC be cleaned? ›Experts in air conditioning advise that even if there is nothing wrong with your air conditioning unit, you still need to have it cleaned at least once every 12 months to make sure that your air conditioner is working at its peak efficiency during the season when you need it the most.
Do evaporator coils need to be cleaned? ›The evaporator coil should be inspected and cleaned (if necessary) before each cooling season.
How do I know if my condenser is dirty? ›- Loud and abnormal noises coming from the unit.
- Significantly reduced cooling capability from the unit.
- The unit is leaking a noticeable amount of fluid past the typical amount of condensation.
Wet the Coils and Coat With Coil Cleaner
Take your hose and gently wet the coils to further remove excess debris. Next, spray a generous amount of foaming coil cleaner onto the coils in a back and forth motion. The coil cleaner will begin to foam and start collecting dust and debris. Let sit for five to 10 minutes.
When a condenser is unclean, its ability to reject heat is severely affected. As a result, the AC does not cool the room the way it used to. If you notice that the cooling power is lowered, your condenser might be dirty. If your AC is emitting loud noises that it usually does not, this is another warning sign.
How do I know when to clean my air conditioner? ›- The external vents are covered in mould and mildew. ...
- The filter is covered in dust and dirt build-up. ...
- It's blowing hot air when it should be cold. ...
- The unit is 'huffing', 'wheezing' or rattling. ...
- There's a pungent smell coming from the air conditioner.
A clean filter means your air conditioner will cool your room more effectively, run more quietly and produce higher air quality. Without regular air conditioner cleaning, your equipment will have to work harder to achieve the same result.
How often should central air need freon? ›Most systems need Freon replacement anywhere from once every two to five years from a professional HVAC Contractor. The most significant exception to this rule is when there is a leak in the air conditioning system, which decreases the amount of refrigerant in an AC unit over time.