Dehumidifier not working


  #1  
Old 08-27-14, 05:36 AM
O
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Aug 2014
Location: United States
Posts: 2
Upvotes: 0
Received 0 Upvotes on 0 Posts
Dehumidifier not working

My Kenmore model 580.53650200 runs but only shows frosting up on the first finned tube and a little on the second tube. The frosting area is very cold but as far as I can tell, the rest of the finned tubing is not getting cold. I believe this means that the refrigerant gas is low as in a leak somewhere. Can I fix this myself? What equipment would be required? The label says it uses 9.9 ounces of R22.
 
  #2  
Old 08-27-14, 06:53 AM
airman.1994's Avatar
Member
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: VA
Posts: 5,491
Upvotes: 0
Received 8 Upvotes on 8 Posts
No you cant fix it yourself. The repair will be more than a new unit.
 
  #3  
Old 08-27-14, 07:37 AM
PJmax's Avatar
Group Moderator
Join Date: Oct 2012
Location: Jersey
Posts: 64,939
Received 3,951 Upvotes on 3,544 Posts
The charge is low and the unit has a leak. Finding the leak in these units makes them just about unrepairable.
 
  #4  
Old 08-31-14, 03:36 PM
O
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Aug 2014
Location: United States
Posts: 2
Upvotes: 0
Received 0 Upvotes on 0 Posts
Well, not only is this a not do-it-yourself project, you can't do it and you can't hire it done!

The R22 refrigerant that this thing uses is no longer legal. Even a professional AC man is not legally allowed to use R22. It has been replaced but the replacement is not suitable for use in the older equipment. A noticeably higher pressure is involved with the "replacement" refrigerant so is not safe to put in the equipment designed for R22.

I have scrapped the dehumidifier and recovered some electronic parts, some relays, a temperature sensor, a rather decent fan and the capacitor that runs that fan's motor, an amount of copper which will be recycled, some very neat tiny pushbutton switches, a microswitch, (used to detect tank is full), some LEDs both red and green, and a rather heavy sealed compressor.

As a replacement dehumidifier I have selected a thermoelectric form which does not use a refrigerant or a compressor. It cannot leak, as there is nothing to leak! I expect it to last a long long time.

Thanks for the comments. I took them as a challenge and look where it lead.
 
  #5  
Old 09-24-14, 07:26 PM
user 10's Avatar
Member
Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: NA
Posts: 1,829
Received 57 Upvotes on 50 Posts
The R22 refrigerant that this thing uses is no longer legal. Even a professional AC man is not legally allowed to use R22. It has been replaced but the replacement is not suitable for use in the older equipment. A noticeably higher pressure is involved with the "replacement" refrigerant so is not safe to put in the equipment designed for R22.
R22 is still legal for servicing existing machines, but you have to have a license to buy it.

I only recently found out about those thermo-electric models and they apparently have very little capacity. You'll probably find that it doesn't work well and will go back to a refrigerated model.
 
 

Thread Tools
Search this Thread
 
Ask a Question
Question Title:
Description:
Your question will be posted in: