Dehumidifier not working
#1
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.
#3
The charge is low and the unit has a leak. Finding the leak in these units makes them just about unrepairable.
#4
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.
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
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 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.