carrier straight cool R-22 condenser SHORT-CYCLING?


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Old 08-04-11, 04:54 PM
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carrier straight cool R-22 condenser SHORT-CYCLING?

Greeting all,

It has been a while!...my friend called me and indicated that his CARRIER straight cool exterior condensing unit (2- 2 1/2 ton, r-22) was not cooling.

To skip to the heart of the matter, i purchased a dual run/start cap and installed, reasonable thinking that that was the problem as all in this unit was original...fan runs and always ran fine...the compressor will start for only 1.5 seconds and the shut down with fan still running.

He had a bad 220vac 60-I breaker and i replaced same with a new box and breaker as his was in bad shape....he has 220vac from panel to disconnect, to starting relay (activated of course my 24v), and to load side of start relay. there are no burned, loose wires of any sorts.

i applied my gauges to the condenser ports and the suction/low side was pegged to the end of gauge (which i have never witnessed before) and the liquid/high side was quite a bit up there although, i don't recall measurement at this time.

i am stuck at this point and standing around in 100* outside temps is no fun here in Florida - believe me!

what would cause this typical carrier R-22 condenser to very short cycle and crap-out?..ANY fast help would be appreciated as the alternative would be to totally replace the unit..THANKS AGAIN!
 
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Old 08-04-11, 07:47 PM
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were you taking a pressure reading with the compressor running?? if the compressor was only running for a mere 2 seconds, its going off on overload. check amperage if you have a clamp meter. windings could be messed up inside the motor.
 
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Old 08-05-11, 03:21 AM
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...THANK YOU very much for reply!

.....i didn't have one with me at the time and, the readings i took were the only readings i could get and that was with the unit on (meaning fan running and compressor short cycling for about a second..when it did that ANY readings on the gauges wee negligible.

.....i was attempting to find out the tonnage of this unit and came up with a carrier model number off the compressor unit which was; 38BRG036300 and from the air handler which is: FC4CNF036. If i read this correctly (and PLEASE correct me if i am wrong!) this is a 3 ton(?) split system unit. the strange thing is WHY would someone put a 3 ton system into a house that is 1,318 sq feet!? (500 sq ft = 1 ton, 1,310 ~ 500= 2.63). it appears that this house should have taken a 2.5 ton unit.
 
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Old 08-05-11, 06:05 AM
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Well...I have a 3.5 ton (IIRC) for about 1600 sf but thats mostly because of our high summer temps and large windows. Florida is warm AND humid...
You can't just go by sq footage. When determining the size needed they look at type, location, and size of windows, amount of insulation, air leakage, etc etc. Then they prob said...we'll go a bit bigger since we have one in stock and don't want to order one...lol.
 
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Old 08-05-11, 04:11 PM
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lol. even if they did do the calcs and it coincidentally came out to that number, you always go to the next size up.
 
 

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