How not to maintain your AC

[dreamshark]

As temperatures soared to close to 100° yesterday I noticed that the big air conditioner on the landing (the one that cools the whole downstairs) wasn’t exactly putting out cold air. It was still running but the air coming out of the vents was at best lukewarm. Looked this up in the troubleshooting section of the manual and it said, among other things, “When was the last time you cleaned your air filter?”

Hmmm, I said. Never? Turns out you are supposed to do that every 2 weeks. We bought this unit in 2018. And judging by the unbroken tape on the sides, nobody has ever even looked at the air filter. It was just a little tricky to get the front grill off (less tricky once I noticed the tape holding it on). And this is what I found.

Gross. 

Comments

[carbonel]

So did cleaning the filter actually help with the problem?

[dreamshark]

Yes indeed. The most obvious improvement was that the volume of air coming out of the thing increased noticeably, which I wasn't expecting. The air is definitely much colder, but it still seems to be cycling between truly cold and comfortably cool, even though it never gets down to the target temperature setting. All the other AC units in the house just pump out cold air nonstop (or at least until they get down to the target temperature if they are that sophisticated).

I absolutely LOATHE the controls on this unit (a large Danby), which are identified with tiny, faint, cryptic icons, so I'm never sure I've actually set it to do the thing I want it to do. But no matter which settings I choose, it's still doing that cycling thing. It's definitely producing more cold air now, however. And probably using less electricity to do it.

ETA: Attic update. All the air conditioners seem to be working better now, but the biggest improvement is the 10-year-old one on the south side of the attic, which was really just left there as a backup when we installed a bigger and better one on the north side. It's still not as good as the new one, but it's actually worth turning on now.

[davidwilford]

YIKES!

[laramie]

Wow. And thanks for the reminder. I don't use my AC much - until this summer - but I've been here five years now and have never accessed the filter. Not sure how.

[dreamshark]

It's generally very easy. On our larger units, you open the grate in the front, which usually just pulls forward from the top. If you have never opened it before, as was the case with one of ours, there might be pieces of tape holding it on the sides that was part of the original packing material.

The small units that I've been buying at the hardware store are even easier. The filter just slides out from the side. Look for a little tab or indentation to pull on. Ours were on the right right side. This was so non-disruptive that I didn't even bother to unplug the AC. I did turn it off of course.

[laramie]

Thanks for the clues!