rheem ac noise

md

in our church we have about a 22 year rheem 5 ton ac system which is on its last leg,, but trying to keep it going  do to low funds,,, system gets low on freon every 2-3 years but no one can find leak,,,, fan motor for outside unit just got changed, indoor and outdoor  coils were cleaned,filter new,,, shrader valve just changed on the suction side, high pressure side valve tap is all corroded and no one can get a gauge on it,,,,but unit has been working  this season real well, until this weekend, it ran none stop from sat 6.00am until 6.00pm no problems church cooled to 74 deg,, sunday unit is running and outside compressor sounds very loud,  it sounds like a dry air compressor with no oil and with the discharge hose off hissing air, and loud, also alot of flashing bubbles are seen on the site glass on pressure line,,, but the unit was cooling but not like it used to, we checked inside and outside coil no ice up, filter good, we shut unit off for 10 minutes refired it up,, noise is gone, no bubbles and ran unit for a few more hrs and it sounds fine,,, any ideas,, seems like a compressor / valve issue,,,,,/???????????

Techman

Rheem

With that hissing sound,it might be the comp internal hi press relief valve. Is this a scroll compressor?If yes,the comp might have been running in the wrong rotation.Is the electric 1 ph or 3 ph?How did you physically check the evap coil for iceing ? 5tons of cooling is not very much  cooling for most churches. I would replace that hi side service valve, or, recover the freon and solder in a Schrader wrot [wrought } T,1 1/8 "or 7/8" .

Empire_2

22 YEARS?

Wow, count you blessings and not to sound consenting, but the average life of ANY system is roughly 12 to 15 years before you can expect problems like you are experiencing.  Yes, I know this does not help, but the HVAC does not owe the church anything.  It has served you somewhat well.  Now a decision has to be made as the HVAC community can only put on so many band aids before you start saying I will try another contractor".  Unfortunatly, these service calls cost a lot of money and in the end of things you will never be happy.  This syste3m is crying out, "I cant do it any more".  Just an opinion.



Mike T.



Hey Terry, how have you been?