Trane Air Handler leaking water

bodo4847

We purchased a new Trane Run-Tru 3.5 ton system in September 2023, pretty much at the end of the Summer season. This year we have been going through a nightmare where as the air handler is leaking condensate water into a protective 30 x 60 drip pan under the entire unit. This is above a bathroom ceiling, We also installed a wet switch in case of leaks, thank God. The problem is the unit shuts down every day because of the condensate water leak. I've tried contacting Trane customer service, they are not very helpful to say the least. The installer has been here several times and has sprayed the coils to see if that would help clean the oils off and solve the problem, it did not. They are coming back nest week to replace the internal condensate pan hoping that will solve our problem. I asked Trane to replace the coils at the same time as I've found on Google that could be one of our issues, but Trane refused! Hoping the internal pan replacement works, if it does not the next step will be to remove the entire brand new Trane and have another competitive system installed. I will go after Trane to foot the complete bill as this installation was quite an arduous task. This is a Horizontal installation and was done by 2 upper level techs, as we could not have been happier with the installation, and the unit cools very well, when it works. Unfortunately, this is a daily occurrence of having to climb a ladder go into the attic and remove the water from the pan beneath the air handler. A less than happier Trane customer!! Bob

pecmsg

Trane has nothing to do with the install and do not talk to the end consumer only the contractor. Where is the installing contractor, it should still be under warranty.

Static pressure is the 1st thing that needs to be checked. Excessive static pressure prevents the condensate from draining.
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gyrfalcon

I am a homeowner with a horizontal - American Standard (Trane) in my attic. Last year I had found water leaking from the cabinet. This was installed from a reputable company but hindsight proves the installation team made mistakes. I found that on this model the blower fan pulls air across the coil making negative pressure in the cabinet. This negative pressure pulls on the condensing water that should be running out the drain. Slowing down the water or stopping it from flowing .
This issue is alleviated by having a proper trap in the drain. I found a few other issues too( missing drain bungs in the condensate drip pan which I had to silicone shut. )

Make sure the drain is clear all the way to outside or wherever it terminates- make sure it has a trap- unless your model is a positive pressure model - then it’s probably ok to not have a trap. If this doesn’t resolve the issue, some in depth investigation is needed. Trane will likely not come to the rescue directly.

EBEBRATT-Ed

If the coil and fan are mounted so you have negative pressure at the drain you MUST have a trap and the trap must be deep enough to overcome the negative static pressure in the AHU.

This is a common mistake.

To check to see if this is the problem have someone watch the drain and with the unit on and cooling shut the AHU switch off. If it doesn't drain much when running but drains when shut down the trap or drain is improper