Job completed for United States Forest Service

Completion date: February 21, 2018

Location: Swoope, VA

Why did the customer contact us?

Customer contacted us about inspecting an old Heat pump that had been dormant for around 7 years at a United States Forest Service Station.

Solutions provided:

In our initial inspection, we found some electrical issues that we recommended an electrician fix before we tried to re-commission the system. The major issue appeared that the system had received a major surge of extra power that damaged the fused disconnect.

After an electrician made the repairs recommended we returned to commission the system.

We started our inspection at the indoor air handler. Repaired insulation that was coming loose inside of the air handler that was blocking one side of the blower housing. Inspected indoor coil, the coil is clean and in good condition. Cleaned indoor coil with specified indoor coil cleaner. Changed the customer's air filter.

We found some major issues with the condensate lines and pan for the system. Installed a new drain pan closer to the underside of the air handler. Installed a new pan switch on the emergency pan. Installed an EZ trap on the primary drain line. The current drain line ran flat on the floor, code requires 1 inch of fall for every 5 feet. We re-ran the drain line to have a proper fall. This helps reduce blockages in the condensate line.

Installed Surge protectors at both the Air Handler and at the Heat Pump outside. These will protect the systems from power surges in the future.

We cleaned the outdoor coil on the heat pump, this will allow proper airflow across the outdoor coil and maximum heat transfer between the refrigerant and the outdoor air.

Replaced failing contactor and Dual Capacitor for the Heat Pump.

Discovered the low voltage connections for the Heat Pump were really worn due to exposure. Multiple wires had bare spots, re-wired the low voltage connections to prevent bare wires from possibly causing a short in the low voltage circuit. When a short occurs it will cause the system to not operate, and possibly damage low voltage boards.

Verified proper refrigerant charge.

Made sure the system operated properly in both Heating and Cooling modes.

Team members on this project:

Alex Laukaitis,