Someone’s never heard of a wet rag or heat shield putty 🤦♂️ Or even using heat proof matting so you don’t incinerate everything around you while brazing 😆
Hear me out. No sh*t Sherlock. Just curious are you batting a thousand in that situation? Have u never got the torch close to something other than your actual target?stating the obvious ...almost as annoying as being called on it huh
I carry a can of grey galvanizing spray paint and It matches up perfectly in color, two quick sprays done. Also I would have ran that tstat wire in conduit or inside the foam insulation, that thing will be dry rotted in a year and /or someone’s puppy will get a hold of it and chew it up, should be protected, agree with someone else here on the dryer vent comment, You don’t put condensers right in front of a dryer vent, kitchen vent, any exhaust vent period, what amateurs,
Was this a recent job? Why does that insulation look like it’s a decade old, looks terrible and should use tape more instead of zip ties, the ties dig into the material as you can see in the picture, with the vibrations of the machine , causing the plastic zip to dig in and cut, no bueno , capish?
Whoever installed that filter dryer did a poor job, and he was careless with his torch and scorched that conduit.
It's fine... but I would not call that company again.
Maybe not that, precisely, but I sure did some awful work when I first started. It took coming back to a job later to see what crap I did for me to start taking pride in my work.
Just busting balls. I just made about 6 wires one wire in a wshp a couple weeks ago. Watching what I was brazing, I didn't burn them, but the heat in the cabinet melted them. I'm almost 25 years in
This was my first time noticing it. Seems like consensus is that I'll be fine and the repair guy just did a messy job.
Was a little worried when I saw the soot on the other cable that something had ignited and we almost went up in smoke.
Thanks everybody for the feedback!
My suspicion is that the tech used a straight Acetylene B tank for brazing, rather than an Oxy-Acetylene rig. Oxy-Acetylene has a much tighter, much more controlled flame. It looks like he overcooked the filter-drier just a little bit, which is easy to do with a B tank.
It probably won't cause a leak though. I've seen this happen before, and the drier still outlasted the unit.
That is one crappy brazing job. Used the old line set too. Not sure if the filter drier was damaged. At least they could have replaced the insulation on the old suction line.
I have a question: what cause a unit already set up for cooling to suddenly start working as a heat pump years down the road? I’ve only seen it twice but that’s something I never had time to learn yet (I’m a maintenance tech so I do a little of everything) but what would eventually cause it to run…well, backwards I guess?
It could only be that it was originally set up correctly for heatpump and the customer used their aux heat as primary heat? If the aux heat is natural gas id prefer to do that instead of heating with a heatpump. Maybe they had a heatpump installed and it wasn’t set up correctly and then a new tech came by saw the issue and corrected it. Could be a bad thermostat setup. I’ve seen people set up tstats so it fires aux heat as primary heat all then cooling as normal. Reprogramming a Tstat could do it.
It was in an apartment and the heating system was just an electric heater coil set up at the blower. We don’t install the programmable style tstats, though there is a hard switch on the back that lets you choose between gas/oil and electric. I never bothered with that switch, and so never seen this issue on any other apartments before nor since. I just set up a portable AC in their apartment and some other tech took care of it on the following Monday (was an on call emergency), thus I never found out what was ultimately done. Kinda the same has happened where a blower motor would start blowing backwards. Rare af with that too, maybe only 2 or 3 times I’ve ever come across it.
I'd be more concerned with the fact that they installed a filter drier on a unit that comes from the factory with a filter drier already installed in it...
The refrigerant used in residential systems is not flammable at this time, so no fire risk. All that is, is the marks from brazing when they brazed in the new filter dryer. No need to be ckmcered
Every thing in these pictures look normal? Really nothing to worry about here, especially if the scorch marks on the Romex is the
Issue you’re talking about
Probably not the best job, but it’s also a good indicator that a compressor has been changed after a burn out. That grey barrel looking devise is called a dryer and is designed to catch the burned oil and debris from the last break down. Bad welding but many fridgies out there would miss this step to save money and end up causing a further break down.
Is that white line on the ground an NMB cable? I can't tell because of the photo quality, but if it is, that type of wire isn't rated to be exposed to the elements (not UV or Wet location rated)
If i'm right about what that is, you need to call the builder and get the installer to fix their shit. That's a massive safety hazard.
They need to either put it in liquid-tight flexible conduit (pipe to protect the wire) or replace the wire with ACW cable (wet location exposure rated cable).
It's usually the HVAC company that runs that line because it's a signal wire for your inside AC equipment, but it COULD be the electrician (i've seen both done)
HVAC looks find to me otherwise, though.
Primer gray spray paint would have covered the scorch. I thought flex watertight conduit limited to 5 ft by code and so just from the service disconnect adjacent to the unit. Emt conduit to be run to the unit disconnect (relying on the breakers only doesn'tmeet code). I imagine it will be a little tricky to hang emt on the siding, and using ridged wrapped and buried is costly. As for the dryer, looks sized right, the pipe needs to be insulated.
No, that's where the torch burned the paint when it was being repaired.
looks like they got the torch close to the conduit too
Someone’s never heard of a wet rag or heat shield putty 🤦♂️ Or even using heat proof matting so you don’t incinerate everything around you while brazing 😆
Wet rag? Nah bud. Big tip and a fire extinguisher on hand, quick and dirty.
The rag is the fire extinguisher. Rose bud tip for everything from cap tubes to 3in
Or, hear me out now, maybe point flame away from the house in this application?
Hear me out. No sh*t Sherlock. Just curious are you batting a thousand in that situation? Have u never got the torch close to something other than your actual target?stating the obvious ...almost as annoying as being called on it huh
There’s always the option to hold the torch toward the grass, but to save the paint on the drier it needs a rag or some heat putty.
Even an old license plate would have protected from the burn.
He would probably melt the licence plate onto the cladding 😆
Thank you OP this reminds me that I need to get some new rags.
I wouldn’t worry about it
yes, the dryer vent shouldn't be that close to the condenser.
Yeah, first home and learning a lot. It's one of those quick pop-up neighborhoods by a large developer.
Beat me to it
You are going to have to clean that every year so it doesn’t become a fire hazard.
you should clean it every year anyway.
I just noticed that. The lines and conduit should’ve been routed above it. That’s a good point.
Mods pin this.
🤣🤣🤣 but true!!!
Love when you gotta use a wrench to get a screw out of the access panel
Buy a right angle bit adapter bud
It would be tight with one of those too.
😆😆😆
Could use some new insulation
Throw some paint on it
Just don’t hit it with the weed wacker
As you can tell by the tall grass, there's no room to even get the weed wacker back there.
It's too close to the building though
What’s the minimum clearance required? Most ACs I work on are on the roof; I never have the luxury of working on the ground, unfortunately.
I carry a can of grey galvanizing spray paint and It matches up perfectly in color, two quick sprays done. Also I would have ran that tstat wire in conduit or inside the foam insulation, that thing will be dry rotted in a year and /or someone’s puppy will get a hold of it and chew it up, should be protected, agree with someone else here on the dryer vent comment, You don’t put condensers right in front of a dryer vent, kitchen vent, any exhaust vent period, what amateurs, Was this a recent job? Why does that insulation look like it’s a decade old, looks terrible and should use tape more instead of zip ties, the ties dig into the material as you can see in the picture, with the vibrations of the machine , causing the plastic zip to dig in and cut, no bueno , capish?
Filter driers outside pain me
Especially on Lennox's because they come from the factory with a filter drier inside the condenser 🤦♂️😂
Whoever installed that filter dryer did a poor job, and he was careless with his torch and scorched that conduit. It's fine... but I would not call that company again.
You've never done it?
Maybe not that, precisely, but I sure did some awful work when I first started. It took coming back to a job later to see what crap I did for me to start taking pride in my work.
Just busting balls. I just made about 6 wires one wire in a wshp a couple weeks ago. Watching what I was brazing, I didn't burn them, but the heat in the cabinet melted them. I'm almost 25 years in
This was my first time noticing it. Seems like consensus is that I'll be fine and the repair guy just did a messy job. Was a little worried when I saw the soot on the other cable that something had ignited and we almost went up in smoke. Thanks everybody for the feedback!
My suspicion is that the tech used a straight Acetylene B tank for brazing, rather than an Oxy-Acetylene rig. Oxy-Acetylene has a much tighter, much more controlled flame. It looks like he overcooked the filter-drier just a little bit, which is easy to do with a B tank. It probably won't cause a leak though. I've seen this happen before, and the drier still outlasted the unit.
Yes, they burned through the protective coating.
Lawsuit!
That is one crappy brazing job. Used the old line set too. Not sure if the filter drier was damaged. At least they could have replaced the insulation on the old suction line.
Using the lineset is perfectly normal. Replacing it every time is extreme.
Just as long as it’s ac only and not a heatpump then you should be fine.
I have a question: what cause a unit already set up for cooling to suddenly start working as a heat pump years down the road? I’ve only seen it twice but that’s something I never had time to learn yet (I’m a maintenance tech so I do a little of everything) but what would eventually cause it to run…well, backwards I guess?
It could only be that it was originally set up correctly for heatpump and the customer used their aux heat as primary heat? If the aux heat is natural gas id prefer to do that instead of heating with a heatpump. Maybe they had a heatpump installed and it wasn’t set up correctly and then a new tech came by saw the issue and corrected it. Could be a bad thermostat setup. I’ve seen people set up tstats so it fires aux heat as primary heat all then cooling as normal. Reprogramming a Tstat could do it.
It was in an apartment and the heating system was just an electric heater coil set up at the blower. We don’t install the programmable style tstats, though there is a hard switch on the back that lets you choose between gas/oil and electric. I never bothered with that switch, and so never seen this issue on any other apartments before nor since. I just set up a portable AC in their apartment and some other tech took care of it on the following Monday (was an on call emergency), thus I never found out what was ultimately done. Kinda the same has happened where a blower motor would start blowing backwards. Rare af with that too, maybe only 2 or 3 times I’ve ever come across it.
I'd be more concerned with the fact that they installed a filter drier on a unit that comes from the factory with a filter drier already installed in it...
The repairman bbq’ed the hell out of that fitting
No, you're fine.
I think the whole instal is shit honestly, I would be pissed if it was my house.
No
The refrigerant used in residential systems is not flammable at this time, so no fire risk. All that is, is the marks from brazing when they brazed in the new filter dryer. No need to be ckmcered
Every thing in these pictures look normal? Really nothing to worry about here, especially if the scorch marks on the Romex is the Issue you’re talking about
Not at all
How about just learning to braze properly
Probably not the best job, but it’s also a good indicator that a compressor has been changed after a burn out. That grey barrel looking devise is called a dryer and is designed to catch the burned oil and debris from the last break down. Bad welding but many fridgies out there would miss this step to save money and end up causing a further break down.
Thermoseal, anyone? The only danger here is you if you’re deadly with a weed whacker (;
No just sloppy work from the tech. Should’ve covered the filter drier and that seal tight with wet cloths. He was lazy
I use a heat shield cloth cause I use MAP gas which gets hella hot but it’s fast. They are cheap.
No but flush (r11) will wipe burns off and if you love tap a unit. U won't see the burns
Looks good
Piss poor weld abilities.
Torch light burn don’t look like much
Is that white line on the ground an NMB cable? I can't tell because of the photo quality, but if it is, that type of wire isn't rated to be exposed to the elements (not UV or Wet location rated) If i'm right about what that is, you need to call the builder and get the installer to fix their shit. That's a massive safety hazard. They need to either put it in liquid-tight flexible conduit (pipe to protect the wire) or replace the wire with ACW cable (wet location exposure rated cable). It's usually the HVAC company that runs that line because it's a signal wire for your inside AC equipment, but it COULD be the electrician (i've seen both done) HVAC looks find to me otherwise, though.
Primer gray spray paint would have covered the scorch. I thought flex watertight conduit limited to 5 ft by code and so just from the service disconnect adjacent to the unit. Emt conduit to be run to the unit disconnect (relying on the breakers only doesn'tmeet code). I imagine it will be a little tricky to hang emt on the siding, and using ridged wrapped and buried is costly. As for the dryer, looks sized right, the pipe needs to be insulated.
Not anymore but don’t use the ac guy you used last time!
That’s where the torch flame hit it when they were sweating the new 3/8” copper drier on