Air conditioning problems in Florida

About a year ago, I moved in with my elderly father, who was recently diagnosed with bone cancer, in Southern FL.

Overall it's been a very positive move - I've been able to save a little bit of money, while also helping him out a lot and hopefully prolonging his life.

And of course the weather here is amazing. The temperature this year ranged from about 95 on the ten hottest days, to 65 on the ten coolest. And the real temperature range has been more like 72-85.

But of course, it's extremely hard on air conditioners and ours was already old. It started really failing this past "winter" so you can imagine how it likes the summer, and we decided to replace it.

The crew installed it last week, and my father did something that really irritated me at the time but I have now come to see as the result of a lifetime of experience with this sort of thing.

They required a 1/3 deposit up front, which we paid, but when the job was completed they wanted the rest of the money. Which sounded reasonable to me, and I was sort of upset on their behalf when he said "I'll pay you after the legally required inspector looks at it and tells me you did the job properly."

They were fucking pissed, but sure enough it has failed to properly cool the house. It's working, but it can only move the temperature here by about fifteen degrees instead of twenty, which is what it should be.

Now they're being pissy about showing up to fix it because they're still mad that they didn't get paid. They came once, but it didn't work and now they're griping about coming again. They've said they will, but they've already put it off twice.

I was thinking that if they hadn't gotten back to me by Monday, I'd start a complaint with the Better Business Bureau, and the online service that I used to find them (who assigned me a case worked automatically.)

But as I sit here and type, I'm kind of getting frustrated and I think I might pull the trigger on that today instead.

Just venting

Jeff,

IMHO, start a complaint right away. There's no reason for them to complain to return to a job they failed to do correctly in the first place. You may want to suggest legal action as a threat against them if they don't return immediately

luvgirlsfeet said:

Jeff,

IMHO, start a complaint right away. There's no reason for them to complain to return to a job they failed to do correctly in the first place. You may want to suggest legal action as a threat against them if they don't return immediately

Click to expand...

I've been thinking about that too - demand the deposit back and they can have their unit back.

After we pay a second crew to come along and fix what the first crew did.

I mean, I'm hoping it doesn't come to that, but that's the direction I'm leaning.

And I did end up contacting the company I found them through, to ask them to act as a third-party mediator. I'm going to give them through tomorrow to make some progress and then Monday go ahead with the next steps.

Your father sounds like a wise man. I hope everything works out

Yeah we had our AC serviced last summer and then this year it died. Seemed like the first people that "fixed" it kinda just put a bandaid on it to last a short amount of time.

The new one is great and we got a good deal, but they had to remove something from the crawlspace above the house and took out the frame of the small door in the ceiling that allows access to that space. Then they left and everything. AC is great, but the frame in the ceiling for that door is gone and there's like pieces of drywall hanging and shit and dude never responded to calls afterwards.

weird afffff

I like your dad.

My A/C unit has been rattling in my walls at night and it's driving me crazy. I've secured all the lines I can access to joists and studs and nothing is lose on the actual unit. The A/C guy said older units do this when the freon settles at night. Might be complete bs, but can't find much about this type of issue online.

Jeff, sorry to hear about your dad.

Can you replace your AC Unit SPSRS1?

If it's keeping you up at night then I'd imagine that's grounds for disturbing your peace and quite.

ILuvDebonairDamsels said:

Can you replace your AC Unit SPSRS1?

If it's keeping you up at night then I'd imagine that's grounds for disturbing your peace and quite.

Click to expand...

That's what probably needs to happen. It's just the cost that I'd like to avoid. But I'll eventually have to replace it.

That's what probably needs to happen. It's just the cost that I'd like to avoid. But I'll eventually have to replace it.

Click to expand...

Do you live in a apartment or do you own your own home? I ask as if it's the former then perhaps the landlord could be persuaded to fix or replace it at no additional cost to you?

Didn't know the boss man lived near my neck of the woods; a belated Welcome to Florida to you, sir!

I'll consider myself fortunate, as when our A/C started acting up last week for the 2nd time this summer, all it took to fix was suctioning out the drainage line with a shop-vac.
We tend to turn the system for most of the (short) winter down here, which can facilitate junk growing and accumulating in the drainage line.

Good luck with getting your system replaced!

happy_touch said:

Didn't know the boss man lived near my neck of the woods; a belated Welcome to Florida to you, sir!

I'll consider myself fortunate, as when our A/C started acting up last week for the 2nd time this summer, all it took to fix was suctioning out the drainage line with a shop-vac.
We tend to turn the system for most of the (short) winter down here, which can facilitate junk growing and accumulating in the drainage line.

Good luck with getting your system replaced!

Click to expand...

On a day like today when its 90+ outside, how cold do you get your house? Do you know if you could you get it to 72 if you wanted?

Does your house have multiple levels? I don't know if it's this way where you live, but here in AZ if it's a house that's not just one floor, they usually have 2 AC units. This kinda blew my mind coming from the midwest where central air is a luxury and usually only works on the main floor haha.

chicago said:

Does your house have multiple levels? I don't know if it's this way where you live, but here in AZ if it's a house that's not just one floor, they usually have 2 AC units. This kinda blew my mind coming from the midwest where central air is a luxury and usually only works on the main floor haha.

Click to expand...

No, just one level. And same here - where I grew up central air was rare but here, and when I lived in vegas, everyone has huge AC machines attached to their house.

TMF Jeff said:

On a day like today when its 90+ outside, how cold do you get your house? Do you know if you could you get it to 72 if you wanted?

Click to expand...

I've never set it below 76; usually I leave it at 78-80 (home & away) as 78 is comfortable for me and keeps the energy bill in check. I also have a portable unit in my room for more granular control. It is the furthest room from the air handler, making it the hottest. I don't have to run the main unit as much and if there's every an emergency there's one room of the house that isn't an oven.

TMF Jeff said:

On a day like today when its 90+ outside, how cold do you get your house? Do you know if you could you get it to 72 if you wanted?

Click to expand...

If I set mine that low, it will get down to 72, but with so much humidity in the air the drain pain (located in the attic) will overflow, as I discovered when I saw a water spot on the ceiling, so I keep it more like 76. And this is after making sure the drain line was not clogged, and I change the filter monthly in the summer. But it is an older A/C unit.

With summers getting hotter and longer, the A/C business seems like a good one to be in.

To be clear, I dont necessarily want my house at 72 (although I dont necessarily not want that either) Im just trying to judge the AC because the installer is saying I should only expect a 15 degree movement but online Im told to expect 20.

TMF Jeff said:

To be clear, I dont necessarily want my house at 72 (although I dont necessarily not want that either) Im just trying to judge the AC because the installer is saying I should only expect a 15 degree movement but online Im told to expect 20.

Click to expand...

A new A/C should be able to do that, unless it is the wrong size for your house (both in terms of square footage of your house and the height of the ceilings).

Today we had the installer along with a couple of representatives from the manufacturer here, and they tried a number of fixes. After a lot of what I would consider to be good-faith effort, they concluded that the machine is just a lemon and they're going to replace it (for free of course.)

I'm greatly relieved, although of course it could turn out to still not do the job. But at least there's been progress, and I was fairly sure that the rep was just going to come in and rubber stamp it, saying "It's doing what it's supposed to do, if the house isn't cool enough, it's a problem with the house."

But they were really determined to make it work, and when they couldn't they didn't miss a beat before agreeing that the problem is with the compressor. They said "It should be able to do this but it clearly can't."