There are approximately 500-1,000 deaths from electrical injuries in the United States every year. Nearly 3-5% of both fatal and non-fatal admissions to burn units every year are a result of electrical injuries.

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Ban electricity

Just use a solar fixture, Hawaii.

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IKE! you're the man!

I just had the guy come out and replace with LED's. It took him like 15 min to do them all. He said they didnt need the ballast thing and he didnt need to turn off the electricity.

From now on, any house updates you're the go to guy!

Thank you again to Darko and Ike on pages 20 and 21 for their help answering questions about my AC unit/specifically about leaking coils in the attic a couple years back.

I haven't had a checkup since today. Same company came out. As soon as the technician greeted me, I told him that I'm aware of the leaking coils in the attic and that he'll probably have to add some refrigerant before he leaves. After looking at the unit and then the attic, the technician tells me everything is "pretty bad." He suggested (like the guy that came 2 years ago) I fix and replace the leaking coils or buy an entire new unit. I told him while I respected his opinion and judgement, I'm not going to do either option as I'm going to ride it out. I asked about refrigerant cost. $470 for 4 pounds. He then started to say it might be a "legal issue" if he puts in the refrigerant while ignoring/doing nothing about the leaking coils. He said he could lose his certification or the company mights lose its license. He mentioned things would be bad if something happened to me. Blah blah blah.

I told him confidently the same company has added refrigerant before knowing there was a leak and the conversation was much different than the one we're having today. There's nothing wrong with breathing in 410a and I feel like you're trying to scare me. "No, no, no, I wouldn't do that. We're just trying to help." I asked him why refrigerant exists. You're supposed to use the stuff if there's a leak and the unit is older. Why else would you have refrigerant in your truck. Your company bought it to use it. He finally said he could add refrigerant and ignore the leak if it was put in the notes that I understand it's a "temporary solution" and their suggestion would be to fix and replace the coils.

I had enough and asked him to schedule a time next week to come out and add refrigerant. I'm going to weigh all options because I'm tired and confused after all this talking. Unbelievable experience.

*It's important to note, my air conditioner works fine, it works great actually. Could there be a little more insulation around the house and are there hot and cold spots, sure, but the thing is still powerful in the dog days of a Phoenix summer.

Don't let them keep charging the unit every summer, have them put a sealant into the system to stop the leak..then charge it. They don't need to hit you up for 300$ every summer.

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This isn't great advice. Leak seal is maybe OK to get you through one summer... maaaaaaaybe. Leak seal does fucked up things to metering devices, seals, valves and oil. I've seen maybe a 5 to 10% success rate with it. And once that shit is in there you can't use it again. The only scenario I'm using that stuff is if it comes with dye marker and I can pinpoint a Leak (which I can do with my IR camera and or IR sniffer) and it's in a repairable location.
That being said...
I used Leak seal at Doug's condo and it worked. It was one of the very few success stories I have. His system took half a pound a year before I put in the seal. Anything more than that and it won't work imho.

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

He already knows his system is shot and he needs a new unit.

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I will say that a tech talking about losing certification for recharging is an asshole. TECHNICALLY possible... a system eating a pound a year requires repair per epa but I've never once seen that enforced in any way. That was a scare tactic and it was some bullshit. But those numbers I saw from a couple years ago... I reviewed them... looks to me like an overcharged system with a bad metering device... sorry of I'm repeating myself... but that high subcooling high superheat doesn't say undercharged to me.

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

Ive got one for you. My A/C has always kind of done a shitty job of keeping when I do use it which is not all that often. It works but it seems to take a while. Regardless....it worked. It no longer works. I have done some of the basic stuff. I gave it a rinse as it was pretty dirty, i checked and replaced the capacitor as the herm side was about 30 percent low. I have the new one in and it still doesn't work. I get the fan to fire but the compressor wont do shit. I checked the voltages and while I do have a sticky contactor it did pull in and gave me my 240 to the compressor. I did hear a little hum for about 3 seconds, every minute or two which seemed to be the compressor wanting to fire but not actually doing so. I don't think there is anything else I can test with my electrical knowledge and tools.

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That's my purse! I don't know you!

The compressor humming sounds like a bad capacitor. Since you replaced it, check your wiring to the capacitor, make sure you didn't switch Fan and herm. Then, check your physical wiring between the contactor, capacitor and the compressor

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

So I went out to double check things. I swapped the fan and herm wires for the hell of it since the new capacitor has them on the opposite sides as the original. It actually fired the compressor that way for a a little bit. I could also pull the fan lead off the capacitor and it still ran the fan but at a way lower speed. There is some little blue thing that takes one of the herm leads and one common and then has a wire that enters and exits the blue thing by itself. Also when I test the contactor i have my 240 at the top but when its not sucked in i dont get 240 at the bottom but i do get 120 to each side somehow. The wiring sounds fucked up but its how its always been. I only changed the capacitor and took pics to ensure i put it back correctly.

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That's my purse! I don't know you!

Ok so a little basic electricity...
When the contactor isn't pulled in you should have 240 on the line side. It must be a single pole contactor, meaning when it's not pulled I. There's 120 on one of the two legs. You'll get 120 on each side of the contactor on the load side to ground when it's not pulled in but 0 pole to pole on the load side. This is because the 120 passing the contactor on the shunt side is passing thru the common windings back to the other side of the contactor. It's the same phase, that's why you get 120 to G on each side but 0 across both terminals.

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

The contactor is working fine then. Does that 2x2 inch rounded blue box with the capacitor common, herm wire and internal loop wire ring a bell with you? This thing has to be 25 years old, a carrier and it claims to be "high effiency" in and era where I don't recall there being any true high efficiency.

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That's my purse! I don't know you!

You wanna take a picture of it and text it to me? Pm me if you want contact info.

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

if you take a wood screw and drive it in at an angle where the contactor button is you can force the compressor on permanently.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

Can someone explain to be how a 25' x 25' deck costs over $10k to just replace the boards and railings? I got four different quotes and one was actually for $30k!

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the contractors think youre a bitch

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

Pressure treated? Composite? Cedar?

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Pressure treated composite ceader decking. You just gave me a new billion dollar business idea. Thank you.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

That is pretty damn expensive unless you are using that composite trex stuff which is not cheap.

I got the AC back up and running today. I was moving the bundle of wires going to the compressor just to make sure a mouse didn't eat through one and the next time i tried to run it I got a dead short. I didn't realize there was a tiny j box on the compressor and sure enough one of the wires had corroded and arced enough to break it free of its stake on terminal. Im going to have to re-do all those connections as they all looked like shit but only one broke loose.

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That's my purse! I don't know you!

I need to replace the hot surface igniter on my brothers furnace and the old one seems to have no part numbers on it. Are this pretty much universal or do I need to get specific with this? It resembles the one in the link below only it was hardwired instead of the connectors.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Robertshaw-Hot-Surface-Ignitor-Series-41-407-41-407/300280479

I have a broken brakes and just ordered all the parts can you come over and help me do all the work. I got a 4k of keystone we can share while I learn from you. I promise I will talk the entire time and ask a lot of questions.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

That ignitor should be able to be replaced with a glowfly. It's universal, cheap, and will last times as long as that one. It comes with like 5 different brackets and directions on how to do the bracket thing. That's your best bet.

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

I have some if you're in my neck of the woods.
But grainger should have them.

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

No sir I'm in St Louis. Ill grab them from grainger since I probably need the gas valve as well. Thanks for the help.

This is on top of our hot water heater in WI. Is it a recirculating pump? If so should I bother plugging it in? I did read somewhere they should not be installed on top of the hot water heater yet here it is. Also I read using them can eventually cause pinholes in hot water pipes which I definitely don't want. So is it worth the trouble?

Is there anything else I should know?

BTW going tankless is presently not an option.

Thank you in advance,

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"I honestly don't see a good bet on the board here."

Pump with a timer.

tune it to 670 Bernstein is on now

Darkslide, I have an exhaust fan that wasn't running. The breaker was tripped. I reset the breaker and it's running ok now.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.