Central A/C not working after power outage

rs1971 · 04-22-2012, 12:18 AM

Hi,

The power was out neighborhood wide for a couple of hours today in a house I rent. The air conditioning was working fine before the power went out (though by chance it was off as I was just about to leave the house) but now that the power is restored it's not working. I've tried to contact the landlord but can't get a hold of him.

The model number is RHEEM RPKA 036-JAZ. Unfortunately I know next to nothing about air conditioning. I verified that none of the circuits had tripped and also found and pushed a red reset button one the outside of the unit but to no effect. I should add that when I pushed the reset button I didn't hear any sort of a click or anything, so maybe I just wasn't pressing hard enough? I thought about trying with a screw driver or a pen but am paranoid about breaking something as it's not my unit. Does anyone know how much pressure this button take? I'd really like to get this sorted out since it's going to be 104 tomorrow. (the house is located near Yuma, AZ) It doesn't seem like it should be so hard since it was working fine before the power outage.

Does anyone have any thoughts? Thanks in advance.

-rs1971

ggold · 04-22-2012, 12:36 AM

you should be able to reset it with a push from finger, did you check fuses ?

rs1971 · 04-22-2012, 12:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ggold

you should be able to reset it with a push from finger, did you check fuses ?

Which fuses? Are there fuses inside the unit?

-rs1971

ggold · 04-22-2012, 12:45 AM

should be a fused disconnect box next to unit.

rs1971 · 04-22-2012, 12:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ggold

should be a fused disconnect box next to unit.

There is a box next to the unit (attached to the exterior wall of the house). When I open it there is something which may or may not be a fuse. It's essentially a black rectangular piece with a little notch in the side which displays the word 'on' underneath. It looks like it should slide and I tried sliding it and got it just far enough to see the word 'off' on the opposite side but no further. Again, I didn't apply to much pressure for fear of breaking something. Does this sound like the fuse box?

-rs1971

ggold · 04-22-2012, 01:10 AM

yes, remove that piece with the on/off tag, there should be one screw holding a black cover, behind that should be two 35 amp fuses..

biggles · 04-22-2012, 01:16 AM

do you get a least supply fan from the stat in FAN ON position that shows you have 24Vs down in the furnace/air handler.if the fan doesn't run might have a glass auto fuse on the control board within or a mini circuit breaker on the transformer mounted in the furnace

ggold · 04-22-2012, 01:19 AM

yes, biggles is correct. do you have a electrical meter (tester) ?

rs1971 · 04-22-2012, 01:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ggold

yes, remove that piece with the on/off tag, there should be one screw holding a black cover, behind that should be two 35 amp fuses..

When I remove that I actually don't see any screw. There is what looks like a tab which may be removable unfortunately, I don't even have a screw driver and am working with a little penlight. This isn't my primary residence and unfortunately all of my tools (including my multimeter) are 200 miles away. I guess that I'll just have to sweat the night out and try to get a hold of the landlord again in the morning.

Thanks a lot guys for taking the time to try to help.

-rs1971

Techy · 04-22-2012, 02:01 AM

could easily be a nonfusible 'pullout' disconnect aswell,

Doc Holliday · 04-22-2012, 02:09 AM

Flip all breakers off and then on.

rs1971 · 04-22-2012, 02:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Techy

could easily be a nonfusible 'pullout' disconnect aswell,

Yeah, that's what it was I think. The piece that pulled out had four metal prongs positioned asymmetrically so that if you flipped it 180 degrees the prongs inserted into a different set of receptacles, obviously killing the power (and exposing the word 'off' in the little slot).

-rs1971

rs1971 · 04-22-2012, 02:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by biggles

do you get a least supply fan from the stat in FAN ON position that shows you have 24Vs down in the furnace/air handler.if the fan doesn't run might have a glass auto fuse on the control board within or a mini circuit breaker on the transformer mounted in the furnace

When I flip the fan from 'auto' to 'on' I don't hear anything, so I guess that there is no power to the fan. I'll try to look for those in the morning but one thing that strikes me as strange is that the unit was turned off both at the moment the power went out and also when it was restores. Given that, wouldn't it be strange that a circuit breaker would have tripped / fuse blown?

-rs1971

rs1971 · 04-22-2012, 02:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Doc Holliday

Flip all breakers off and then on.

It was worth a try but no dice. If nothing else, at least I'm getting good at resetting all of the digital clocks in the house.

-rs1971

Doc Holliday · 04-22-2012, 07:01 AM

The breaker is tripped even though it appears to not be. I bet you didn't reset them, did you?. Flip both a/c and furnace breakers off and then back on.