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Dog ate themostat wires and now the A/C Doesn't Work..HELP!

9K views 3 replies 3 participants last post by  yuri 
#1 ·
Hello Everyone,

Here is the problem. I own a rental property and the dog who belongs to the tenant decided to chew up the themostat wires that runs outside. Now, before this happened the A/C worked great and blew nice cold air.

Well, after discovering the dog ate the wires my A/C guy and me determined this was the first problem why the A/C was no longer working. So we replaced the wires and put a fence around the outside unit to keep this from happening again. Well, we went inside the house and switched on the A/C and nothing happened.

The unit inside the house also known as the furnance/air handle has power going to it, but doesn't come on. Even if you hold down the little black switch on the unit nothing happens. You know the one that typically gets pushed down by the front panel and turns off if you remove the front panel.

Themostat appears good and the outside will turn on if you physical touch the contacts. This house has fuses instead of breakers and all of them appear fine and test fine.

He bridged the themostat as well to see if anything would happen. I guess it's called bypassing and still nothing happened. My A/C guy believes the themostat isn't the problem though, but were open to anything.

This unit also doesn't have a control board. It is a older rheem and has one of those fan relays things instead of a board with the transformer built on to it.

Now, he thinks it's the transformer or the relay "Might" be the problem because when he test it out of the four different screws with wires attached to it one or two doesn't set his volt meter off. Once again, we are not sure and are open to ideas. Could it be the fan relay thing or transformer?


Thank you in advance, if you need more information I will do my best to provide it for you.

Josh
 
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#2 · (Edited)
That item is called a combination fan relay centre and has the 24 volt transformer/power supply for the system and the fan relay on it. More than likely the transformer is burnt out. There should be 24 volts from the terminal R to C on it. The one I use is a WR White Rodgers 8A05A-4. I would also get a 3 amp GM auto fuse and (2) 1/4" stakon connectors and splice it into the wire from R so it protects the transformer in the future. Or buy an inline fuse holder at Radio Shack and do the same.
http://www.emersonclimate.com/Documents/White-Rodgers/catalog_06_pages/Cat_06_pg0094.pdf
Bottom of page.

Or: (copy and paste link)

http://customer.honeywell.com/Honeywell/UI/Pages/Catalog/ComponentCategory.aspx?Catalog=Homes&Category=Fan+Centers_33114&ChannelID={2EB2F178-20ED-44E0-97FB-CCFB4218DD64}

for the Honeywell version. The wiring is slightly different for the WR so you should try match the same brand or come back and we can talk you thru it.
 
#3 ·
Not to bust on your A/C guy too much. But he may be a handyman. He is not an A/C guy.

Since that was a very very very common relay.

Its easy to test it for proper operation with a meter and jumper.
 
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