There is nothing worse than a 95F degree day and you realize about halfway through the day that the temperature in your house has reached well above the point where the thermostat should have kicked on your air conditioner. Well, that is not necessarily true as I’m sure there are plenty of other things worse, but that happened to me one day in mid-June.
I knew the furnace with the air conditioner (AC) A-coil on it was working fine as my blower was blowing warm air through the house but a quick look outside and I noticed the air conditioner condenser fan was not running.
I went outside and I could hear the compressor running and radiating lots of heat through natural convection but I knew this was not good so I shut things down before it burned up the compressor.
Now before I continue I will tell you I am by no means an HVAC professional and am merely telling this story from my own experience. If you do not feel comfortable doing such work then by all means hire a true professional!
The first thing I did was I let the entire unit cool down some before attempting any sort of diagnostics as I didn’t want the unit to get any damage from overheating. While this was happening I went out with a long screwdriver and attempted to spin the fan motor to see if it had frozen up. To my joy, it had not. Once it had cooled down a bit I flipped the unit back on and went back out with a screwdriver and spun the fan again. This time the fan spun up to speed and started cooling so knowing a little something about electric motors I figured the capacitor had gone out on it.
This time I pulled the power disconnect out at the disconnect box on the house, verified there was no power with my voltage detector, removed the electrical service panel on the condenser, and tested the capacitor. This thing was pretty crusty and I thought it was dead on the fan side. The compressor side showed the appropriate uF (micro-farad) reading. I grabbed the part number and headed to Amazon as I knew having a professional HVAC technician come out and fix this would be in the hundreds of dollars.
Since it was 91F in my upstairs I decided to set the thermostat to 60F and manually spin up the fan motor. At this temperature, I knew the unit would not kick off automatically and therefore stop the fan from running. At bedtime, I turned the unit off and repeated this process each morning until I could get a replacement part.
Luckily I found the replacement part for about $16 and had it shipped with Amazon Prime. It showed up two days later and I went back out to replace it.
As before, I pulled the disconnect and used my voltage detector to ensure there was no power going to the unit. I removed the service panel again because I didn’t want to leave it open for two days and verified the new part with the old one.
With the match in hand, I removed the bracket holding the old capacitor on, switched over the wires to the new one while ensuring I connected them back up exactly, and then screwed the new one back in place with the bracket.
With the service panel still open I put the power disconnect back in on the ON position and the fan instantly spun to life. I pulled the disconnect again and replaced the electrical service panel on the air conditioner condenser after all, I had made it this far without any shocks so I didn’t want to take a chance and get electrocuted now.
Once everything was all buttoned up I put the disconnect back in on the ON position and let it go. I was down and glad this was all it was. I finally had reliable cool air flowing in my house again.
As always if you have any questions or comments post them below or on my YouTube video comments section and I’ll do my best to respond.
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Equipment and Materials
*Disclaimer: While I attempt to list the equipment I use, some items have been discontinued or have newer models.
- Capcom 97F9895 Capacitor
- Craftsman Screwdriver Set, Assorted, 25-Piece (CMHT65046)
- Craftsman 100 Piece drilling and driving kit
- Ideal 61-657 – Dual Range 12-1000v AC NCVT with Flashlight
- Klein Tools MM400 Multimeter
- Kobalt 24-Volt Max Lithium Ion (Li-ion) 1/2-in Cordless Brushless Drill
I hope you find this video useful and can use some of the tips presented. Feel free to leave any comments, suggestions, or experiences you have had below.
Some of the links in my video description and article above are Amazon Affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. If you would like to make a different purchase from Amazon, you can also use the storewide link.
