Probably have a tech come out next week but wanted to run it by someone to be sure I'm not getting hosed. M5350ti-a unit. About 5 years old Fan wouldn't come on couple months ago and replaced the capacitor and all was good. Yesterday the compressor failed to engage. Tried real hard but didn't start the fan did start running like it thought the compressor was on. It would reattempt every few minutes. I suppose the thermal switch tripping then cooling off. Is there a second cap for the compressor? Based on how many wires connected to the fan cap I'm guessing it does both. Im sure it will be worst case with my luck lately and the compressor is toast. Unit has 7yr parts warranty but labor will be on me. Any testing I can do to be sure tech is giving me the truth?
If there is only one capacitor, it is a dual cap. Internally, one cap for the fan, the other cap for the compressor. Depending on how far you want to get into this, the first thing I would do is kill the power. There are three wires going to the compressor. Take a picture, draw a diagram, whatever you do, make sure you put the wires back where they came from. With the wires off of the compressor, use a good ohmmeter and measure the resistance between the pins on the compressor: A to B, A to C, B to C. (actually, they are C, S, and R, doesn't matter for this). The two small ohm readings should equal the big ohm reading. Check each pin to ground on the compressor body. If all of this checks out, compressor is good.
Will put the meter to it in the morning. Is it possible the cap was defective but still will start the fan?
There should be no continuity from a pin to ground. I've never seen a dual cap fail only on one side, so not sure. Maybe, could happen. I will say that the AmRad Turbo line of capacitors, while mucho expensive, never fail.
