# Replaced Carrier Avir V



## thunderbird (Aug 27, 2006)

Greetings,

Last month we took a jaunt over to Tuckahoe State Park On Maryland's Eastern shore. Great place - highly recommend. See details here (http://www.baygateways.net/general.cfm?id=68)

Anyway, it got up to or over 100 degrees, and the Air Conditioning was very weak, hardly worked the way it should have. On the way home I dropped the OB off at my local dealer, and a few days later they told me the unit needed to be replaced because there was a leak, and also that Carrier "went out of business". Well, that didn't sound righ, so I called Carrier and they confirmed that they wen t out of that business - no more RV Air Conditioning for them because of changes in federal regs regarding coolant.

Anyway, the fix is a Dometic 13,500 BTU which is done now, but I haven't seen yet. The warranty company covered all but $100, although I had to fight with them for the last $400 which they tried to call an "upgrade" (they needed to put a thermostat in).

So my question is ... anyone else go through anything like this? I probably should have asked this before I had the work done, but life is so strange and crazed right now that it didn't occur to me to ask.

Comments? Thanks.


----------



## Tangooutback (Apr 16, 2010)

Well, Thunderbird, that makes two of us. My Carrier went south six weeks ago. It had a leak and I could not find it. I found out Carrier no longer produce the Unit V in my OB, but fortunately I found a vendor still having a few units in inventory. I quickly ordered one for $600 including shipping. Tomorrow morning my buddy, an AC tech, is to drop in and give me a hand installing it. He has never done a/c installation on RV, so, it is learning curve for both of us.

Oh, by the way, I also ordered a hard start kit, which is an oversize capacitor with built in electronic sensor circuitry. This gadget is to help the a/c to start a lot easier especially where power is marginal in amperage...likely when I use my generator to power it. I am going to install the hard start kit into the unit before mounting it on the roof. The OEM start capacitor is very marginal and has dubious lifecycle.

How old was your a/c unit when it quitted? Mine was five years old and had seen heavy use.


----------



## thunderbird (Aug 27, 2006)

Hi. My unit was four yearrs old and had seen moderate use. The first year or two it worked great - cooled like an ice box - but the last two years not so good. I thought about finding a Carrier unit in inventory but figured if they were discontinuing, it would just make it that much harder to maintain in the future. I'm curious to get reports on the Dometic.

Thanks


----------



## Tangooutback (Apr 16, 2010)

I just installed the replacement Carrier top unit this morning. I first tried to run it with my Yamaha 2400is and the compressor shut down within half a minute. The fan continued to run. That pointed out the Yamaha did not put out enough amps to power it up. So, just for curiosity sake, I plugged it into house outlet (15A). Same result, unable to start the compressor.

I then pulled out the factory start coil, which is about the size of my thumb, and replaced it with the hard start capacitor kit. Man, after that change out the Yamaha had no problem running the a/c at full speed. Current draw was at 12.3A. With both fan and compressor running, the Yamie was spinning at 3040 rpm. With only the fan and trailer converter running, the Yamie spinned at 2060. I am all sold on aftermarket hard start capacitor kit. The factory start capacitor is pathetic junk.

With your new a/c being Dometic instead of the original Carrier, did they also replace the panel (control system) inside the trailer?

I only replaced the top unit, since the replacement is same model as the original.


----------

