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If its thats old of a unit more than likely your contactor is in pretty bad shape. regardless of whats else is bad. I am guessing its a gettol (sp)

 

you can open the electrical side and see the contactor. . also being that old you probably have alum wire running to the unit from the fuse box.

turn breaker/fuse box off tighten all wires both at fuse box(breakers) and at contactor on unit

 

2 things cause older units to click on and off.

one is the condensor fan motor not working causing the high pressure switch to kick out.. or low on freon.

 

contactor will cause the unit to draw a ton of amps becuase its not making good contact.

 

 

 

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I hope you have your unit up and running by now but if you don't cool touch was my company of choice. They were fair/ honest and on time.

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I just had Cool Touch put a new unit on my house yesterday, they do great work as usual.

 

+1 for Cool touch , great company as stated before ⬆️

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I learned a bit about AC's this summer when a capacitor on mine went out. Blower motor was running but the air was blowing really hot in the house. Went to take a look at the unit and noticed that the fan motor on the AC unit was not blowing at all. Found a narrow stick and gave the blade a push start and was back in business until the next day when my buddy who does AC work could get a new capacitor for me. Haven't had an issue since. Cost me $50 to have him diagnose it and change it versus calling an AC guy over the weekend who would have probably hit me for 5 times that. Moral of the story is the capacitor just gives a boost to the fan motor to start up. If you can do that with a push start it might keep you going until you can get someone over. Like they said above though if your compressor is bad you are better off turning off the whole system.

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i will give everyone some advice, never call goettl air conditioning, those guys are low life thieves! a couple summers ago my air had problems so i called them, the guy said low freon so he filled it up and also told me the unit was bad and tried to sell me one for $10,400. the next day i had cool touch come over and give me a quote for the same exact unit, the price? $6,400. i still have the same unit and it's working fine. i still get pissed off talking about this!

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i will give everyone some advice, never call goettl air conditioning, those guys are low life thieves! a couple summers ago my air had problems so i called them, the guy said low freon so he filled it up and also told me the unit was bad and tried to sell me one for $10,400. the next day i had cool touch come over and give me a quote for the same exact unit, the price? $6,400. i still have the same unit and it's working fine. i still get pissed off talking about this!

seems they got it fixed as you said.

everyone will tell you your unit is bad if its 5 years old. bad meaning obsolete, they been doing this since I can remember in the 80's. its called upselling, its total BS but thats they the world turns. alot of people dont know how to check there own oil or fill up a radiator. so people are going to take advantage of it.

 

our unit lasted like close to 30 years only reason we had to get a new one was due to it rotting out(piggy back swamp cooler package unit old gettol units form the early 80;s)

gettle sold out many years ago, they were a union shop the guys who bought the sheet metal side were pretty cool guys( they used to be business neighbors of ours) I forget where who the ac side went to.

I worked in the ac field for a local company when I 1st got here in 1982, seen and heard a ton of stories. Wife and I were buying the sheet metal side of ORIGINAL AHC Service, but the owner a very close friend got into coke pretty heavy in the early 80's and he got into alot of trouble jumped bail and fled to fla.

 

I stayed kinda involved in it for years, just because another very close friend of ours owned a a/c co as well. He passed away a few years back and his wife 2 years before that. Best advice I can give you when you need ac service is count on your true friends for who they use. going by word of mouth from people you dont know usually ends up badly but not always.

I use a guy on the east side BUT I dont like calling on the east side for service I think hes on this website as he is always busy so I wait till winter or fall. if I have a problem with it(fortunately I haven't yet). I need to get a new unit installed on our machine shop was going to do it a few months ago when it got hot. just going to wait till fall or winter when there not busy. 5 ton unit for commercial Wife got quotes from 5000-14,000 all of the same size unit just different brands.

DONT call people who are not Licensed and Bonded or some idiot off of Craigslist. Unless and only unless your willing to be sued or have to pay for any damage they do or for the work again cause they f'd it up. I know plenty of guys that are not licensed but I wont use them for that very reason. not to mention do you want these guys in your house checking it out someone who you cant track down and only have a phone number for.

BTW the craigslist guys will charge for the same type of unit about 1/2 price. 3k is alot of money if you have to do it again or there wiring burns your house down or they screw up the unit when putting it on. almost guarenteed they will just ignor you and leave.

over the years I have seen and herd it all cause someone was trying to save a bunch of money which is fine but theres a chance you could have issues.

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I just got prices for a new unit from someone who sponsors some hunting stuff and i believe he is member on here so not gonna name them. This company wanted $685 for fan motor and $452 for capacitor + the original $100 diagnostic. 😡😡😡

 

Called my hvac father inlaw who almost choked when i told him prices. He said motor parts price $89 and capacitor $15

 

 

Obviously I had the work done by somebody else. Especially since I had the original company give me quotes on new units also and after calling three other places and all of them costing roughly one-third the price good. Well just imagine my thoughts now about the original company

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Heres a hint for those wanting AC parts on hand to replace when they go bad. Find the exact motor and capacitor on Grainger, order a couple of them for backup, and have one new one and one in the garage storage to replace when they it goes bad. You can Order 10 capacitors on grainger for like $100.

 

If your AC goes out you can replace it yourself easily in like 10 mins and be back in busines. Even a motor change out only takes like 20 minutes.

 

AC companies rip you off because they can.

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I just got prices for a new unit from someone who sponsors some hunting stuff and i believe he is member on here so not gonna name them. This company wanted $685 for fan motor and $452 for capacitor + the original $100 diagnostic.

 

Called my hvac father inlaw who almost choked when i told him prices. He said motor parts price $89 and capacitor $15

 

 

Obviously I had the work done by somebody else. Especially since I had the original company give me quotes on new units also and after calling three other places and all of them costing roughly one-third the price good. Well just imagine my thoughts now about the original company

 

George Brasil? LOL

 

We don't do residential and as a DDC Controls Contractor we don't scalp customers. Parts markups are typically 30% and hourly rates are about 60% of the big companies.

We get most of our customers from referrals and treat our customers fairly. When a customers facility has a problem we usually log into the system and resolve it in half an hour. Facilities that are out of state or three hours away really appreciate this. Integrity is everything, really.

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Here is a couple hints.

 

Don't ever call any company you have seen commercials for, heard on the radio, or seen billboards for unless you like giving away extra cash to strangers for no reason.

 

The AC business, especially on the residential side has ALOT of scummy people and companies.

 

If you want to buy your own AC parts don't use Grainger unless you like paying 40% extra to be able to get it right away.

 

Don't buy off brand no name air conditioning units.

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I just got prices for a new unit from someone who sponsors some hunting stuff and i believe he is member on here so not gonna name them. This company wanted $685 for fan motor and $452 for capacitor + the original $100 diagnostic.

 

Called my hvac father inlaw who almost choked when i told him prices. He said motor parts price $89 and capacitor $15

 

 

Obviously I had the work done by somebody else. Especially since I had the original company give me quotes on new units also and after calling three other places and all of them costing roughly one-third the price good. Well just imagine my thoughts now about the original company

George Brasil? LOL

 

We don't do residential and as a DDC Controls Contractor we don't scalp customers. Parts markups are typically 30% and hourly rates are about 60% of the big companies.

We get most of our customers from referrals and treat our customers fairly. When a customers facility has a problem we usually log into the system and resolve it in half an hour. Facilities that are out of state or three hours away really appreciate this. Integrity is everything, really.

Not G.B.

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Heres a hint for those wanting AC parts on hand to replace when they go bad. Find the exact motor and capacitor on Grainger, order a couple of them for backup, and have one new one and one in the garage storage to replace when they it goes bad. You can Order 10 capacitors on grainger for like $100.

If your AC goes out you can replace it yourself easily in like 10 mins and be back in busines. Even a motor change out only takes like 20 minutes.

AC companies rip you off because they can.

.

 

Amazon can be even cheaper

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