Often if the refrigerant is low, the evaporator will get so cold that it
freezes
the condensate and very little air gets through. The reduced pressure in the
system causes the fluid to boil at a lower temperature than the system was
designed to handle (usually about 40F.) I wouldn't expect to hear gurgles from
that source with the system operating. Maybe it's just water on the coils
that's being blown about?
You can operate the system with the "access panel" (or even one entire side of
the duct) off, as long as there is some air flow through the evaporator, if you
want to observe the operation. The less air, the shorter I would run it,
though. I don't know how many safeties are built into residential A/C systems.
Donald.
Mark Andy wrote:
>
> Howdy,
>
> I don't think its the condensation tray...
>
> I took off the "access panel" (ok, actually I took apart one entire side
> of the duct. There wasn't an access panel per se, but it wasn't too bad).
>
> The condensation tray had a small amount of water in it, up to the
> bottom of the (horizontal out the side) drain tube. That was after
> perhaps three hours of sitting not running, so maybe there's a clog that
> still allows enough water to get by so that it drains in three hours but
> not enough for when its running? I dunno... Doesn't seem like there'd
> be that much water coming off the a-coil (see? I'm picking up the
> lingo! :-)
>
> Here's another description of the sound... Its kinda like the sound when
> your garden hose spits out an air pocket. Is it possible that the
> system is running low on refrigerant? I'd have thought that it wouldn't
> blow cold air if that was the case however.
>
> Of course, I started it back up after I reassembled the duct, and
> haven't heard the sound since then...
>
> Btw, today was the first day we've run A/C this season. I dunno if
> there's anything that needs to warm up or something? Like could oil
> have accumulated in a low spot and now its been distributed evenly?
>
> Mark
>
> (A/C systems seem to be haunting me these days... I'm going to need to
> do a condenser in this minivan I'm buying.... :-)
>
[snip]
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