Water Source Heat Pump - Compressor start/no-start

[C317414]

Hello,

I have a Climate Master water source heat pump in my condo. It uses water from cooling towers in the roof of the building. The system was working fine the last time I used the Condo two months ago. Now the compressor is not starting every time. Here's what is happening:

1- If I set the thermostat to cool, the fan will go on but the compressor will not.
2- If I turn off the breakers for the heat pump, wait a bit to turn them back on, and set the thermostat to cool, the fan will come on but the compressor may or may not come on.
3- If I do as in step #2 above, but in addition remove the thermostat from the wall, remove the batteries for a bit, replace the batteries, and replace the thermostat, the compressor will come on when I select cool. It will continue working well and cooling until the set temperature is reached. After it warms up a bit and the thermostat signals the AC to turn on again, the fan will go on, but the compressor will not.

Step 3 above is the only way to ensure the compressor will run.

I suspect a thermostat issue, but I'm not certain. Good techs are hard to find here, so I appreciate any ideas or suggestions you may have?

Thanks

 

[Fitter30]

Since your on a closed loop system for the condenser portion there is hose kit that connects unit to main loop piping. Hose kit includes a strainer and a variable flow control valve. The hoses will have valves off the main piping. Valved off to service strainer to open it up and clean it. More than likely it dirty. Being in Washington that water will contain glycol and treatment. Management should know who normally comes out for service.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Reach4]

I don't know about your hardware, but is there a start capacitor for the compressor? If there is a motor with a start capacitor, and it starts sometimes, I would consider replacing the start capacitor.

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[C317414]

Since your on a closed loop system for the condenser portion there is hose kit that connects unit to main loop piping. Hose kit includes a strainer and a variable flow control valve. The hoses will have valves off the main piping. Valved off to service strainer to open it up and clean it. More than likely it dirty. Being in Washington that water will contain glycol and treatment. Management should know who normally comes out for service.

Thanks. I forgot to mention that this condo is in Puerto Rico, not Washington. This is why I mentioned that good techs are few and far between.

There is no glycol in the system. There is no strainer external to the unit itself. I know that the building system has large strainers on the rooftop and they are serviced regularly. I'll take a look to see if there's a strainer inside the heat pump itself.

This heat pump compressor will shut down for restricted or no flow. This happened once before when the building system was down. This is not what's occurring in this case. If I use the method #3 in my original post, it runs fine and cools well, until it shuts down at the thermostat set point.

 

[C317414]

I don't know about your hardware, but is there a start capacitor for the compressor? If there is a motor with a start capacitor, and it starts sometimes, I would consider replacing the start capacitor.

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Thanks. I should have thought about the start capacitor. I may give this a try.

 

[Fitter30]

brand of unit and model
Unit if they trip a safety they lock out. To reset turn thermostat to off then back to cool or kill power or a minute.

 

[C317414]

brand of unit and model
Unit if they trip a safety they lock out. To reset turn thermostat to off then back to cool or kill power or a minute.

Thanks.

ClimateMaster TCV060AGCX0CVTB

I just found the lockout codes in the manual. I did a hard reset, and it is running OK, but it has not reached the thermostat set point yet. If the compressor does not startup once it does that and the thermostat calls for a restart, I'll check the LED light for the codes.

BTW, this is being used in cooling only. Heat is not necessary here.

 

[C317414]

Update - Problem Solved

Before doing anything else, I followed my gut feel and bought an inexpensive thermostat at the local Walmart. This did the trick. The compressor now starts up every time the thermostat calls for cooling.