See for more themes. | Q4: Welcome to Off Grid living. Today is Feb 26 at 7:30 am, 15 days of running the Air Conditioner. The Air Con switches off at least once per day? After contacting the manufacturer, we agreed that the fan blowing the hot air out is falling and being sucked back into the machine itself, forcing it to work hard and switch itself off. So I intalled a 350mm by 350mm metal ducted square tube. I also took the main covers off to inspect, for wasp mud deposits:
The fins look clean. Good.
Not sure what sensor A does, but all looks OK.
Not sure what sensor B does, but all looks good.
Some rust with water, cleaned it off.
Also water here, wiped it off.
Not sure of this thing? but it looks OK.
What the sensor reads after "firing it up".
The air temp outside is 25 degrees. The hot air over the fan is usually 29 degrees, about 2 to 3 degrees warmer.
The picture of the air ducted pipe, newly installed.
How the new ducted pipe looks outside. You can feel the hot air pushed out. I also placed a flyscreen to keep wasps out. And a hood to keep rainy drizzle out.
How the room for the unit looks. It is 3.6m high and 2.4m wide, with vents and door openings both ends.
As this picture shows. Carpet protects here, low entry door.
Inside the console are some parameters. D shows voltage, often too low, so I switch off and also inverter and switch on again.
These look OK? They do not show all errors. The machine now switches off without telling you why? This has happened at least a dozen times.
And these?
Amps coming into batteries early in the morning is 14A And amps leaving the battery, for Air Con. is 23 A. The battery is 26.4V about 40 to 50% fully charged.
The Smart Solar Controllers all on bulk. This is normal. Now let's see how the air con goes today, with it's newly installed air pipe duct. It's 9:30 am Temperature on Air Con is 27 degrees Amps coming in is 35 Amps Amps going out is 17A BATTERY VOLTAGE ia 26.6 about 60% fully charged. The Victron 3000 VAC Inverter is very capable of running the Air con, with it's need for 500W to 1200W as required. This device is the only 240V applicance the Inverter runs. On bulk amps coming in can range over 100Amps, and reach float by 3pm. So the system is well designed to handle needs, with 24 10 Amp solar panels, the theoretical amps available is 240Amps ! but I don't get that because the Panels are peaked half facing East and half facing West, so I max out on 120 Amps. This a theoretical maxinum. Things are looking OK - now let's see if the problems are resolved. Its Friday 27 Feb 2026, 7:20 am and 17 Amps in 15 Amps out Amazing to have so much coming in so early in the morning. Voltage is 26.4 V about 50% fully charged, so the Air con runs 500W all night ! The temperature is 24 degrees with 75 % humidity. While the cooling is set to 8 degrees, it keeps it at 7 degrees. So far so good, now let's see when the day warms up, does the Air keep working all day too? Saturday Feb 28 , day 17, 7:00 am, the inverter made it into the night , wow !! , and let me read the parameters, only to stop working moments later, bother !!. I can't get it to switch on, after 4 attempts. Bother :( I am suprised the cool room went from 7 degrees to 9.5 degree in the 10 minutes I was there. There are some warnings on the unit panel itself, I am not sure about? (1) earth grounded wire? where? why? the cord it plugs into is already grounded, isn't that enough? My understanding having two to three grounds causes eddy currents flowing between them? Thinking the grounding might help the console when you touch it? Hmm? Dunno? (2) defrosting - can't figure this out? At 8 degrees, does the unit ever need defrosting? I inspected the fins inside the cool room and all clear and clean. Maybe if you are getting down to zero or below zero. so what is my problem? (3) High pressure switch with reset manually? What is this and why? The console once listed " Alarm P6 indicates high pressure. Possible causes include: 1. Dirty or blocked condenser fan. 2. Dirty or blocked condenser, resulting in poor heat dissipation. 3. Excessive environmental temperature. I have checked , I think all these things, the unit is clean, no dirt no blockages. The recently insalled vent pipe, is not solving the problem either. There is no console message as to why the unit switches off. It used to happen once per day. At 7 :00 am the system was 5Amp in 15.5Amp out, on 26.3 V about 40% fully charged. All controllers on bulk on a cloudy drizzle day. I received no manual with this product, so I am not sure how to look after it properly. It's 7:30 am , and I went down to start the air con, and it started up :) It ran all day until it was raining hard, and I went down to turn it off, as some moisture drifted into the room. After two hours around 7pm, I turned the unit back on, the battery was at 27.3V fully chanrged. The unit ran into the night, until 6:00 am, I woke up and touched the console to make the console light come on, and touched it again to unlock, exposing the parameters, reading 8 degrees/7 degrees, so the unit had reached the desired parameters, and than after a few seconds, the unit switched itself off. The current coming in was zero, 15.5 Amps coming out, the voltage was 26.3 around 40% fully charged. This problem happened the day before, when I tried for 4 times to make the unit come on. This time, I decided to leave the unit rest. There is no historical faults recorded on the console since I cleared the console, showing P6 four times before. The unit just switches off, no reason given. Leaning about air con technologies, https://www.corestartech.com/blog/common-causes-and-analysis-of-central-air-conditioning-high-pressure-alarm/ "Common Causes and Analysis of Central Air Conditioning High Pressure Alarm" Quote: When a central air conditioning compressor triggers a high-pressure alarm, it indicates that the system’s high-pressure side has exceeded its designed safety threshold. This alert relies on real-time monitoring by pressure sensors to prevent irreversible damage from abnormal pressure surges.
If refrigerant fails to dissipate heat effectively during condensation, high-pressure side pressure will continue to rise. Once it surpasses the set value, the alarm mechanism activates immediately. In severe cases, the system will automatically shut down to initiate overload protection. OK. But my unit is running around 500W all day and night, on its lowest ability of 1200Watts, so it should be easy for such a unit to cope with hardly any performance expected of it? The room is 150mm foam, so it keeps cool for long times, the mass in the room is not much as yet, I suspect less than 250 Kg so far. When the unit is off the room temperature warms to 11 degrees within 30 minutes. Since the unit is set on 7 to 8 degrees, never near a frosting condition, and running on 500 W , why does the high pressure exceeed itself? The fan over the fins to remove heat is working OK, (it's temperature is around 2 to 3 degrees higher than surrounding air coming into the unit under the same fins) , the fan blowing cooler air off the fins in the cool room is working OK, it's air is sucked from the inside the room itself, so why is there a problem? Condenser Heat Dissipation Issues
Here is a picture of the condenser fins, where the fan above sucks air through these fins, into the above, pushing air up the newly installed metal ducted pipe out into the outside air. You can see the fins are very clean. There is nothing I see to impede the flow of air here. A flyscreen mesh over the ducted pipe, reduces air flow by 50% but this is required to stop wasps and moths entering the fins, and I feel the air coming out OK. I have yet to place additional flyscreen mesh over the unit itself to stop insects entering, and this will impede air flow entering as well by 50%. I will try to find the bigger fly mesh for this reason, with 3mm holes. Excessive Refrigerant Charge "Overcharging causes liquid refrigerant to occupy pipe space, obstructing circulation. One trusts our manufacturer here with this issue? System Blockages I am not sure if the unit has filters and such things? Compressor Issues Reasons listed here are technical beyond a handyman can resolve. Solving the problem: (1) clean fins of the condensor often (2) inspect fan for bearing wear, blade damage etc. (3) Adjusting Refrigerant Charge - not something I can do? (4) Replacement and clean filters. Not sure I have any of these? Not sure what the issue is at this time?
It's been 40 minutes typing this, I should be able to turn the unit back on. 7:00 am Day 18 16 Amps in 18 Amps out The unit switches on OK. Cool room temp is 11 degrees, outside air is 22 degrees 91% humidity. Battery is 26.5 around 50% fully charged. One thing I am thinking, the unit never switches off once reaching 7 degrees? So what happens if on 500W the cooling is too great for it, and the excessive cooling makes the pressure build up? If the unit switched off and rested, the problem would go away? But it seems to be running on 500W all the time, and maybe this amount of cooling is too much for the desired setting? ie 8 degree?
Cheers for now :)
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