Why is my ac line frozen
8 Reasons Why Your AC is Freezing Up
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hey guys J here with word of advice TV
in my comment sections on a lot of my AC
videos I get a lot of questions asking
me hey my a/c is freezing up outside or
inside do you have any idea what could
be causing that and fortunately yes I do
have an idea of what could be causing
that in fact there's 8 reasons that I
can think of of what can cause your
air-conditioner to freeze up and believe
it or not but one of the most common
reasons of why your AC is freezing up is
a very dirty furnace filter and if while
you're watching this you're thinking to
yourself crap I don't remember the last
time I replace my filter chances are
that is your problem
also if you're doing any kind of
construction sheetrock any wood cutting
or even painting when you're sanding the
walls that fine dust will get sucked in
by the return air and plug up your
filter real quick and when your filter
gets really dirty there's not enough air
flow going through the evaporator coil
which causes the temperature of the
refrigerant to drop because the air is
not absorbing that cooling and slowly
that evaporator coil will start to frost
up and then build-up ice so the
condensation that's running down your
coil and then going down that condensate
drain that condensation will start to
freeze up and the longer you run it the
more it'll freeze and eventually the
line set the free on line set going
outside will start to frost up as well
and then the unit outside sometimes if
you've been running it for a long time
this thicker line will start to freeze
up especially in the areas where there's
no insulation all the way up into your
condenser unit and if you look inside
sometimes the compressor will be just a
big block of ice - and another reason
why your AC could be freezing up is if
you have too many vents closed off or
even worse if you have some of your
return girls closed off so maybe you
were moving around some furniture you
put a couch in front of a return or
something's blocking it that will yield
you similar results as having a plugged
filter so if your AC is freezing up one
thing you can try doing is opening up
all your vents and making sure that all
your return grills are opened up as well
and I have seen this before where the
customer would think that the big return
girl is actually a register or event
where the cold air blows out from but
returns do not have shut offs so what
they would do
just put some kind of a paper over it or
some cardboard and tape it up and of
course in a couple of days there AC
freezes over and that's what we come on
another common reason why your AC will
freeze up is that the unit is low on
refrigerant or low on freon and I know
it sounds kind of weird that being low
on freon will cause your unit to freeze
up but the way it works is without
getting too technical typically the
temperature of the freon that's going
inside in the evaporator coil is about
38 degrees and when you're low on freon
pressures and temperatures correlate
which means if one goes up the other
goes up if one goes down two other goes
down so if the temperature of the freon
inside the house at the evaporator coil
is 38 degrees
if the pressure goes down the
temperature will go down as well and
once it gets below 32 degrees that
compensation that your evaporator coil
is collecting is going to start freezing
over and again the longer you run it the
more ice will build up on that a coil
and eventually the ice will travel
outside and to the compressor as well
now if you've noticed that your AC unit
has frozen over like that there's no
point to continue running it because
it's not doing much cooling and all it's
doing is building up more ice at that
point I would turn off your air
conditioner and turn your fan setting on
the thermostat from auto to on to keep
that furnace fan on and it'll take
sometimes a day or even two depending on
how much ice you have built up there to
that ice out and once it starts melting
keep in mind that the ice will not
always go neatly down into the drain pan
we'll go down the sides of your furnace
and inside of your furnace if you have
like some kind of carpet or wood around
your furnace I would put down some
towels and be expecting that there will
be a little puddle underneath your
furnace as that ice will thaw and
unfortunately freon issues are not
exactly a do-it-yourself kind of project
you would need some expensive tools plus
the refrigerant or the freon which you
need a license to buy and you do have to
be educated on what you're doing to be
able to recharge the unit properly
another thing that can cause your air
conditioner to freeze up is if you're
setting your thermostat too low the
lowest set point that most air
conditioners are designed for is about
67 degrees so if you're setting your air
conditioner to like 62 for some reason
because you're really hot or something
there's a good chance that your
air conditioner will start to freeze up
so really the lowest you should go on
the thermostat is about 67 68 and
another reason why your a/c could be
freezing up is if your blower motor is
not working inside of the furnace if
it's burnt out or maybe the capacitor
for it is either weak or dead if that
blower motor is not spinning there's no
air going across that evaporator coil it
will freeze up in minutes and of course
the longer you keep the outside unit
running without the fan inside running
the more ice will build up on that thing
and many times if your motor inside the
furnace is trying to start but it's
failing because either the bearings are
burnt out or the windings are opened if
you take out the bottom doors of the
furnace and just reach in there and
carefully touch the motor it'll most
likely be really hot to the touch if it
is really hot then there's a good chance
that that motor is burnt out but if you
want to know more about how to check
that blower fan inside the furnace I do
have a video on how to check that in my
a/c playlist just go into the playlist
it's in my description and just find
that video how to check a motor inside
the house another thing that I see once
in a while is that the actual control
board will be bad inside the furnace so
the board is simply not sending power to
the blower motor therefore it is not
turning on and blowing air so don't
automatically assume that your motor is
bad perhaps is it simply not getting
power and I have a video for that too
how to troubleshoot a control board and
the motor between those two videos you
should be able to figure out which one
of them is the culprit and in the blower
motor video I actually show a way of how
to check it without a meter too so if
you don't have a meter there is still a
way to check your motor without a meter
and we're not quite done yet there's two
more reasons why your AC can be freezing
out another reason why your air
conditioner could be freezing up is if
your metering device which is at the
evaporator coil is plugged up usually
it'll either be a TXV metering device or
a fixed orifice or a piston and how that
could happen is if you have some kind of
a contaminant inside of your freon loop
the inside of the copper pipes or the
freon is spinning around if there's some
kind of moisture or debris some dirt
that metering device is actually just a
really small tiny hole so it will not
take much to get that thing plugged up
and if there is some kind of blockage
blocking that metering device and the
freon is having a hard time going
through that will lower the pressure
inside of that evaporator coil and if
you remember how I mention
earlier the lower pressures equal lower
temperatures and once again that would
cause the con sation on your evaporator
coil to freeze up and unfortunately this
too is not exactly a do-it-yourself type
of project you probably will have to
call a technician to figure that one out
for you as well
and I promise this is the last one one
more reason why your AC could be
freezing up is if that evaporator coil
which on most units is above the furnace
sometimes if you have a down flow
furnace it'll be below or if you have a
horizontal one it's either on left or
right side just see where your freon
lines are coming into it and that's
where it is but anyway if your
evaporator coil is plugged up let's say
you forgot to put in a filter at one
point or your filters are dirty often
whatever dust gets by that filter will
go up and get settled into that
evaporator coil from underneath and the
evaporator coil is almost like a little
radiator with the fins so if there's a
lot of dust that gets under there
it will start to blanket the bottom of
that which will also restrict the air
flow causing the same effect as having a
really plugged filter generally cleaning
the bottom of the a coil can be pretty
tough if you're lucky you'll have a case
to coil where you just take out a couple
of screws and the panel comes off
reviewing your a coil and you can get to
it that way
other times you can try to take apart
the plenum that's encasing that a coil
or you can cut a hole in it try to get
to the bottom of it and then patch up
that hole afterwards but keep in mind if
you're gonna try doing this yourself try
not to move around that coil too much
because if you kink those refrigerant
lines going into the coil then it's
really a bad day and if that is your
problem your evaporator coil is plugged
another option would be to call a duct
cleaning company the ones that clean
your ducts and ask them to clean your
evaporator coil from underneath now
cleaning the a coil can be kind of a
nuisance
so most duct cleaners will not clean
your a coil unless you specifically ask
them and I am finally done listing my
reasons of wire AC can freeze up I hope
you found this video helpful thank you
so much for watching especially if you
watch it all the way till now don't
forget to mash that like button on the
way out and we'll see you next time
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you
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