My Ac was not cooling today. 82 degrees inside. After watching this video I looked at this on my unit. Holy shit...looked exactly like that one. Did what you did and now it's rolling back cooling. Thank you for posting.
We purchased a home where an older lady lived for years. She obviously never changed the A/C filter. It was so clogged that the filter collapsed and sucked into the fan cage. You could hear the system struggling while it was on. We paid around 800 to have the coil removed and cleaned. The tech said in 25 years, it was the worst he has ever seen. The dirt was nearing 1/2 thick and the fins were not visible anywhere. He was taking pics and sending it to other techs. The fan assembly was caked in dirt as well. He used rags, vacuum, and air gun to clean everything as he said it was a fire hazard..... A few months later, I replaced all the flex duct myself and it was packed with dust and dirt. Before any work, the house wouldn't cool below 82 in July. It now has no issues getting in the 60s if I want it to. He said the previous owner obviously never changed the filter in many years and it's a miracle the system didn't quit.
Rental units are the same. Tenants don't replace HVAC filters. Sometimes they don't even clean dryer lint filters or dishwasher filters. Tenants appear to have lower IQs than the general population
Good job. Great information. Really appreciate the level of your expertise. Now I have the confidence to clean my coil. It’s not real dirty; just needs some TLC. Cheers!
You could also cut the handle off of that brush since you’re working in such tight spaces might make it easier for them to maneuver with additional torque
Thank you sir. Perfect information. Not sure where to get the coil cleaner but I’m sure it’s around. With your information i can clean mine and big deal i get my hands dirty LOL ✌️☕️
Hi. Thanks for the video. I was looking for videos to help me with my apartment ac and this might be one of the best ones. It's my landlord's job to fix this stuff but looks like it's on me to do repairs again. So, I want to make sure I get it right. I ordered some of that foam cleaner from Amazon which should be in by tomorrow. I have major asthma and me and my child both have some other breathing issues. I heard my landlord LAST YEAR tell me that he has to get down there and clean the coils because they're dirty, so I'm only guessing that is why my electric I PAY FOR is sky high and the wall outside the ac is freezing cold (the wall the connects to his wall where I am sure THEY'RE in their chilling) but my AC is reading 62 degrees while my thermometers are reading 77 downstairs and 85 upstairs....WAY TOO HOT for an asthma patient with other lung issues. So, the only problem would be HOW TO ACCESS THE COILS? So, I'm off to look for a video on that next.
Changing filters wouldn’t prevent this. A dirty filter would let LESS stuff to pass through. So I’m not really sure what you’re talking about? This, is a cheap filter. No filter. Or maybe poorly fitting filter.
@@jamesbizs If the ducts are clean and filters are changed when needed the blower wheel and evap coil will stay clean. You say a dirty filter would catch more debris? Dont see your thought on that. Dirty filter will cause air flow restriction along with bent/kinked filter. The dirty air will follow the easiest path around the filter and cause this issue again.
I try to use my shop vac, air compressor and the brush before foaming then repeat the shop vac and air compressor. Less mess, better results and less foam time.
I had to do this to my AC unit too...instead of that expensive coil cleaner spray I used engine degreaser spray from the auto parts store which worked very well.
@@machopr1958 I assume foaming, right. My coil is raining gunk as a I brush it. I used foaming bathroom spray in the past, but I assume engine degreaser should be stronger.
Correct...the foaming kind. Use a soft bristle brush and a spray bottle with water to flush all the gunk out. Honestly it is a messy job but well worth it.
Was this filmed in Upstate, NY ? I lived in an apartment complex that had the exact same condenser coil, mine looked like that upon move in. Filter was new though.. Had to clean it myself.
I usually run a small shop-vac to vacuum as much off as I can, because breathing that is not fun. I also have a Turbo tank rinser. He did not even mention the blower wheel, you can bet it was nasty, too.
Thanks 🎉 but all through the cleaning all I could think about was why a huge wire brush? Cutting the handle off would be much easier. A hard toothbrush would be so easy to manage.
Very little air flow out of my condo A/C. I have an upflow slant coil that literally has blue corrosion on the top side of the coil. How do I deal with that? Does the spray foam cut through corrosion or do I need to spray some sort of baking soda type cleaner on there to dissolve it? I'm worried that the fins are now shot and will all have to be replaced. HELP!
He's only able to clean a few fractions of an inch there's no way he can clean all that junk out all the way through. Once he's cleaned the surface and used the coil cleaner there will still be too much crap left over. The best defense is to have the system regularly cleaned by our AC tech. I just replaced our AC/Furnace this week and I've signed up for the semi-annual maintenance which includes cleaning both the condenser and evaporator coils.
Wow. That’s what we’re breathing. No wonder people are sickly. I didn’t even know this was something you have to maintain. Mine have never been cleaned. After 22 years! So....what should I expect? And one of my units is under the house in the crawl space, so there is a guilt issue of having some young fello crawl under the house and try to clean the damn thing.....
So it is possible to get them clean w/out having to replace it? I just have a company come Inter for the same problem in this video. The technician said there was nothing he could do and call in a sales rep. They tried to sell me a brand new unit for 11 thousand or get into a program for a 200 a month indefinitely and they will replace things. Is a shame the level of dishonesty.
Wow, Mary, that’s crazy! I think mine is pretty bad, but repair guys have said they’ve all seen much worse. I had one quote me $250 to pull it out and clean it, but I’m about to do it myself. Thanks HVAC Tech. 👍
@@sharyn4271 bro no way! I charge my neighbors 20 bucks to clean their condenser, and 30 for their evaporator.(a bit of the money goes into the cans of cleaning fluid which are about 7 dollars each, and for every unit i use the whole can.) Some people are just way too pricey id say. Its literally a chore to me, its just spraying and brushing really. at some point though i hope to start doing some more advanced and high paying stuff though, as my grandparents have got a buissness in hvac.
Wouldn’t it work better to spray the cleaner from the top and allow gravity to pull the cleaner through? Seems like that would help pull the gunk out the way it went in and waste less cleaner since it won’t drip out until it has ran through? nice work though.
@@felixchien1664 ummm no actually doing it the way you're describing is the opposite of having common sense. The foam is supposed to be sprayed directly on the dirt and grime to loosen it up.
@@ironmike742 I never said you couldn't spray it from the bottom. If I were doing it, I'd spray on both sides. Come on, I'm not saying there is only ONE way to do something; all I'm saying is use common sense. When you hand wash a car, do you start on the bottom of the car or the top? One way make more sense than the other. Think about that and get back to me.
I hope more people see this video and realize what they are breathing everyday. Definitely get yours cleaned and install a UV light on the coil. That’s a pretty bad one.
12k for a brand new unit. Apparently no such thing as a service call anymore...they go in for the kill when you live in a nation that's dying and lacks any sort of integrity
And what really sucks is the new units don't last as long as the older ones. It's the same way with clothes washers, they're designed to fall apart after only a few years. The big corporations are charging high $$$ for crap that's designed to fail.
I’ve seen this a lot and wonder why not pump the unit down and pull the coil out to clean it the proper way . I understand you could creat a leak in the future but best way is to remove and clean with water
Can you still have dirty coils if you change your filter twice a year? My system is 25 years old and blows fine. My neighbor who is an AC contractor said I do not need to clean my coils. I will make this a Saturday project if what he says is incorrect. As far as I know the coils have never been cleaned before.
@@jamesduffey4442 appreciate your comment. I'm going to make it a task for one Saturday to open on of my units and see what it looks like. Once I do I will report back.
@@jamesduffey4442 Update: Last night I opened up my unit to get to the coil. I was surprised that it was perfectly clean with no signs of being dirty. I've been here a little over 6 years and my neighbor across the street who is an AC guy always took care of the AC here and said they have never been cleaned as they do not need to. The units are from 1996, I guess in this case my neighbor was correct.
I first used a shop vacuum cleaner to get most of gunk out....combed fins with a brush...sprayed coil cleaner on BACK side of coil...finished up using shop vac. Worked great. I do this as maintenance every 3 years...writing date of doing it on a panel of unit. Once you know how to do this it will save much grief later on..... 👍
I think you need to start using a very strong vacuum cleaner and suck that out... That's what I have done running into something that bad, and it works great
Alright, I know this was mentioned already...but it doesnt make sense to me to spray the cleaner on the bottom. Some should be sprayed on the top to allow gravity to pull it through. You can also try vaccuuming from the bottom or using compressed air from the top. All the above would seem to clean up that coil far better rather than scraping from the bottom and possibly pushing some of that gunk deeper into the coil. 🤷♂️
@@felixchien1664 the reason you don’t is that the top is usually still pretty clean. The foaming cleaner will clean the top well enough but the bottom is where the air comes from so if dirt is caked on like in the video then you have little to no airflow across the coil.
@@chadhowell1328 I was being nice when I said "doesn't make sense". I get why he sprayed it from the bottom. But he never thought about spraying it from the top to allow the cleaner to seep down. Common sense would tell you that you can get some better cleaning that way. The same reasoning as to why vacuuming it from the bottom and not the top. Or spraying it with compressed air from the top and not the bottom. just to name a few common sense examples. Obviously, the bottom is where the dirty part is because that is the point where air first contacts the coil (in this case it is getting sucked up). But what you're saying is pointless...you want to clean the entire coil. Simply spraying it from the bottom and having the cleaner just fall back down isn't the most efficient way to do it. Unless you think gravity has negligible effect on the cleaner.
It’s a no rinse cleaner. The coil will condensate when it starts back cooling and will self rinse. Just FYI, that coil cleaner is one of the worst. Don’t work great and if the company I work for didn’t buy it, I wouldn’t use it.
My evaporator coil doesn't "slide out" - obstructions in the way....I made a fitting for shop vac pipe out of 1" PVC 90 deg elbow that enabled me to reach inside of coil for cleaning. (I cut off one of PVC elbow's pipe fit socket to enable getting in tight corners of coil).
That looked like 10 years of dirt to me. I've got ours to do today that the filters were 2" short for so we ordered the correct ones and I have 3 cans of the foam, a long brush, a chemical water pump and white vinegar, sprayer, a Tupperware basin and algicide tablets for the drains and pan afterwards - wish me luck, I'm gonna be laying on the floor with my head and arms up under it dripping in my face in an hour or two, wish me luck! 🤢🥴
@@vapemcvaperson good luck, man! I need to do this, but I'm unsure if I can access it well enough to clean it. Hvac guy only wants to replace it, of course. I just need to get through the next few weeks of summer. Let me know how it goes for you
@@EllenD333 Thank you for the encouragement! I did it a few days ago, It's in a closet in the hallway, I took a lower front panel off so I could see the top (or back side) of the coils and that side was clean looking but the underside behind where the air filter goes was black looking in areas and slimy, other areas had grey and black fluffy dust. I had measured between the legs that the air handler sits on and couldn't find a 16"x16" Tupperware or basin anywhere so settled on a roasting pan that fit under there to try to catch the majority of drips of goo etc to make clean up better at the end - it was about 6" tall so didn't get in the way of me reaching up to the dirty coils. I got everything I needed within arms length of me laying down on my right side on an old blanket folded over a few times to make laying down on tile less painful. The tricky part was figuring out the PVC drain pipes for the condensation pump which catches the water and pumps outside. It's normally routed to a plastic water pump (condensation pump) underneath the unit, this was now powered off along with the whole AC at the fuse breaker box so as not to get electrocuted! I got a big salad? Bowl and you can untwist the plastic PVC pipe sections and rearrange their direction so I ran that to my right over where my head would be laying down so as not to be in my way while cleaning and it drained into the very big bowl (which has to be emptied about 4-5 times total. I put on clear plastic goggles (eye protection) I already had from a previous job in case chemicals got in my eyes, as I was laying to the side under where I was spraying the foam. Basically sprayed up in the top from underneath and up and down the length of the coils, it's bubbling and pulling the gunk out - didn't really drip off much to the pan on the floor but does drain down to the catch lip - channel that goes to the PVC drain to the bowl. Let first spraying take 8 mins or so sitting on there and it does it's thing, then I could see it had dissipated I sprayed more covering all the surface from top to bottom again in up and down with the grain of the fins and that was pretty much the end of can #1. I left that heavier amount of foam on there about 10mins and returned and it had melted more goo and was getting dryer already so now I got the small wet vac and put a small angled brush on it and starting at the top of the fins going with the grain of the fins (so as not to bend them) I vacuumed down from the top of each row that the brush covered and then again on the next row beside it all the way across and then cleaned the brush a few times and did again. Then comes the warm water and white vinegar mix, the bleach sprayer from Home Depot held a gallon and a half so I mixed about a third of vinegar and the rest warm to hot water and pumped it up and sprayed from the clean top back side of the coils through to the dirty side - the whole gallon and a half, it came through without hitting the floor and drained down the dirty side into the channel and out the PVC drain pipes into the bowl, black black water, had to stop and empty bowl in toilet nearby. Then mixed up another gallon & half of the vinegar water mix and did another quick spray from the top through and went back down on the floor and sprayed upwards with the remaining liquid and mixed one more gallon for a final quick spray through the back pushing anything left out to the dirty side and again sprayed the previously dirty side until after emptying the bowl another time or two the water mix was running clear! I had a look again after about 10 minutes and felt the coils were dry to the touch so, vacuumed any cobwebs and dust from inside the air handler and around the edges etc also using paper towels to dry anywhere else that had drops of foam or water so the new filter wouldn't get soaked and particularly clean with wet vac with the skinny pointy nozzle attachment in the V shaped channel that catches the condensation during use which still had big clumps of black dust and goo also final wipe out with paper towels in the drain area and took PVC pipes out back to the garden hose to spray out the smegma that likes to build up in there so the freshly cleaned condensation pump doesn't get needlessly dirty again and reassembled the pipes into the little pump and cleaned up the tiles under the unit. I'm not gonna lie, ... it's a bit of a PITA and a messy job but probably took two hours maybe 3 with getting everything ready and putting everything away and clean up. All the three cans of foaming spray, the bleach sprayer (weed killer ones will break immediately because they don't have the right type of seals to deal with vinegar) the brush, vinegar, algaecide tablets for in the drip channel after the cleaning and 1 in the pump, AC tape to properly seal the gaps between panels on the unit, and an adapter to use sockets on my electric screwdriver/drill and a few other things I forget cost $59 at home Depot as opposed to the quote of $500+ from the AC company to take the coils out which means them de soldering or cutting the copper pipe and taking out back to clean with a hose, capture (hopefully your refrigerant to be reused) and risk them getting damaged and leaking refrigerant after he leaves (had that happen before in another house) aside from what ever else they would charge to clean the gunk from the condensation pump (some houses have the PVC just drain with gravity to the outside through a wall - depends on the location of the AC in the house whether there would be a pump or not. But yeah, I was aching a bit the next day from having to get up and down from the floor without anything to grab onto in the hall, but it's running cooler now with stronger flow from the vents and the nice lemony from the foam and white vinegar mix smells pretty good and goes away after a day or so. I'd say it was worth it and will do once a year in future before it gets too bad again as the unit was put in in 2017 so it took a while to get that bad but even the vinegar with warm water once a year should do a good job keeping the algae away and dust off with the sprayer. Of course it's still 90° outside so the air is running a lot but it's keeping it at 76 at least and hardly runs much at night now. I hope this can help you if you can get access to the coils, they should be right above where you put the air filter pretty much! Good luck to you and I feel this would be much easier next time because I know what to expect, you don't have to be really strong or anything, just determined!
Why don’t they make a tool without that dumb long handle? One were the handle protrudes downward instead of off to the side. So a tool that may be the approximate shape of a razor you shave a beard with.
My Ac was not cooling today. 82 degrees inside. After watching this video I looked at this on my unit. Holy shit...looked exactly like that one. Did what you did and now it's rolling back cooling. Thank you for posting.
This is exactly what I needed to see. I wasn't sure about mine but your video answered so many questions. Thank you for posting this.
Toothbrush and a plastic tip vacuum carefully did a great job with no mess thankfully, so far.
Hard bristle paint brush
I had this done at my old house and it makes a HUGE difference!
We purchased a home where an older lady lived for years. She obviously never changed the A/C filter. It was so clogged that the filter collapsed and sucked into the fan cage. You could hear the system struggling while it was on. We paid around 800 to have the coil removed and cleaned. The tech said in 25 years, it was the worst he has ever seen. The dirt was nearing 1/2 thick and the fins were not visible anywhere. He was taking pics and sending it to other techs.
The fan assembly was caked in dirt as well. He used rags, vacuum, and air gun to clean everything as he said it was a fire hazard..... A few months later, I replaced all the flex duct myself and it was packed with dust and dirt. Before any work, the house wouldn't cool below 82 in July. It now has no issues getting in the 60s if I want it to. He said the previous owner obviously never changed the filter in many years and it's a miracle the system didn't quit.
Rental units are the same. Tenants don't replace HVAC filters. Sometimes they don't even clean dryer lint filters or dishwasher filters. Tenants appear to have lower IQs than the general population
@@veryslyfox typically because they’ve never been homeowners and believe simple maintenance belongs to the landlords.
My hat is off to you Sir. All of you. I wish I could fit under mine to do this... thus was an awesome video!
Good job. Great information. Really appreciate the level of your expertise. Now I have the confidence to clean my coil. It’s not real dirty; just needs some TLC. Cheers!
You may want to try to cut the handle off that wire brush and use it like a comb. Great video and very helpful!
Exactly my thoughts
Wow! Mine is bad,but not that bad. Thank you for showing how to clean. Got everything except wire brush.
I forgot to put my filter back on and mine started to look like this At the bottom. Thank you so much for this video!
That was a good one. Nice job
I’m glad you enjoyed it! I appreciate you watching.
Thank you so much for this wonderful informative video
Thanks for posting this!
You could also cut the handle off of that brush since you’re working in such tight spaces might make it easier for them to maneuver with additional torque
Great video ty for sharing very helpful
Thank you.
Great job man
Thanks so much!
Thank you for the information! 👍🏻
You bet!
This is great if you can get to the coils I have an older furnace that is sealed not meant to be opened, not sure if anything can tk be done with it .
Hey, really cool, great job and info, will help me when it comes time, thanks.
Great video I like it.
Thank you sir. Perfect information. Not sure where to get the coil cleaner but I’m sure it’s around. With your information i can clean mine and big deal i get my hands dirty LOL ✌️☕️
Get it at Lowes
This is the helpful video, my evaporator cooler in my 1993 Peterbilt as the same issue but I cleaned the same way?
Hi. Thanks for the video. I was looking for videos to help me with my apartment ac and this might be one of the best ones. It's my landlord's job to fix this stuff but looks like it's on me to do repairs again. So, I want to make sure I get it right. I ordered some of that foam cleaner from Amazon which should be in by tomorrow. I have major asthma and me and my child both have some other breathing issues.
I heard my landlord LAST YEAR tell me that he has to get down there and clean the coils because they're dirty, so I'm only guessing that is why my electric I PAY FOR is sky high and the wall outside the ac is freezing cold (the wall the connects to his wall where I am sure THEY'RE in their chilling) but my AC is reading 62 degrees while my thermometers are reading 77 downstairs and 85 upstairs....WAY TOO HOT for an asthma patient with other lung issues.
So, the only problem would be HOW TO ACCESS THE COILS? So, I'm off to look for a video on that next.
Nice job! Customers say changing filters every month is a waste of money along with duct cleaning. Keeps us working.
🤣🤣
Changing filters wouldn’t prevent this. A dirty filter would let LESS stuff to pass through. So I’m not really sure what you’re talking about? This, is a cheap filter. No filter. Or maybe poorly fitting filter.
@@jamesbizs If the ducts are clean and filters are changed when needed the blower wheel and evap coil will stay clean. You say a dirty filter would catch more debris? Dont see your thought on that. Dirty filter will cause air flow restriction along with bent/kinked filter. The dirty air will follow the easiest path around the filter and cause this issue again.
I think I've got a job ahead of me. Thanks for the guidance
I used my vacuum wand and brush slowly and it worked perfectly. Also use gloves! Goggles! Face mask! Thanks for the video ❤
PS I don't think you cleared enough gunk off before you sprayed it
I try to use my shop vac, air compressor and the brush before foaming then repeat the shop vac and air compressor. Less mess, better results and less foam time.
Is there a way to do this without removing everything and draining the freon?
I had to do this to my AC unit too...instead of that expensive coil cleaner spray I used engine degreaser spray from the auto parts store which worked very well.
What brand cleaner?
Automotive section at Walmart, any brand of engine degreaser.
@@machopr1958 I assume foaming, right. My coil is raining gunk as a I brush it. I used foaming bathroom spray in the past, but I assume engine degreaser should be stronger.
Correct...the foaming kind. Use a soft bristle brush and a spray bottle with water to flush all the gunk out. Honestly it is a messy job but well worth it.
And your house smelled like an oil refinery afterwards. Nice.
Tyvm.
Was this filmed in Upstate, NY ? I lived in an apartment complex that had the exact same condenser coil, mine looked like that upon move in. Filter was new though.. Had to clean it myself.
I usually run a small shop-vac to vacuum as much off as I can, because breathing that is not fun. I also have a Turbo tank rinser.
He did not even mention the blower wheel, you can bet it was nasty, too.
exactly my thoughts! i use the shop vac first and then the cleaner so my coils don't get like that.
Thanks 🎉 but all through the cleaning all I could think about was why a huge wire brush? Cutting the handle off would be much easier. A hard toothbrush would be so easy to manage.
Do hvac, they said. It’s clean work, they said.
Sir, they've lied. 💯
This was awesome how much is it to do this ????
I use a worx battery operated pressure washer to clean evaporator coils. That’s if you can pull them out far enough away from the cabinet.
Yeah I use my carpet extractor brush attachment to do preventative maintenance on all evap coils... F. That
Shoulda changed her smoke detector battery while you were there
Very good
Since you had the coil mostly out, can you put a plastic tub underneath it and wash the coil with a hose from the top?
Great job! Did you have to remove away anything (PVC pipe) before pulling the coil out?
No i just had to remove it from the pump
Very little air flow out of my condo A/C. I have an upflow slant coil that literally has blue corrosion on the top side of the coil. How do I deal with that? Does the spray foam cut through corrosion or do I need to spray some sort of baking soda type cleaner on there to dissolve it? I'm worried that the fins are now shot and will all have to be replaced. HELP!
He's only able to clean a few fractions of an inch there's no way he can clean all that junk out all the way through.
Once he's cleaned the surface and used the coil cleaner there will still be too much crap left over.
The best defense is to have the system regularly cleaned by our AC tech. I just replaced our AC/Furnace this week and I've signed up for the semi-annual maintenance which includes cleaning both the condenser and evaporator coils.
How do you maintain the A-coil, so the rust is minimized...
Wow. That’s what we’re breathing. No wonder people are sickly. I didn’t even know this was something you have to maintain. Mine have never been cleaned. After 22 years! So....what should I expect? And one of my units is under the house in the crawl space, so there is a guilt issue of having some young fello crawl under the house and try to clean the damn thing.....
Please show how you removed the pvc pipes before you pulled the coil out
Vacuum after wire brush them spray?
Do evap coils use filters? I have no intake filter location.
I actually wet the coil if its dry and I find the dirt peel off easier with it wet just spray water on it
Thanks for the tip
guess after you spray the cleaner you can use pressurized water to further clean it
How much did this cost?
How much is a service like that?
4:50 When you drag the wire brush down the fins and it makes no noise at all then THAT IS THICK!
I would cut the handle off that wooden brush so you can maneuver in there a little better.
What about the rust?
Pretty interesting you have an Egyptian onk tattooed on your hand. Do you know what it means?
Just found out this was a thing today dudes wantin $2,500 to fix it maybe this can keep me from havin to front that within the week.
Easy guys ...Great day ...If yall know so much about cleaning coils why are you watching ...good video bro 😂😅
Would cleaning the evaporate coil aid with cigarette smell? I was told it was pointless to change plenum.
Yes it would help in my opinion
So it is possible to get them clean w/out having to replace it? I just have a company come Inter for the same problem in this video. The technician said there was nothing he could do and call in a sales rep. They tried to sell me a brand new unit for 11 thousand or get into a program for a 200 a month indefinitely and they will replace things. Is a shame the level of dishonesty.
Yes you can clean them without replacing. This company is trying to rip you off
Unfortunately...there is a lot of dishonesty in the industry.
Wow, Mary, that’s crazy! I think mine is pretty bad, but repair guys have said they’ve all seen much worse. I had one quote me $250 to pull it out and clean it, but I’m about to do it myself.
Thanks HVAC Tech. 👍
@@sharyn4271 bro no way! I charge my neighbors 20 bucks to clean their condenser, and 30 for their evaporator.(a bit of the money goes into the cans of cleaning fluid which are about 7 dollars each, and for every unit i use the whole can.) Some people are just way too pricey id say. Its literally a chore to me, its just spraying and brushing really. at some point though i hope to start doing some more advanced and high paying stuff though, as my grandparents have got a buissness in hvac.
That's why TH-cam video's are worth their weight in gold and why we very carefully try to repair ourselves..
What do I do if my lines don't have enough slack to slide my coils out they only slide out a couple inches but nt enough to see inside.
You will have to recover the refrigerant in the system and cut the lines. Better leave a job like that to a professional
Wouldn’t it work better to spray the cleaner from the top and allow gravity to pull the cleaner through? Seems like that would help pull the gunk out the way it went in and waste less cleaner since it won’t drip out until it has ran through? nice work though.
Maybe. Never tried it
Yea, this is kind of common sense
I have it don't work it always foams out the side you sprayed..Nasty job but someone's got to do it.
@@felixchien1664 ummm no actually doing it the way you're describing is the opposite of having common sense. The foam is supposed to be sprayed directly on the dirt and grime to loosen it up.
@@ironmike742 I never said you couldn't spray it from the bottom. If I were doing it, I'd spray on both sides. Come on, I'm not saying there is only ONE way to do something; all I'm saying is use common sense.
When you hand wash a car, do you start on the bottom of the car or the top? One way make more sense than the other. Think about that and get back to me.
Do you have to be careful brushing? I heard, it can cause damage if done harshly.
Yes. You can only brush straight down with the fins. If you move side to side it will fold them over.
I hope more people see this video and realize what they are breathing everyday. Definitely get yours cleaned and install a UV light on the coil. That’s a pretty bad one.
Does the cooled air pass through a filter before entering the house? I'm not familiar with this system.
Great video !!! What's a fair price to have someone come out a do that type of service?
Around $150-$200 would get you a full maintenance plus evaporator cleaning
What would a service call typically run for this in the industry?
I had a service out today. $525 to do this. I said no thanks. I’m cleaning mine on Tuesday.
12k for a brand new unit. Apparently no such thing as a service call anymore...they go in for the kill when you live in a nation that's dying and lacks any sort of integrity
And what really sucks is the new units don't last as long as the older ones. It's the same way with clothes washers, they're designed to fall apart after only a few years. The big corporations are charging high $$$ for crap that's designed to fail.
Might help to saw some of that wire brush handle off.
I tried that brush and bent the fins.. can they be straightened
Yes they can. It works best if you buy the fin combs. You can get them on amazon
I’ve seen this a lot and wonder why not pump the unit down and pull the coil out to clean it the proper way . I understand you could creat a leak in the future but best way is to remove and clean with water
Most people don’t want to pay for it. It would be much more expensive
Yeah 1200 dollars to remove clean a coil on a 18 year old system is a little much for some people
Can you still have dirty coils if you change your filter twice a year? My system is 25 years old and blows fine. My neighbor who is an AC contractor said I do not need to clean my coils. I will make this a Saturday project if what he says is incorrect. As far as I know the coils have never been cleaned before.
You shouldn’t need to clean the coil if it’s filtered and replaced regularly
@@HVACTechTips thank you for letting me know. Probably saved me hours as I have two units.
@@jamesduffey4442 appreciate your comment. I'm going to make it a task for one Saturday to open on of my units and see what it looks like. Once I do I will report back.
@@jamesduffey4442 Update: Last night I opened up my unit to get to the coil. I was surprised that it was perfectly clean with no signs of being dirty. I've been here a little over 6 years and my neighbor across the street who is an AC guy always took care of the AC here and said they have never been cleaned as they do not need to. The units are from 1996, I guess in this case my neighbor was correct.
How long after doing this should I keep my Unit turned off?
You can start it back after it’s put back together
You should wear a respirator when dealing this stuff - can't be healthy to inhale the small particles.
Can you make a video for a system that doesn't have an access door?
Have to cut the unit open to make sure to be able to put it back together at a beer format but using caulking and cloth
Is a metal wire brush necessary? Will a regular brush work?
The wire brush gets in the grooves good. The brush has to be stiff
I first used a shop vacuum cleaner to get most of gunk out....combed fins with a brush...sprayed coil cleaner on BACK side of coil...finished up using shop vac. Worked great.
I do this as maintenance every 3 years...writing date of doing it on a panel of unit.
Once you know how to do this it will save much grief later on.....
👍
I would have condemned it. Lol
Wow
I think you need to start using a very strong vacuum cleaner and suck that out... That's what I have done running into something that bad, and it works great
That’s a great idea! Thanks Talli Sman
I have been used a good "steam vacuum for carpet, over 30 years old" which works perfectly every time.
So it’s not necessary to use water after coil cleaner??
Not for the foaming evaporator cleaner. It is no rinse.
Did they slean the vents
No. Lol
So that’s why you change your filters every month if you have 3 cats. Huh. Well now I know.
Lol they wanted 1500 to clean the inside coil and another 250 to do some other "service".
Vacuum
That's a mold infestation! Yikes! That house is a biohazard.
Mold mold mold y’all trying to sell a customer new units scare the customer about mold
Can the gunk build up cause allergies?
Not likely, it will cause lots of ice though
Gunk build up can cause mold so I'd say yes.
Alright, I know this was mentioned already...but it doesnt make sense to me to spray the cleaner on the bottom. Some should be sprayed on the top to allow gravity to pull it through. You can also try vaccuuming from the bottom or using compressed air from the top.
All the above would seem to clean up that coil far better rather than scraping from the bottom and possibly pushing some of that gunk deeper into the coil. 🤷♂️
No you are wrong. This guy in the video did the job correctly. Opinions are like buttholes, everyone has one
@@ironmike742 basic physics and common sense isnt really just an opinion
@@ironmike742 I get the sense that "Work smarter, not harder" is a concept that eludes you.
@@felixchien1664 the reason you don’t is that the top is usually still pretty clean. The foaming cleaner will clean the top well enough but the bottom is where the air comes from so if dirt is caked on like in the video then you have little to no airflow across the coil.
@@chadhowell1328 I was being nice when I said "doesn't make sense". I get why he sprayed it from the bottom. But he never thought about spraying it from the top to allow the cleaner to seep down. Common sense would tell you that you can get some better cleaning that way. The same reasoning as to why vacuuming it from the bottom and not the top. Or spraying it with compressed air from the top and not the bottom. just to name a few common sense examples.
Obviously, the bottom is where the dirty part is because that is the point where air first contacts the coil (in this case it is getting sucked up). But what you're saying is pointless...you want to clean the entire coil. Simply spraying it from the bottom and having the cleaner just fall back down isn't the most efficient way to do it. Unless you think gravity has negligible effect on the cleaner.
You didn't have to rinse it with clean water? the coil, after spraying the cleaner.
It’s a no rinse cleaner. The coil will condensate when it starts back cooling and will self rinse. Just FYI, that coil cleaner is one of the worst. Don’t work great and if the company I work for didn’t buy it, I wouldn’t use it.
So many things wrong with what you did. But you'll be back to clear the drain in about three days
Is it safe to use that wire brush on the unit?
I don't think so.
Yes as long as you clean the coil in a vertical motion in line with the fins. But safety is not a concern. There is no power going to the evaporator.
From this video, this evaporator coil is so bad and nasty. How can I clean it without pulling out.
My evaporator coil doesn't "slide out" - obstructions in the way....I made a fitting for shop vac pipe out of 1" PVC 90 deg elbow that enabled me to reach inside of coil for cleaning.
(I cut off one of PVC elbow's pipe fit socket to enable getting in tight corners of coil).
“You don’t want to cut your hand” add to that, don’t breathe the crap either. Wear a respirator!!!
Next time go get some yellow death and catch pan to put up under it.
yellow death what the hell is that ?
Shop vac with a wire brush nozzle
My AC guy said has to pull it and clean outside $900 fee can't I just clean it in place
Not always. Sometimes you have to pull it and cut the lines. Just depends on how the coil is positioned.
How long do think it took to get this bad 🤢🤢
That looked like 10 years of dirt to me. I've got ours to do today that the filters were 2" short for so we ordered the correct ones and I have 3 cans of the foam, a long brush, a chemical water pump and white vinegar, sprayer, a Tupperware basin and algicide tablets for the drains and pan afterwards - wish me luck, I'm gonna be laying on the floor with my head and arms up under it dripping in my face in an hour or two, wish me luck! 🤢🥴
@@vapemcvaperson good luck, man! I need to do this, but I'm unsure if I can access it well enough to clean it. Hvac guy only wants to replace it, of course. I just need to get through the next few weeks of summer. Let me know how it goes for you
@@EllenD333 Thank you for the encouragement!
I did it a few days ago, It's in a closet in the hallway, I took a lower front panel off so I could see the top (or back side) of the coils and that side was clean looking but the underside behind where the air filter goes was black looking in areas and slimy, other areas had grey and black fluffy dust.
I had measured between the legs that the air handler sits on and couldn't find a 16"x16" Tupperware or basin anywhere so settled on a roasting pan that fit under there to try to catch the majority of drips of goo etc to make clean up better at the end - it was about 6" tall so didn't get in the way of me reaching up to the dirty coils.
I got everything I needed within arms length of me laying down on my right side on an old blanket folded over a few times to make laying down on tile less painful.
The tricky part was figuring out the PVC drain pipes for the condensation pump which catches the water and pumps outside.
It's normally routed to a plastic water pump (condensation pump) underneath the unit, this was now powered off along with the whole AC at the fuse breaker box so as not to get electrocuted!
I got a big salad? Bowl and you can untwist the plastic PVC pipe sections and rearrange their direction so I ran that to my right over where my head would be laying down so as not to be in my way while cleaning and it drained into the very big bowl (which has to be emptied about 4-5 times total.
I put on clear plastic goggles (eye protection) I already had from a previous job in case chemicals got in my eyes, as I was laying to the side under where I was spraying the foam.
Basically sprayed up in the top from underneath and up and down the length of the coils, it's bubbling and pulling the gunk out - didn't really drip off much to the pan on the floor but does drain down to the catch lip - channel that goes to the PVC drain to the bowl.
Let first spraying take 8 mins or so sitting on there and it does it's thing, then I could see it had dissipated I sprayed more covering all the surface from top to bottom again in up and down with the grain of the fins and that was pretty much the end of can #1.
I left that heavier amount of foam on there about 10mins and returned and it had melted more goo and was getting dryer already so now I got the small wet vac and put a small angled brush on it and starting at the top of the fins going with the grain of the fins (so as not to bend them) I vacuumed down from the top of each row that the brush covered and then again on the next row beside it all the way across and then cleaned the brush a few times and did again.
Then comes the warm water and white vinegar mix, the bleach sprayer from Home Depot held a gallon and a half so I mixed about a third of vinegar and the rest warm to hot water and pumped it up and sprayed from the clean top back side of the coils through to the dirty side - the whole gallon and a half, it came through without hitting the floor and drained down the dirty side into the channel and out the PVC drain pipes into the bowl, black black water, had to stop and empty bowl in toilet nearby.
Then mixed up another gallon & half of the vinegar water mix and did another quick spray from the top through and went back down on the floor and sprayed upwards with the remaining liquid and mixed one more gallon for a final quick spray through the back pushing anything left out to the dirty side and again sprayed the previously dirty side until after emptying the bowl another time or two the water mix was running clear!
I had a look again after about 10 minutes and felt the coils were dry to the touch so, vacuumed any cobwebs and dust from inside the air handler and around the edges etc also using paper towels to dry anywhere else that had drops of foam or water so the new filter wouldn't get soaked and particularly clean with wet vac with the skinny pointy nozzle attachment in the V shaped channel that catches the condensation during use which still had big clumps of black dust and goo also final wipe out with paper towels in the drain area and took PVC pipes out back to the garden hose to spray out the smegma that likes to build up in there so the freshly cleaned condensation pump doesn't get needlessly dirty again and reassembled the pipes into the little pump and cleaned up the tiles under the unit.
I'm not gonna lie, ... it's a bit of a PITA and a messy job but probably took two hours maybe 3 with getting everything ready and putting everything away and clean up.
All the three cans of foaming spray, the bleach sprayer (weed killer ones will break immediately because they don't have the right type of seals to deal with vinegar) the brush, vinegar, algaecide tablets for in the drip channel after the cleaning and 1 in the pump, AC tape to properly seal the gaps between panels on the unit, and an adapter to use sockets on my electric screwdriver/drill and a few other things I forget cost $59 at home Depot as opposed to the quote of $500+ from the AC company to take the coils out which means them de soldering or cutting the copper pipe and taking out back to clean with a hose, capture (hopefully your refrigerant to be reused) and risk them getting damaged and leaking refrigerant after he leaves (had that happen before in another house) aside from what ever else they would charge to clean the gunk from the condensation pump (some houses have the PVC just drain with gravity to the outside through a wall - depends on the location of the AC in the house whether there would be a pump or not.
But yeah, I was aching a bit the next day from having to get up and down from the floor without anything to grab onto in the hall, but it's running cooler now with stronger flow from the vents and the nice lemony from the foam and white vinegar mix smells pretty good and goes away after a day or so. I'd say it was worth it and will do once a year in future before it gets too bad again as the unit was put in in 2017 so it took a while to get that bad but even the vinegar with warm water once a year should do a good job keeping the algae away and dust off with the sprayer.
Of course it's still 90° outside so the air is running a lot but it's keeping it at 76 at least and hardly runs much at night now.
I hope this can help you if you can get access to the coils, they should be right above where you put the air filter pretty much!
Good luck to you and I feel this would be much easier next time because I know what to expect, you don't have to be really strong or anything, just determined!
Do you ever worry about black mold it looked like there was some mold there on that plastic just curious
Why don’t they make a tool without that dumb long handle? One were the handle protrudes downward instead of off to the side. So a tool that may be the approximate shape of a razor you shave a beard with.
Where's your eye googles and respiratory???
Lol
Shop vac works better with brush on end and no coil cleaner not good for coil
Wear eye protection 😊
Car wash bucket, water, Dawn dish soap and a soft nylon bristle brush and rags. That spray can junk is lame.
Cocaine's a helluva drug
Yea agree. It sucks
That was really really bad should have take that outside and clean it
That would not be worth the effort