Water Dripping from Air Conditioner - We have 2 air conditioning units in our house and 2 pipes protrude from the roof. One of the pipes is dripping water. We were told to look for a blockage and to empty the pans. I don’t see where to check for a blockage. The air conditioning units we have: Bryant models 373LAV, 376CAV Downflow/Horizontal and 383KAV, 395CAV Upflow Gas Furnace.Water Dripping from Air Conditioner | Condensation Pipe Drain Answer Thanks for visiting High Performance HVAC and asking a good question. I see you have two zones so actually, you should have more than two drains. Possibly 3 or 4 drains depending on where the units are located. Typically air handling units installed in the attic or closet spaces upstairs will have two condensation drain pipes for condensation. There are some systems that utilize a pump rather than a drain.One is the primary condensation drain pipe where the water should continuously drain the condensation during the cooling season and in the winter heating season if you have a high efficiency condensing furnace.

In the summer it is possible these drains could get clogged up. Normally what clogs these condensation drain pipes is algae and crud growing in the pipe. It will usually block or clog the primary condensation drain causing the water to back-up in the unit. The water eventually finds its way to the secondary or emergency drain pan which should also have a condensation drain pipe attached to it that drains out the water when the primary condensation drain pipe gets clogged. too large ac unitWe have many other related articles. hvac unit worksUse the search feature to the right to help you find other related articles.cost to repair car acWater Dripping from Air Conditioner | Condensation Drain PipeThese two different condensation drain pipes should be distinctly different from one another.

One should drain out in the flower garden or at the base of the house somewhere. The other should drain over a window or someplace where it will be recognized when it is dripping water. This is a warning sign that the primary condensation drain pipe is clogged and needs to be unclogged.As a third measure of protection to prevent severe water damage to a ceiling a float switch is usually installed in the secondary pan so if it begins to overflow the float switch will kill the unit making it inoperable for use until the drains have been unclogged returning the unit to normal operation with all condensations drains open and freely draining condensation.Diagnostic ChecksThere are different methods of unclogging condensation drains. It is recommended that you call and HVAC Technician to unclog the drains because the unit could have another related problem that causes units to flood and a quick diagnostic check by a qualified HVAC technician will ensure this problem does not exist and it is actually a clogged condensation drain.

A special tool that uses pressurized CO2 cartridges to blow the line is used sometimes while other times a shop Vac can suck the muck out of the line. Water hoses can also be used to flushed the line although one must be very careful because you can actually cause reverse flooding and cause more damage than a clogged condensation drain ever could. Condensation Drain Pipe TerminationFind where the lines terminate outside the house and make sure the ends or not plugged by dirt or something else. Slugs or snails love crawling inside of the pipes and they can also cause a clog so make sure the pipe is up a little and not in the dirt of the flower garden. Please use the search feature to the right to help you find other related articles.To learn more about HVAC click here.Water Dripping from Air ConditionerThis time of year, especially when it gets cold outside in the evenings, we get many calls from homeowners concerned that there is cold air blowing out of the duct registers in their home when their heat is running.

We wanted to address this, as many times homeowners think this is an issue with their heating and cooling system, but if they have a heat pump, it's actually typically a very normal process. Don't know if you have a heat pump? Check out this article, on how to tell if your unit is a heat pump or air conditioner. In the summer, a heat pump picks up the heat in your home and dumps it outside. In the winter, your heat pump picks up heat from the outside and dumps it into your home (yes, even when it's cold outside). Now, that may be hard to grasp, but this is the way it works. In the summer, your indoor coil is cold (and pulls humidity out of the air, and comes in the form of water) which is drained from that PVC pipe located on your roof, or side of your house. In the winter, that same humidity is pulled out of the air, but it comes in a form of frost on the outdoor coil (condenser). If you see frost on the outdoor coil, it is natural to the process and it is not a sign of any kind of malfunction- the reason the coil is cold falls back to the second law of thermodynamics- which states that energy always moves from areas of higher concentration to areas of lower concentration.

As the frost builds up on the outdoor coil, it could potentially inhibit the ability for air to flow across that coil. Once the frost builds up, your heat pump automatically goes through what we call, a defrost cycle to keep allowing the air to flow across the coil freely (which is a necessary function of your system). You may have noticed a loud sound right before cold air blows out through the vents in your home. The sound you hear is the reversing valve switching your unit over to cooling mode. Frost on the outside coil is condensation that forms up on the coil in the form of frost. When a heat pump begins the defrost cycle, the outdoor fan shuts off and the system switches over to cooling mode. The reason for this, is that in the cooling mode, the outdoor coil actually becomes hot. This is because hot refrigerant circulates through the outdoor coil, which in turn melts the frost. The reason the fan shuts off during this process is so the system doesn't pull the cold air from the outside across the coil while the hot refrigerant circulates.