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View Full Version : Daikin ducted unit, never worked properly



Apples
28-09-2007, 12:28 PM
Hi all, just found this forum tonight. Having a lot of trouble with our Daikin ducted unit since day one. Have just sent an email to Daikin, here is a copy of it.

What is every ones take on our troubled a/c?

Cheers
Peter
Qld, Australia


RE: Faulty air conditioning ducted unit
I write to you with dissatisfaction of your DAIKIN DUCTED AIR UNIT product.

We purchased a Daikin fully ducted system for our new house about 4 years ago. Ever since the installation of the system we have had nothing but trouble with it. This will be my second letter to head office (Brisbane). CoolCo in Toowoomba are the distributers that we purchased the system from. I have had them onsite a number of times now to try and resolve the issue.
Basically it is not getting cold. For example, today Friday 28th September we had the unit running with the wall control panel set at 16deg. on high with only the main zones on. I let it run for about an hour and stuck a thermometer up the closest outlet to the a/c. The temperature coming out was 17.3deg. I have been told by the technicians that the air coming out should be around 10-12deg. lower than that set on the control panel. The outside temperature was 27.6deg. and the inside temperature was 26.6deg.
So it is back to square one again. On one visit from CoolCo the gas was taken out and weighed. There was only 1.5kg of gas in there instead of the required 5kg. After weighing the gas it was filled up to max again with a fresh charge. Instantly the unit worked like it never had before, it had icy cold air coming out. But slowly over time this failed, and the air was not coming out at the right temperature again. Back to square one.
On a later visit CoolCo replaced the condenser coil??? The one with all the fins. As they suspected a leak. Gave her a fresh charge of gas again and like before it was icy cool, and the heater function seemed to work better.
Since then we have only been using the heater function and have not had a chance to use the cooling function until the other day, as it wasn’t hot enough. Now when we go to use it, it's back to the original state that it was in when in was installed 4 years ago.
Last time I contacted you, I was told if I have further problems to recontact you guys and that you would send a technician out (from Brisbane). Well I can now say that I have had a gut full of this system. Originally when we went a/c shopping we asked for a system that could cool and heat our house with total ease. We wanted to have more cooling power than required just to be on the safe side. CoolCo said that they could install a Hitachi system(from memory) for $8000. But then also said that if we were going to stay in the house for a long time we would be better off getting the Daikin at an extra cost of $2000 because they are the best. So $10,000 later we feel that we should have in fact bought a different system.
Also we were never told (at purchase time) that we can only have all the bedrooms on or only the main area on. We originally asked for the whole house to be fully cooled. It was only on one of the last visits that CoolCo said that we can't have the whole house on a once. So when the kids go to bed, we have to turn the main room off......??? What's the point of that??? Having to sweat it out in the main area or go to bed at 7:30pm with the kids to keep cool???
I am asking you!What will you do for us as we have put up with this for far too long. I’m thinking that we get our 10K back and get another system or you guys come down and rip the lot out and re install a new Daikin system including the outside unit, inside unit and all the pipes etc.
I feel that there might not be any other solution to this problem. I don’t mean to be a whinger and complain all the time but hey, it’s not doing what it should.
I have a wife at home all day with a 6 month old baby and two toddlers. My wife also has eczema which is irritated by the heat. We need this problem sorted as soon as possible.

frank
28-09-2007, 12:56 PM
Hi Peter and welcome to the forum.

To be fair to the installing company, I've changed their name as it's not acceptable to publically criticise some one on an open forum especially as they are not in a position to defend themselves on here.
Any disagreement between you should be discussed in private.

Seems like you have an ongoing problem though with the installed equipment, and from your tale, I don't think it's the fault of the manufacturer either. It sounds like the system has not been pressure tested correctly and has a slow leak, which leads to a reduction of gas charge over time.

You say that when the gas was recovered and then recharged correctly, the system ran fine, giving you decent air off temperatures, but now, after only using the system on heating for a while, it again gives poor performance in cooling mode.

Can you post a little more about the system? like, what model is the outdoor unit, how many indoor units are connected to it, how is the ducting distributed to the different rooms etc. Any information you can give to help us understand the set up will allow the members to give more helpful advice.

AcidSlasher
28-09-2007, 02:01 PM
Sounds 99% to be a slow gas leak. contrary to popular belief, A/C systems do NOT "use" gas as such, it flows continously throughout the system. A unit that is working properly should never have to be re-gassed or topped up throughout its whole life.

I agree with frank, chances are this isnt daikins fault. I personally find the most common gas leaks are due to fault of the installer, daikin pressure test all their units to check for leaks before they are sold, so chances are its a dodgy flare or weld somewhere in the pipework. Any good technician should be able to find the leak for you and repair it.

On another note, there is no reason why u cant have both zones on at the same time, none of us can tell u if the unit u have is big enough to cool the whole house at once, but that doesnt mean u cant use both zones at the same time.... it just might not be quite as effective. U say u bought a unit that was bigger than u required, so chances are it will cool effectively with your living area and bedrooms on at the same time, unless there is another reason that we dont know about.

Also in my personal opinion, the extra $2000 to buy a daikin over a hitachi is well worth it, They are great units, but of course like everything there is always a bad apple. My guess in this case is the problem isnt with the unit, rather probably a small leak on one of the flares, but no one can know for sure until it has been properly pressure tested. You say they replaced the condensor coil suspecting a leak but u still have the problem, i would be interested to know if they actually pressure tested it and FOUND a leak or if they were just guessing. seems pretty dodge to me!

Anyway good luck, and i hope it gets fixed!

Krondor
28-09-2007, 04:54 PM
Hi guys,

I must agree that in most cases leak is caused due to a poor installation. However, we had already 2 cases were we found a leak inside the coil of the indoor units.
So be aware of that possibility also.

AcidSlasher
28-09-2007, 06:35 PM
Daikin indoor units come pre-charged with dry nitrogen from the factory, so leaks in the indoor unit from day one are rare, unless of course the installer didnt notice the fact that the indoor unit had little or no pressure, which is possible. Just because its filled with nitrogen under pressure from the factory doesnt mean that it wont leak out during transit and pre-installation, it then becomes the installers responsibilty to be aware of the amount of nitrogen in the indoor unit, and obviously not install a unit that is lacking in charge.

does this make sense?

Apples
28-09-2007, 11:47 PM
I have included a photo of the plate on the back of the outdoor unit, for reference to model numbers etc.

They did climb up into the roof and follow all the lines along with one of those electronic gas leak detectors.

I'm pretty sure that they also pressurised the unit with the higer pressure nitrogen to find a leak.

So yeah maybe there is still a leak.

It is quite obvious that there is a slow leak there somewhere cause when it is fully charged it works really really good.

We have 8 outlet ducts, one in kitchen, one it lounge and one in dinning. Then one in the computer room and 4 more for the bedrooms.


Also, I havent noticed it this time but last time it was low on gas, when in heating mode it would alway go into defrost mode. Does that make sense? Would that also happen with low gas ?

Cheers
Peter

Looks like I will have to post the other photo in a new post as the files are too big.

Apples
28-09-2007, 11:49 PM
nope can't post the 2nd photo. but the model number is:

RZP125DV1

BigJon3475
28-09-2007, 11:54 PM
I have included a photo of the plate on the back of the outdoor unit, for reference to model numbers etc.

They did climb up into the roof and follow all the lines along with one of those electronic gas leak detectors.

I'm pretty sure that they also pressurized the unit with the higher pressure nitrogen to find a leak. Question is did they pressurize for 15 minutes or did they let it sit for a while and come back and check. Also why did they not pull a vacuum on the system with micron gauge. That right there would tell them almost instantly if there was a leak. One test on pressure and one on vacuum will catch 99.9% of the leaks in a system and at least tell you that you have one.





So yeah maybe there is still a leak.

It is quite obvious that there is a slow leak there somewhere cause when it is fully charged it works really really good.

We have 8 outlet ducts, one in kitchen, one it lounge and one in dinning. Then one in the computer room and 4 more for the bedrooms.


Also, I havent noticed it this time but last time it was low on gas, when in heating mode it would alway go into defrost mode. Does that make sense? Would that also happen with low gas ?

If the thermostat was not being satisfied by the heat pump then aux. will come on. If it's low on ref. not only is it harder to tell from homeowners standpoint in heating mode because of aux. heat that it is low. If heat pump is low on ref. you will not have as much heat transfer so yes it will make the aux. heat come on more often.

frank
29-09-2007, 10:44 AM
Hi Bigjon

On the Daikin ducted units there is no auxillary heat fitted. It purely works as a heat pump.

The RZP125 is rated at 12.5kw so it should be big enough for the average house

Peter

Upload your photo's to www.photobucket.com (http://www.photobucket.com) and then just post the link it gives you

MadMax
21-05-2009, 01:34 AM
I agree with most of the above. Does sound like a slow leak.

2 points though - if they told you that you could only do the main area OR the bedrooms, the unit is clearly not sized to do both & undersized to suit your budget.

Also, airconditioners shouldnt really be set at 16 degrees - unit will be working longer and harder to get there resulting in higher electricity bills. Typically people should set cooling for about 23/24 in summer and 21-22 in winter.

yinmorrison
21-05-2009, 09:51 PM
Hi Bigjon

On the Daikin ducted units there is no auxillary heat fitted. It purely works as a heat pump.

The RZP125 is rated at 12.5kw so it should be big enough for the average house

Peter

Upload your photo's to www.photobucket.com (http://www.photobucket.com) and then just post the link it gives you

Frank, that might be ok in the UK but not so sure in Australia though, say 2kw per bedroom plus another 2 for the Comp room doesnt leave much for the main areas of the house.Maybe if there was more info on the actual property would help however it seems there is definately a gas leak in any case.There was an excellent link from someone a few weeks ago about this but cant remember where ( senile dementia im afraid ) Surely though the Contractor should be prepared to go back in order to satisfy an obviously disgruntled customer? Public relations and all that.

Brian_UK
21-05-2009, 11:10 PM
Well, back in 2007 when this was first discussed they seemed more relaxed about these things :)

yinmorrison
22-05-2009, 06:36 PM
Well, back in 2007 when this was first discussed they seemed more relaxed about these things :)
Doh, what year is this again:eek:

icecube51
24-05-2009, 08:42 PM
back to the future...???

Ice

skags
28-06-2009, 12:56 AM
so did this get resolved ? if it cooled or heated the house sufficantly after regasssed then it most likely isn't a sizing issue , more likely to be a leak on there flares i have seen flares that only leaked when in heating due to expantion of pipe work that didn't leak with 400 + psi of nitrogen put threw ,
but if they are positive it is not there flares then i would be isolating both indoor and outdoor unit and pressure testing individually to narrow down the search,
i think your going in the right direction 10 g is alot of money to spend on something that isnt working but daikin are one of the best to deal with for faults/parts etc

skags
28-06-2009, 12:59 AM
oh wait i just seen it was posted in 2007 too, hahah hope its been fixed buy now