So, earlier this summer, we dropped a few grand on the Heathenmobile to return its a/c capabilities to a level Stuttgart intended, and figured that was enough HVAC work for the year. It sure FELT like enough.

Oh no. Not even close.

The house unit’s been kinda puny lately — taking a longer time to get the job done, creating higher bills, etc. The unit’s from 1997, so it’s not surprising for it to need some work (it’s been perfect so far), but we were kind of surprised to discover that it had basically failed while we were at the best concert ever last night. Thermostat setting? 74. Household temp? 82. Uh-oh.

It didn’t get below 80 all night, and crept way past the end of the dial during the day today. Ick. The a/c guy finally made it over about 630, and gave a potentially expensive diagnosis inside 20 minutes.

• The system wouldn’t start up at all at this point. Fix: a $150 “start kit”.
• It’s now on, but won’t cool. Whups! Out of freon. $125 later, it’s no longer out of freon.
• Since the lack of freon is certainly because of a leak, let’s add in some dye to help us find that pesky bastard later. $72.50 for the dye, natch.

The story goes a little like: lower coolant -> harder working compressor -> higher bills and overheating -> Profit! Well, for the AC guy, anyway.

The leak diagnosis is a good new/bad news kind of thing. The bad news is that they’re almost always in the coil, and leaks in the coil can’t be repaired. This means we’re about to spend real money.

The good news is that, if we replace the coil, we’ll get an efficiency boost not just because the new one won’t be leaky; SEER ratings for new units are much higher than whatever the rating is on my 1997 unit, so next summer we’ll get equivalent cooling efficacy for fewer kilowatt-hours of work. That’ll help take the sting out of the check I suspect we’ll be writing between now and Thanksgiving. Yuck.