New front AC in my Columbus

[amxpress]

Spent our first night in our Columbus 320RS since the new bedroom AC was installed. Big difference. When my wife heard it, she couldn't tell the difference at first, though. She found the following explaination helpful.
There are actually two noises generating from the AC.
1) The blower. The noise from the air being forced out of the AC unit can't really be changed, other than closing the quick cool vent or changing the spped of the fan.
2) AC compressor. In our old AC, when the compressor cycled on, not only was it loud, it vibrated through the frame of the trailer. The compressor in our new AC unit was hardly noticeable when it cycled.
It is definitely an improvement and provides the right amount of "white noise" when sleeping, as well as keeping the room C-O-L-D!

[Camper Couple]

We had a kit installed in ours and is very quiet!! So much better.

[lgray]

Same here, first trip out with our new front AC, St. Augustine, FL. They both actually don't run all the time. Sitting in the living room, 73 degrees, wife watching TV in front, with AC running.

Lost my water heater door, somewhere on I-95. Never had that happen...

[eisbell]

We had grommets added to our bedroom a/c and it did make it so much more quiet but now we are thinking what is quiet? Of course the living room a/c is very noisy when the vent is open and blowing down on the couch so we closed it off but very little was coming out of the first vents and nothing out of all of the other vents so we suspected some type of a clog. Saw pictures on another thread and Ervin opened ours up and the openings to force air to the vents was covered with the foil tape. He opened these up and now we have air going to all of the vents and it is so quiet while watching tv and talking so now our bedroom a/c sounds loud and some vibration with the l/r so quiet. So our question is, how quiet is quiet for front a/c? Another question - when door is closed you can see daylight by the door jamb so does anyone have any ideas how to get the door more plumb?

[rjshiflet]

We had the new bedroom AC installed yesterday - spent an hour shopping while they did the work. While they were replacing it, they found a leak in the duct work and said probably 30 to 35% of our AC was leaking out into the ceiling space (attic for lack of a better description). They fixed that too.

The best I can describe...having the grommet-kit-fix installed reduced the noise 50 or 60% (especially the vibration of the bedroom/bathroom wall and the wall where the thermostat is), and having the unit replaced probably reduced the overall noise another 20 to 25%. Amxpress - we haven't slept under it yet (will next week) but I think you're right about the right level of white noise.

Dometic sent the replacement with a white shroud - thankfully our dealer's service manager pulled the black one and replaced it so they still match. I would not have been happy with one black and one white shroud.

[eisbell]

Thanks for update. Just got back from goliad sp and need to get touch with dealer to fix things they never did and we think we will insist that they put in a new unit for us. Since we opened the ducts in living room we donot get that blast of cold air on the couch the air actually comes out of all the vents which makes it so much more quiet but now you notice the vibration of the bedroom unit. Have you ever noticed hot air coming from the vent in the under cabinet to the left of the sink. Never noticed it before.

[rjshiflet]

The hot air that I've noticed is actually from the heater. I did discover that if I have my thermostat set on "auto" and let's say 74 degrees for the AC but 76 for the heater, the AC will come on and cool it down to 74, and then the heater will immediately come on to warm it up to 76.

So - I keep my thermostat set on COOL for the summer and HEAT for the winter and forget about the AUTO setting.

[TURBS]

Originally Posted by rjshiflet

We had the new bedroom AC installed yesterday - spent an hour shopping while they did the work. While they were replacing it, they found a leak in the duct work and said probably 30 to 35% of our AC was leaking out into the ceiling space (attic for lack of a better description). They fixed that too.

The best I can describe...having the grommet-kit-fix installed reduced the noise 50 or 60% (especially the vibration of the bedroom/bathroom wall and the wall where the thermostat is), and having the unit replaced probably reduced the overall noise another 20 to 25%. Amxpress - we haven't slept under it yet (will next week) but I think you're right about the right level of white noise.

Dometic sent the replacement with a white shroud - thankfully our dealer's service manager pulled the black one and replaced it so they still match. I would not have been happy with one black and one white shroud.

Duct work plenum missing in ours to !
Air flow loss was dramatic !

[lgray]

Can you give more details on how to check for a duct leak? Plenum?

When running our front AC unit, I noticed the closet light had cold air comming from the sides. I assumed but have not confirmed a leak.

One other thing I noticed is that one of the bedroom ceiling vents, closest to the head of the bed, has light comming through, the other does not.

I would like to know a little about this issue before raising it with my dealer.

Are either of these a symptom of a duct leak/connection issue?

[eisbell]

We noticed light coming from the ceiling vent in bedroom but went into bathroom and covered ceiling vent and it disappeared in bedroom. It was the light from the skylight and also the floor vent by sliding door went into bathroom and covered floor vent and it went away in bedroom. We noticed if you close glass doors at shower and hang two towels over them it sure cuts down on the heat from the skylight. We have noticed light coming in one spot from the vent over the couch. We thought that might be a leak. Dealer left one of their mirrors in our unit do we will use it to look for leaks.

[amxpress]

I installed a shade for the skylight over the shower in my Sabre. It did a great job keeping out the sun & heat. I'll probably install one in my Columbus, too. Here it is:
RV Skylight Shade for sale - PPL Motor Homes

[SimchaSabre]

AMExpress...we were looking at that very shade to cover the skylight over the shower in our Sabre, but I didn't think I could mount it. How did u do that?

[lgray]

Great feedback, thanks.

Also now interested in the shade, a little nervous about install.

[TURBS]

Originally Posted by lgray

Can you give more details on how to check for a duct leak? Plenum?

When running our front AC unit, I noticed the closet light had cold air comming from the sides. I assumed but have not confirmed a leak.

One other thing I noticed is that one of the bedroom ceiling vents, closest to the head of the bed, has light comming through, the other does not.

I would like to know a little about this issue before raising it with my dealer.

Are either of these a symptom of a duct leak/connection issue?

They took down the inner a/c bezel and found there was no panel to direct the air directly into the camper roof ducting.
Also fund no tape sealing any gaps .
Once they fixed this I had twice the air flow(imo) to front outlets.
Reason they were looking into this was my a/c kept freezing up.

[eisbell]

So I will have to look at it again, I have always had it set on auto, now I understand why the first trip out the heater came on. Never could figure that out.

[Chaps]

Originally Posted by rjshiflet

We had the new bedroom AC installed yesterday - spent an hour shopping while they did the work. While they were replacing it, they found a leak in the duct work and said probably 30 to 35% of our AC was leaking out into the ceiling space (attic for lack of a better description). They fixed that too.

The best I can describe...having the grommet-kit-fix installed reduced the noise 50 or 60% (especially the vibration of the bedroom/bathroom wall and the wall where the thermostat is), and having the unit replaced probably reduced the overall noise another 20 to 25%. Amxpress - we haven't slept under it yet (will next week) but I think you're right about the right level of white noise.

Dometic sent the replacement with a white shroud - thankfully our dealer's service manager pulled the black one and replaced it so they still match. I would not have been happy with one black and one white shroud.

Glad to hear your A/C problems seem now to be solved!
Would you please tell me how you would compare the noise level of the front vs your rear A/C.
We inspected our new 320 last weekend. The rear A/C is very quiet & works just great. Our dealer told us that our front sounds quieter than the few others that this dealer has inspected so far since they started selling Columbus. Despite that, it is much louder than our rear A/C. It does not, however cause any vibration that I can feel. The dealer also said that 2 other front A/Cs that they replaced ended up sounding just as loud as the original ones. If your front now sounds reasonably close in volume to the rear, then I plan on asking my dealer to replace our front.
Thanks for your help once again.

[rjshiflet]

Originally Posted by Chaps

Glad to hear your A/C problems seem now to be solved!
Would you please tell me how you would compare the noise level of the front vs your rear A/C.

OK, there are a couple of things that come into play here. First, I am going to presume that in both cases you have the "dump vent" closed and are using only the ducting for getting the air distributed. (I'm making that presumption because if the "dump vent" is open, you're going to hear a lot more noise than if it is closed.)

Secondly, it's really hard to "guestimate" a comparison between the bedroom A/C (which is roughly 8 or 10 inches above my head) and the living room A/C which is what...3+ feet above my head?

The bedroom unit certainly sounds louder because it's a lot closer to my ears. But, maybe I need to stand under the living room A/C and then sit on the floor under the bedroom unit for a more objective comparison.

The bottom line for me...we got rid of the HORRIBLE vibration that literally shook the wall between the bedroom and bathroom and where the thermostat is.

The bedroom A/C makes noise, but so does the other one.

What we have done to "fix" this...at night, we'll turn the living room A/C down to about 70 or 72 degrees and turn the bedroom A/C to about 74. Since they're vented together - we get plenty of cooling from the living room into the bedroom and have never gotten hot, nor do we have to listen to ANY amount of noise from the bedroom A/C unit.

[eisbell]

We did notice once we opened the air duct so we have air coming through the vents in the l/r to the b/d at night the b/d a/c does not come on hardly at all and we are comfortable. We still have some of the vibration from the b/d a/c so maybe we do need another unit. We need to take ours back to dealer so they can put the ski on, that's one thing they never got around to, and they want to replace the floor because of a bubble about 3" in dia in the living room floor. Did anyone see the photo I attached of the gap under the entrance door? Need to get them to adjust door somehow. Other than the few problems we have had with our dealer not doing the work on a decent timeframe we love our unit and can't wait until we can take her out again.

[Chaps]

Originally Posted by rjshiflet

OK, there are a couple of things that come into play here. First, I am going to presume that in both cases you have the "dump vent" closed and are using only the ducting for getting the air distributed. (I'm making that presumption because if the "dump vent" is open, you're going to hear a lot more noise than if it is closed.)

Secondly, it's really hard to "guestimate" a comparison between the bedroom A/C (which is roughly 8 or 10 inches above my head) and the living room A/C which is what...3+ feet above my head?

The bedroom unit certainly sounds louder because it's a lot closer to my ears. But, maybe I need to stand under the living room A/C and then sit on the floor under the bedroom unit for a more objective comparison.

The bottom line for me...we got rid of the HORRIBLE vibration that literally shook the wall between the bedroom and bathroom and where the thermostat is.

The bedroom A/C makes noise, but so does the other one.

What we have done to "fix" this...at night, we'll turn the living room A/C down to about 70 or 72 degrees and turn the bedroom A/C to about 74. Since they're vented together - we get plenty of cooling from the living room into the bedroom and have never gotten hot, nor do we have to listen to ANY amount of noise from the bedroom A/C unit.

Robert/Estha

I always appreciate your timely & informative responses to my ?s
Since I don't have the vibration that you & others have referred to I'll be happy with what we have at present.
We have already experienced what several other Columbus owners have stated about expecting to be visited by others wanting to examine the model. It took just sev. hours after we had officially become new owners. Certainly makes you feel proud of your hard-earned investment!

Mark/Jeannie

[amxpress]

...we were looking at that very shade to cover the skylight over the shower in our Sabre, but I didn't think I could mount it. How did u do that

It installs with a few screws, very simple.