Why Most HVAC Techs Can't Troubleshoot - Ya'll Aren't Ready For This 

True,I’ve learn everything on my own with RU-vid and 8 weeks of hvac schooling. I’ve burnt up control boards, thermostats, and relays but I’ve always take something away from every service call. I’ve been blessed or cursed 😮 to be technically inclined in doing everything myself to help save a buck. It all started when my AC compressor died and I was at the mercy of calling a company nearby to help fix it. Let’s just say the interaction with the tech and me was not good. They wanted to sell me a $350 capacitor before they would even consider fixing my compressor. I told them I’m not interested and they then called me a penny pincher. That didn’t bother me but the fact that this guy didn’t even test the compressor really got to me. To this day, I have never charged any customer $350 for a capacitor and even went out of my way to help customers who needed it. This is why I don’t worked for any HVAC company and went on my own, no help, and still learning to this day.😅

Thanks for the video, really helps as a pep talk. New to hvac, fresh hvac graduate and have been hired for close to 3 months now with a great company, they will be sending me out in my own van in a few days. Nervous but excited to keep growing.

Love my AC guy -- when you find a down to earth honest person/company that you TRUST, they have a customer for LIFE.

Thank you for showing why training is so complicated. @3:58 is relevant to my totally unrelated job, especially with IJK thrown in

This guy got it, old boss would send me on calls w me w minor experience and just make me call someone else

My son is interested in hvac I started ( years ago ) bringing home parts some good some bad . To show anyone interested how these things work, how you troubleshoot them . Etc.

Thanks for this video man, I'd definitely like some electrical side of it / sequence of operations for cooling/ heating

Love this! Yes! Sadly, while all the old-heads retire most of the people that did the trades the last decade were pretty low IQ, not in an insulting way, it’s just that those with higher aptitude were pushed into other careers, finance, law, medicine, operations, etc. but now that since 2020 only 6% of ALL new hires in Fortune 500 companies were NON-American/non-heritage Americans so to speak, they all need to find new work as a persecuted minority now. That means taking the jobs “people” don’t want to do ironically. What I found is that the people in the industry now… whew. They cannot troubleshoot and though they’ve been in the industry for 10 years and I’ve only been to school and in my internship they were asking ME what to do? And I am talking basics stuff. Like you I grew up as a math major, Actuarial Science after the Army, but for the safety of my family we had to move to a rural area because my wife was assaulted by our new Americans and that meant having to get a new, much lower paying career. I pray more heritage Americans take up the trades or else we will not have electricity, no HVAC, no clean drinking water, no traffic lights like in Oakland now.

Understanding sequence of operations is very important. Im also a RU-vid university graduate it’s a great resource.

In your opinion how much should you know as a service tech with only 2 years of experience? Not strictly service but mix of maintenance/service calls. I constantly second guess myself depending what the issue is mainly if it's refrigerant related, and I feel slow getting through calls. Maybe that's normal for my experience level?

Thank you for sharing , keep it going , awesome information. 👍

One of the reasons I love watching other heating and air guys on RU-vid is because I might learn something. Sometimes I can even teach someone something too. I like to see how other people solve problems that I run into because everyone has a different approach. RU-vid is really great. If I had this 25 years ago when I started it would have been a huge help.

True, I've been in it twenty years, and now i am the old head.

I'm an electrician but the mindset is similar for troubleshooting electrical. The biggest tip I can give is to learn what correct operation looks like and what causes it to work that way. That puts you on a major leg up on the troubleshooting end. The other aspect is to take the troubleshooting information from someone else with a grain of salt and verify for yourself because they could be lying, have taken an erroneous reading, or ber remembering wrong.

Great advice. Service and troubleshooting can be difficult and hard to teach. This is interesting, keep writing on the white board, the process is worth it, and everyone's is different.

You make em, I'll watch em!!

Yup I'm the same way, never picked up a drill in my life and now I'm not only a hvac owner but working on my vehicles etc. it didnt come easy

Just throwing out an idea. Do you have any tips/cheats on how to verify sufficient/proper airflow through a system?

Great video keep them coming 🫡 keep up the great work

Good stuff man this is all true

50 years in the trade and installs are the worst. Troubleshooting is much easier not matter what type of system.

Can you adjust the speed on an ecm blower motor ?

For a single heat/cool residential system manufactured in the last 15 years its pretty easy, then you get to bigger 2 compressor systems with economizers, or even larger 120volt control AC systems with 4 compressors and huge wiring diagrams. The main problem in the hvac field is lack of good service manuals an install and op manual doesnt go into the service side of things so I would love to see you show us videos of how you find information and manuals if you ever need to look for them, also, things like economizers locking out cooling and how to bypass.

Ill watch. Thank you

Subbed

Have you ever worked for Semper Solaris? You remind me of somebody.

A common Issue is The Unit is low on refrigerant. Numerous companies just come out and recharge systems without ever searching for, isolating and repairing The leak. They would rather change Out the entire system then fix the problem. Need more training for HVAC technicians On how to identify and fix leaks.

Is True men thanks 🙏🏽

you sound earnest, but you are projecting your own frustrations.

Thanku 😊

I call them "phone mechanics" at my job.

In my humble opinion, you cannot aspire to be a good technician without going thru the rigors of installs. If you learn how everything gets put tougher,and why there’s always a difference from one system to another (including,and specially the ducting on central or packaged units). I understand that there are “good technicians” that never had to install at all. How could you tell if the system is installed properly and sized accordingly if you didn’t learn your A,B,C’s?! I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been to “second opinion” visits,and find that they either condemn the system in hopes to “GET PAYED”. Or they over charged with refrigerant due to a dirty filter! And more importantly… don’t get cocky! As we learn,new,more complex system get released on to the field, and as the wilderness creatures they are,we need to learn how to tame them. There’s always one with your name in it,waiting to kick tour ass!

You gotta do research on your own

Stay ontop the videos please man. Could become a 2nd income with minimal effort. If you want editing email in channel