Sharon - NC

:thumbup: Two weeks ago a friend told me her A/C was slowly dying (dieing?) ... whatever ... was cooling less and less each day. Here in southern NC, it's been HOT HOT HOT, so this was pretty bad news. Someone told her to check the battery on her thermostat? HUH? Who knew thermostats had batteries? But she pulled it off the wall, replaced the battery, and it works fine now.

So Tuesday I came home from work and my house was 85 degrees and the A/C wasn't running at ALL. After my moment of panic and dismay thinking about the $ for the service call, I pulled the themostat off the wall and, sure 'nuff, there were two AA batteries in it. I pulled some out of the Swiffer and stuck them in the thermostate and ... voila ... free fix!!

Neither of us had ever heard of this, and when I told my parents, they hadn't either. Maybe this is something the repair guys never tell us ... just come in and change the battery and charge us a small fortune to "fix" the A/C unit??

In any event, I've been passing this tip on to everybody. Sure saved me some bucks, and I hope you can do the same some time.

Sharon

HeatherQuilts

Wow!! I NEVER would have even thought of this!! I'm so glad you told us! That will be the first thing I'll check now! :thumbup:

amma

Great tip! Thank you for sharing this with us :D:D:D

QBeth

Not to sustain the "dumb blonde" jokes out there but... maybe you should point out this only works for central A/C that works off a wall mounted thermostat, not a window A/C.

Unless, of course, this dumb blonde doesn't know about window A/Cs that do have battery operated thermostats! :-)

Jim's Gem

I don't have A/C but this is a good thing to know. Next time my folks talk about their air not working real well I will have to remember what you said.

oatw13

I am going to go and check mine. It just doesn't seem to run at the appropriate times - the colder it gets, the more the A/C runs. Maybe it just needs new batteries. Worth a try! Thanks!

CoyoteQuilts

I guess this post was meant just for me :D . We have a very small house about 900 square feet and our bill has been climbing and climbing since the heat wave hit. We received our bill today at almost 500 bucks YIKES! No, we don't have it set at 40 either. Today the fan wasn't blowing anything, called the landlord and the repair guys called and said that it was probably 'frozen'. So we turned it off the past hour or so and it started blowing a little, then I read this post..... Yep, there are batteries in the silly thermostat! Let's see if that makes a difference and THANK YOU for posting this!

CarrieAnne

WOW, great tip!

lnikkers52

does any one know if a window mounted Ac can be fixed or whatever they do to it. It just wont cool off house and it used to . HELP !!!!

dharen7

we just changed the batteries in ours last week. Thanks to our neighbor who changed his several days prior, we knew what to do as soon as ac quit working