Helpful Gadgets: An Air Flow Meter
RV Lifestyle & Repair EditorsDescription
When something seems wrong with the cooling or heating system of a RV, it is difficult to go to the mechanic and simply say something generic like, “my RV is not cooling like it used to.”
A helpful gadget that every RV owner should keep in their unit is an air flow meter. The best one to keep in a RV is one that shows both the air flow coming out of the air conditioner/furnace and tells the temperature. When the air conditioner feels like it is not cooling right, the air flow meter can check the air flow and temperature to help provide specifics like the air not being cool enough or a decrease in air flow. To test, turn on the unit and hold the meter up to the vent of the air conditioner to check air flow. Then switch to temperature and do the same thing.
If you are starting to see a decrease in air flow, chances are it is the cold air return filter. Low air flow coming out of an air conditioning unit may be a sign it is time to change out or clean the filters. To change the filter on a standard AC unit, unscrew the cover from the ceiling of the inside of the unit. You will see two filters inside the cover. Replace or clean these filters, put the unit back together and retest the air flow. You should notice it goes back to running with normal air flow. For ducted roof air units, the filter is generally located behind the cold air return vent.
If the temperature is not what is used to be, it may be time to take the RV to the dealership and have the air conditioner recharged.
It is a good idea to keep an air flow meter handy so you can test the air flow and temperature of your RV’s air conditioning unit and furnace during normal operation. It will allow you to provide a mechanic with more specifics if something is not working properly.
A cool gadget that I like to take with me when I go Rving, is an airflow meter. This will tell me two things. It'll tell me the air flow coming out of my air conditioner or my furnace. And it'll also tell me the temperature. You know, if I just tell somebody that I don't think my air flow is coming out enough, my air conditioner isn't cool enough. That's a little too general. So, what I want to do is just, periodically test the air flow coming out of it, test the temperature. If I see it start to decrease, then I know I probably am gonna have to change my filter inside my air conditioner, or if I see the temperature going, you know, up and it's not cooling quite as well as it was before, then I'm gonna have to take it in to my dealership and probably have it recharged. So it's really easy to do, you just simply turn this on here. I'm gonna turn the air conditioner here and we've got air flow on the front side here, also on the backside. So I'm just gonna take this, put it up there. So now I'm gonna change my settings. And we're gonna get to temperature. I see I'm running at 67.6. Now, one of the things I did notice with this, is I have a little less airflow than I've had in the past. So that's kind of telling me that my filter up here is probably plugged, very easy to change. Two screws. Take my knobs off the front. And we see we've got some filters that start to look like they need to be changed. Now I can use the same air flow meter on the furnace so I can get air flow out of that and temperature. So it's a good idea to know exactly what temperature, what air flow is coming through it, rather than just have the generality of saying, I don't think my air conditioner's cooling is efficient.
Share tips, start a discussion or ask other students a question. If you have a question for the instructor, please click here.
Already a member? Sign in
No Responses to “Helpful Gadgets: An Air Flow Meter”