I’ve had a leak in my ceiling for a a while now, and I’m finally bringing in a handyman to repair the damage.
I know it’s not the roof, because the leak gets worse when it’s clear and high humidity. (One of the worst times was when we had a record breaking dew point, and no rainfor at least two weeks)
I think that possibly the squirrels chewed on some insulation.
My handyman was here today to look at what it would take to fix it. He agreed that we need to fix what is causing the leak,and thought it might be the lines that run between the indoor and outdoor units. The leaks are between the two units. He pulled enough insulation out to look at what was up in the attic, and there was a copper pipe visible in the attic.
Looking at info onthe internet, there should be two pipes, and one should be the cold air return and should be insulated.
So. Can someone give me the correct terminology, and what we should be seeing up in the attic?
Based on your remark about the humidity, it is quite likely to be the condensate drain. The condensate is simply water that condenses out of the (humid) air and onto the cooling coil, which then drips down into a drip pan. This is normal and how the AC dehumidifies the air. The pan itself is connected to drain pipe (or a condensate pump) which takes the condensate to the outside of the house or to a drain.
The problem is that this drain pipe is leaking somewhere, or more likely is clogged (algae can grow in the condensate drain pipe). The good news is that it is relatively simple to fix.
This site has some good information about condensate lines.
So, there is a pipe that comes out of the inside unit and drains into a pipe. And I have had problems in the past when that gets clogged somehow. But that is in the AC closet.
I missed describing this part. The outdoor unit is on te east side of the house. There is a bedroom and a bathroom between the east side of the house and the AC closet. The leak is about halfway between, in the hallway outside the bedroom and bathroom
Yes there should be two pipes. One hot one cold. The cold one should have a good foam insulation round it for the full length. Maybe the hot one too, but not as critical unless the unit is run as a heating and cooling system. The cold one will condense water on the pipe in high humidity situations if there is not insulation on it.
They are not hot and cold air pipes. They are refrigerant tubing. Compressed liquid flowing through them. Unless I have your system wrong.
My HVAC guy says this is the thing they get the most calls about. It should be the only source of water in the system. Should be white pvc pipe somewhere from the System outside or something. It does get clogged sometimes.
If your AC is low on refrigerant, the pipes that pump the refrigerant between the outside unit and the inside can get very cold (ironically).
This could lead to them condensing a lot of water (and frost) on them, with nowhere to go but your ceiling.
The OP has stated that the air handler is not in the attic but is in a closet presumably on the same floor as the living area but in any case below the level of the leak.
(1) Does the condensate from the air handler (inside part of the AC system) drain directly outside via gravity or is there a condensate pump (a smallish box that would have the condensate pipe from the air handler feeding into it and usually a clear flexible tube leading somewhere outside. If there is a condensate pump can you see where the outlet tubing leads? It’s possible it is run across the attic along with the coolant lines and has developed a leak.
(2) It’s possible that the insulation on the cold coolant line is damaged, leaving an exposed section of copper that will allow condensation.
(3) I had a system where the condensate drain on the air handler clogged, causing the cooling coils in the air handler to ice up. This caused the cold coolant lines to develop frost and condensation on the outside of the insulation. You would have noticed that the system would be cooling very poorly if that happened.