Hi All,

Quick question while waiting for my WF dealer to get to me. I have a 2 year old WF Envision 4ton heating/cooling system, two vertical closed loop wells. No issues since install in new home in late 2009. Last week I mistakenly had my upstairs zone set to COOL and downstairs set to HEAT. This only happened for a few minutes, however the upstairs started blowing hot air so I turned both zones to OFF and then both to COOL. System continued to cool as desired. On Saturday when the zones called for cooling around mid-day, they started to blow warm/hot air as if they were set to HEAT but both were set to COOL. I power cycled the unit but it continued to blow heat so I set both zones to OFF overnight. Tried again Sunday morning and still get heat on the COOL setting.

Is this a quick fix, or did I screw up the computer by having one zone on HEAT and one on COOL?

My fist thoughts are:
is it heating or simply not cooling?
is compressor running?
Is reversing valve energized?
i cant imagine you goofed anything up but aside from first couple questions, you're gonna need a test meter to proceed.
j

Thanks for your quick response. It is definitely heating the air as if it is on the HEAT cycle. On Saturday when it called for cool air and my wife noticed it was pumping warm/hot air, the upstairs was already up to 80 degrees. The compressor is running. I do not know about the reversing valve, not sure what that is or how to check. I really think I just confused it the first time with one zone heat and one zone cool, maybe that valve got stuck or something?

I have a call and several emails back and forth with my dealer trying to get him on a schedule to check it. Just wondering if there was something I could do other then what I've tried.

Need a test meter to ensure 24 v to "O" on the board from the stat- to the geo from the board and to the reversing valve the control board in the heat pump.
Not rocket science, but if it is outside of your comfort zone best to stay away. Among other things, once in the geo cabinet you would be working around live 230v circuits.

If you have the multimeter and are comfortable checking for 24v AC, I'd run through a few scenarios. 1. Both units cool, 2. Both units heat. 3. Stat A heat, B cool, 4. A cool, B heat, 5. A Off, b heat, 6. Off, cool, 7. Heat, off, 8. cool, off...........Document the results in a spreadsheet to share with the WF dealer to expedite a solution and possibly get help in getting the right components out the first time.

Not sure I'd go to the trouble to run through all that.

Either the zone control board is failing to relay the call for cooling or the reversing valve has failed to position for cooling

Explanation of reversing valve for the OP: This component consists of a horizontally arranged cylinder with four refrigerant ports. A 24 Vac solenoid valve uses system refrigerant differential pressures to move a slide valve within the cylinder so that when at one end of the cylinder compressor suction and discharge refrigerant flows are directed to provide heating, and when at the other end compressor suction and discharge flows are directed to provide heating. These sometimes fail, but not generally during the first couple years of a system's life.

You did not break the system by inadvertently having one thermostat in heat and another in cool modes. At worst system would operate inefficiently as the zone board alternately directed the system to heat one zone and then cool the other.

Hope this helps.

Curt is spot on that scenario checks is a bunch of effort. I am only thinking a handful of checks for someone comfortable with a meter might rule out one or the other thermostat as sender of spurious command signal. Depending on mfg and age of stats it is one possibility.

Thanks everyone. I do have a multimeter and I could do the checks however the dealer is scheduled to visit this morning and I am already at work. Hopefully he gets it figured out in one shot. The thermostats and entire system were installed new in a new construction late in 2009. I will update the thread once I hear from them.

jmb,

We are sorry to hear that you are experiencing a problem with your WaterFurnace equipment. If your contractor is unable to provide a resolution, please have them contact our technical support staff for further assistance.

WaterFurnace International, Inc.

Thanks WF. I am sure they can figure it out, they are a competent WF outfit. They weren't there long, only about 1.5hrs so I don't think it was a major issue. I am waiting to hear from them and/or my Father (he was there to let them in).

Tech told my Dad it was a failed circuit board. He replaced and tested ok. I am waiting for official word from dealer as to what exactly failed. Wonder why it didn't show any error lights?