Thermo Shorts when A/C turned on, NEED HELP!

[omrhythm]

Hi,

Just moved from Florida to NC mountains where its cold. Have a great Rheem heat pump with Honeywell. The heat worked fine all winter, but when the temps started to rise this summer and I turned on the cool, the thermostat keeps shorting out on me. I am under the impression that the previous owner did not change any wiring to get the cooling to work, so I think that it MAY be the thermostat. I am a novice with heat pumps and have very little knowledge. can anyone give me a clue or direction to go? I hooked up the Orange wires, which appear to be necessary for cooling, but they looked like they were never hooked up before, and I know the previous owner used the cooling system. Plus, it didnt stop the short. The Thermo will short, I can return it to the off position and it will come back on anywhere from 2 days to 3 weeks later. Any help or advice you can offer is greatly appreciative. Its HOT out!

[mattison]

What do you meen by it shorts?? What exactly does it do when you set it to cooling??

[omrhythm]

The digital thermostat loses power and goes blank, but the circuit breaker does not blow. There is still power to the device. This is AFTER the cooling works properly for anywhere from 5-15 minutes.

The thermostat will stay off (without power to the digital box) for weeks, sometimes come back on, most of the time not. This never happened when we used the heat in the winter.

Thanks for any help...

[Ed Imeduc]

Does the tstat have batt.in it they ok Also on the tstat you cant have the O and the B both on just one is all on a heatpump. Thats for the 4 way valve in the unit

ED ;)

[omrhythm]

Thanks.

tstat had NO batteries. Didn't need them in winter for heat(?)...as it still worked. Just put in batteries and tstat has power, but now the unit will not turn on at all! There is toggle for O and B, and I switched it back and forth. Nothing turns the unit on, neither heat or cold. Now what?? Getting close, I hope!!

[omrhythm]

One more thing. Batteries give power to tstat, but usually tstat has a light on it that illuminates, obviously powered by house electric. It shows temps now, but has no light, so its still not getting power to the tstat from the house elec. Somehow the cool is removing house power from the tstat, and somehow strangely coming back on after maybe 2-3 weeks of being off. Is this a short? Doesnt make sense...

[mattison]

Take the stat off the base and list what wire connections are available and what is hooked up w/colors of the wires. Also pay close attention and look to see if it has "R" or "RH" and "RC" do they both have a wire or a jumper??

[omrhythm]

My wiring is as follows:

On the tstat:
connected wires are: C, W2, E (small red wire patch (jump?) to W2), Y, B, G, and R. There are no other R's, just plain R.

Wires that are NOT connected are a Gray wire (connected downstairs as STAT), a Black wire, a Pink wire (OD), and Orange.

At the unit downstairs, the panel has connected wires as follows:
for "Tstat": connected are Y, W, G, C, and R.

At "Furnace", connected wires are R, W, G, C, and Y

and at "Outdoor Unit" connected wires are OD (colored pink), STAT (the gray wire), Y, W, R, and C .

Thanks

[mattison]

"R" should be powering the stat and with "C" also you should have power to this thing all the time. It sounds like you have wires all over not hooked up and possibly need to be. You could try a new stat and if that don't help call a tech to look at it hands on.