Diagnosing the Failed Evaporator Coil
Liberty Air and Electric got the call when cooling dropped at the property mid-day. Light commercial space, rooftop Lennox package unit, business operating, hot afternoon. The kind of call where every hour the unit's down costs the customer real money.
We climbed up. First check on a leak suspect is always visual. Oil traces showed up at a joint on the line set. Refrigerant carries trace lubricant, and oil residue at a joint usually means refrigerant has been escaping there too. Sniffer (electronic leak detector) confirmed it. Failed evap coil, slow loss over time.
Same diagnostic playbook we use on residential AC repair calls. Visual first, electronic second, refrigerant pressures third. Commercial just adds rooftop access, recovery requirements, and warranty math on top.
Replacing the Coil on the Lennox Package Unit
A Liberty Air and Electric technician recovered the remaining refrigerant safely. Federal regs require recovery on commercial work, not venting, and we run by the book.
Pulled the failed evap coil out of the package unit. Drove to Lennox Stores in Orlando for the replacement. The coil for this specific Lennox model is a specialty part, not something we keep on the truck. Lennox Stores is one of our regular partner distributors in metro Orlando, and they had it in stock. Quick pickup, back on site.
New coil installed. Replaced the filter drier on the refrigerant side, which is standard practice anytime the sealed system gets opened. The drier removes moisture and contaminants from the refrigerant. Once it's been exposed to atmosphere during a coil swap, the existing one is no longer reliable. New drier means a clean restart.
Swapped the air filter while we were at it. The old one had been in long enough. Pressure tested for leaks at the new connections. Recharged to spec. Checked operation before we left.
Repair vs. Replace on a Commercial Package Unit
Three decisions shaped this job.
Repair vs replace. Swapping the coil kept the same package unit in service. The unit was relatively new and showed no other worry signs. Single isolated failure, otherwise running fine. That made the math simple. Pay for the coil, get back to operating. If the unit had been older or showing other failure patterns (multiple recent service calls, weak performance across the board, refrigerant work coming up repeatedly), the conversation would have shifted toward AC replacement. On commercial AC, we count how often that unit has already been down and what a lost day costs the business. The price of one repair doesn't decide it by itself.
Out-of-warranty repair. Commercial warranties are shorter than residential. Usually 1-2 years on labor and 5 years on parts versus the 10 standard on residential. This unit was past its parts coverage window. Total repair landed in the $4,000-$5,000 range. With parts warranty intact, the same repair would have run roughly half that. The difference is essentially what the new coil cost out of pocket. On the commercial side, extended warranties often pencil out faster than they do on residential.
No crane. Rooftop access on this property had a workable path up. We rigged a pulley and hauled the new coil up by hand, brought the old one down the same way. A crane rental for this kind of job runs $1,000-$2,000+ depending on the day, plus the time hold for the operator. We don't book a crane unless the path genuinely requires it. On this one, the customer kept that money.
Same-Day Commercial Cooling Restored
System back to spec. Cooling restored, refrigerant charge correct, no leaks at the new connections. Customer was operating again the same afternoon. No follow-up issues since.
The repair was more expensive than it needed to be, just because the warranty had aged out. But the two pieces that carry the real money on a job like this, the rooftop labor and the refrigerant work, those numbers we kept fair. No crane invoice. No surprise add-ons.
Commercial AC Repair Across Wedgefield and Greater Orlando
A rooftop unit fails on a hot afternoon and the customer wants the air back that day. We buy commercial parts from distributors here in metro Orlando, so on this job the coil came off a shelf across town and the business was cooling again the same afternoon.
We work with Lennox Stores in Orlando plus other regional partner distributors for Carrier, Trane, and other brands. Specialty parts for commercial Lennox, Carrier, and Trane equipment usually means a same-day pickup from one of these locations. That's what kept this job on a same-day timeline.
If you're running a commercial property with rooftop or split-system AC, ask a contractor where he buys parts. A shop that buys locally has your part today. The same playbook runs on the residential side across our Wedgefield service area and the rest of East Orange County.
