Site: Large apartment building in Florida, USA.
Solution: Predictive Maintenance Suite
HVAC System: Daikin VRV
Cross-Communication Wiring Repair
Daikin Heat Recovery VRV HVAC
The Customer
The Challenge
A Daikin VRV 3-pipe heat-recovery system with a multi-branch selector box for each apartment was installed and commissioned two years ago. A tenant opened an urgent service ticket advising that the living room and bedroom HVAC units were not heating properly. He also indicated that it sometimes felt like the units were cooling when they were supposed to be heating.
Traditional Course of Action
1
Schedule a site visit
2
Travel to site
3
Connect a service tool and collect current, limited, operational data
4
Analyze the collected data
5
Find the fault and fix it
6
Collect new data and verify the fix
The CoolAutomation Way
As the site was connected to CoolAutomation’s Predictive Maintenance Suite, an HVAC engineer was able to initiate a remote anomaly test. Results indicated cross-communication wiring between different ports on the branch selector box. Due to this issue, when the living room indoor unit was switched on, the refrigerant was flowing to another indoor unit.
As a temporary solution, the HVAC service provider suggested that the two crossed units should be operated simultaneously until his arrival on-site, ensuring the tenant would not be left without climate control.
The following day, an engineer traveled to the site and corrected the fault.
Engineer time on site for fault correction: 45 minutes.
Result
1
Remote Diagnostics
Access the system remotely from the comfort of the office to detect and diagnose the issue
2
Less Than 1 Hour of On-Site Junior VRF Engineer Time
Send a junior VRF engineer on-site for 1 hour to perform the fix
3
Remote Fix Verification
Verify the fix remotely
Traditional Vs Remote HVAC Service
| Traditional HVAC Service | Remote HVAC Service |
|---|---|
Extended on-site data recording until the error reoccurs (which will not not happen unless both internal units are operating) | Offsite remote system test and fault identification |
Multiple trips to the site are expected |
Less than 1 hour of on-site time by a junior VRF engineer |
Analysis of raw data with minimal assistance from tools involving a senior VRF expert on-site for a considerable amount of time | Remote fix verification |
On-site fix | |
On-site verification test |
Benefits
Minimal customer disturbance
One on-site visit versus multiple visits
Simplified data analysis