Discovery: Front A/C leaking water inside through Return air vents

[MEWright]

We took the coach out last weekend for a quick trip to Round Top TX for a local antique event.

Some background;
We keep the 40G beside the house plugged into a 50a dedicated circuit
typically we run all 3 AC's and set the temps around 85 just to keep it from getting so darn hot since we are in Central Texas and so we can keep the fridge cold and ready to go.

Weather report--Its Texas so its hot as Hades. 100-104 in the shade and a storm on the coast so we were getting intermittent rain pushing the humidity to 90 percent..

So we jumped in, backed it up into the driveway to open it up so we could pack her up and we noticed water dripping from the front #1 unit returns (the vents with filters). It was a lot of water . Got it all dried up and ran to our CG for the weekend. Once set up we started the #1 unit again and within about 20 min the water was dripping from the vents again. Only on the front unit so we shut it off, pulled the vent covers reached in as far as I cold and dried all the water. We left it off all weeekend and its still off. We can stay pretty comfortable with units 2 and 3.

Went on the roof removed the cover and could not find or see a drain hole for the drain pan.

SO; any suggestions here would help;
Where are the drain holes
How do you clean them
How often do you clean them
any other suggestions???

TIA

[Deep Water D]

Feel around underneath where the evaporator is for the hole. It's pretty small and might feel like a grommet. Run a small Allen wrench up there and hope the junk gets flushed out, otherwise it will clog again. The best answer is to pull the cover and clean the debris from the pan, but that's a lot of work. Drail hole is probably on the driver's side of the A/C.

[Jimfh]

You didn't mention the age of your coach. I have a 38 ft 2 dometic air conditioners. front ac begain to drip inside and I thought it needed cleaning. In my case wrong. The problem is the AC roof gasket. The ac drains on the roof and if the gasket is failing water finds it's way back in. I did a little research on the gasket and how to replace it. I suggest you look at that. The gaskets are about 1.5" thick 2" wide single piece square. Youtube it but basically remove your inside bezel and there are long bolts from the underside inside that reach overhead to the ac on the roof that pulls the ac down and compresses the gasket. Once the bolts are removed you can lift the ac easily off the roof unplug electrical and set the ac aside. the gasket is double stick taped to the ac bottom and floats free on the roof. One man job if your handy. I replaced both mine and no more dripping.

[MEWright]

Originally Posted by Jimfh

You didn't mention the age of your coach. I have a 38 ft 2 dometic air conditioners. front ac began to drip inside and I thought it needed cleaning. In my case wrong. The problem is the AC roof gasket. The ac drains on the roof and if the gasket is failing water finds it's way back in. I did a little research on the gasket and how to replace it. I suggest you look at that. The gaskets are about 1.5" thick 2" wide single piece square. Youtube it but basically remove your inside bezel and there are long bolts from the underside inside that reach overhead to the ac on the roof that pulls the ac down and compresses the gasket. Once the bolts are removed you can lift the ac easily off the roof unplug electrical and set the ac aside. the gasket is double stick taped to the ac bottom and floats free on the roof. One man job if your handy. I replaced both mine and no more dripping.

2014 Fleetwood Discovery 40G.. There are not any inside bezels. Complete unit sites on roof with ducts in ceiling. I am sure there is a roof gasket though, I will look into that but it has never leaked in a rain and it has rained allot over the last few weeks.

[Al n Cindy]

Michael--

Deep Water D is probably right. Debris has probably plugged up the too-small drain hole(s). I suggest drilling them out to larger diameter.

The solution that worked for me was to remove the ceiling AC covers inside and tighten the four bolts a bit. This compressed the gasket around the 14" square hole a bit and stopped the drip. It remained sealed for 3+ years.

That is the gasket Jimfh was talking about replacing--you will probably need to do so sometime, but on your '14 it would seem to be too soon to be required--mine lasted till this year when I replaced both units on my '08.

[agpopp]

The actual issue here is most likely cold air is mixing with warm. There should be a baffle under the air plenum that separates the two, most likely it has come unglued or shifted out of place. Get up in there with some foil tape and seal it off. Very unusual the roof condensate would make it inside past the foam gasket.

[KF5UMC]

About every year I need to remove the AC roof covers. Remove the sheet metal shroud, locate the front radiator (evaporater) look under there and find a long white plastic tray with 2 drain holes on each end. Clean the tray out. You can remove this tray by carefully pulling up on the evaporator. Once the tray is out clean it and all around the roof below the tray.

[MEWright]

Drain hole was fully clogged on drivers side and partially on passenger side. Both are clean now. Thank for the help. Once again IRV2 saved a trip to the dealership.