Misters for the Cruisair Condensing Unit

[jimshoen]

Does anyone have misters on their Cruisair Condensers and does it work?

I am considering adding high pressure misters to the three condensing units in an attempt to get them to work (and work better) while travelling down the road.

The only other A/C I have is Drivers Air.

I'd like to be able to run the generator while driving down the road in summer and run all three Cruisair units plus the drivers air.

The coach is wired to run the Galley (middle) and Bedroom (rear) Cruisair units through the inverters, and the drivers air (front,engine driven) without the generator running.
I have done this and they will run, but I am not to sure the 270 amp alternator on engine is able to keep up or how long I could really run in this configuration and still have good voltage.

Seems to be a lot of wisdom that recommends just running the generator and getting on down the road.

The condensing units and generator are mounted as follows:
The Salon and Galley condensing units are in the spare tire bay,
the Bedroom condensing unit is in the first bay passenger side (rear inside corner of bay),
the generator (20KW Powertech) is in the first bay drivers side.

One of the troubling factors is that all of the fresh air flow for the three Cruisairs and the generator comes through the front bumper grill.

Maybe this setup does not prvide enough air flow when all four items are running at the same time. Or that in any situation there is never enough air flow for the lonely Cruisair at the ent of the fresh air supply line (Bedroom Unit).

It is hard to believe that Marathon would engineer it that way? But, it is a consideration.

Currently the biggest problem is the Bedroom unit will 'HI PS' in the cooling mode and shut down regularly. The same unit also shuts down in the heating mode, as recently tested on a run from Vegas to Reno when the OAT's were 30 degrees F. This unit also has the longest line set and the least efficient of the three.

The freon charges in all three units have been check twice by Chris at DWC and there are no leaks. At least one unit was found to be overcharged and corrected.

Additionally, the condensing units and the evaporators have been carefully cleaned. All the fans are blowing, but I may need to replace them too.

These particular Cruisairs, according to someone who knows, are the same as the new ones today. No easy upgrades to the equipment as far as I know.

Basically, I need to get these Cruisair units to work and run (to the max)while travelling down the road. Does not seem like it should be this much trouble.

[Joe Cannarozzi]

Hard to disagree with anything you mentioned.

Ray said that one of the buses he saw has a 12 volt cooling fan directed at the condenser. If that works it might be another solution and a little more practical.

I'm sure he will read this and refresh my memory.

[garyde]

Hi Jim. Are you saying you do not have any roof units. I wasn't aware of Marathon only having one A/C system on board.

[truk4u]

Jim,

A couple of comments, since I had a 97 Marathon XL prior to the CC.

My Condensers, all 3, where behind the front bumper and the intake air came from openings underneath each unit and the exhaust came out by directional vents. It did not get it's air through the bumper.

I ran two Cruiseairs plenty of times with no degradation of amperage due to the 270 amp alternator and did not experience the Hi Ps problem in the summer.

The 20 KW generator had it's own intake air and didn't share with A/C's.

My Cruiseairs were also heat pumps, so that may explain why you didn't have heat at 30 degree's, they don't work.

I don't think misters are the answer, it seems like you may have other issues. If you have SMX controls, you can adjust the fan speeds to your liking. If your in such high ambient temps that the dash and 2 Cruiseairs aren't doing the job, why couldn't you just run the gen and fire up all 3.

The Cruiseairs vs Roof airs have been discussed here may times and since I have had both, I better understand the shortcomings of each system. Since you may be in the Southwest, my Cruiseair experiences in 100+ degrees may not be a good comparison. I liked them...

Have you discussed this with Marathon, I don't know who DWC is?

[jimshoen]

No Roof A/C, DWC = Desert West Coach, the other two Cruisair units work OK in the heat mode (heat pump).
I like the idea of the 12volt radiator type electric fans.

[jimshoen]

Tom,
Was your 97 Marathon a straight front axle or IFS.
Mine has IFS (July 1996 Prevost build) and I am wondering if the difference in the Condenser placement is because of that?

[truk4u]

Jim,

You might be on to something there with the axle. Mine was the straight axle, 1996 shell. Maybe that has some bearing on the placement of the 3rd A/C.

Kevin - Did you have 3 A/C's behind the bumper on your 99?

[Ray Davis]

Check with Steve Bennett of California Coach (a POG sponsor). He has a very large fan mounted up front near his condensers, and he's told me that he can keep it cool in any situation.

I've seen the fan, and it's large as I remember (maybe 14+ in diameter), and I'm sure it moves a lot of air across the condensers.

Ray

[gmcbuffalo]

Jim
I have a 92 Beaver conversion and it has two AC's behind the bumper and one enclosed in the middle of the 2nd bay. The generator is also in the second bay drivers side. The intake and output for the Condensor is thru the floor of the bay. The Generator output is thru the floor also. I had PS HI problems with the middle AC and made many visits to the Thermal King people. Once the unit had a faulty fan in the condensor, fixed that and late in NV had PS HI problems again the fan was working OK. I found that the deflector on the generator output air was bent and the AC was sucking up by the hot air. The AC output deflector was also not good and the AC was sucking up it's own hot air discharge. This hot air would cycle around until the AC unit overheated and raising it's freon pressure until it shutdown do to the PS HI. It trys to restart itself three time before a the PS HI shutdown.

So check the direction of your inflow and outflow deflectors and make sure they are pointed in opposite directions.


Also my three AC's controllers (SMX)are not the same, two are Cool/heat models and one is cool only. The model numbers are TXO14 and TXB14. I forget which number is the cool only model.

It should only read PS HI in the cool mode so maybe when you turned it on for heat it was in the cooling mode and if the generator is run you are getting the high temp air recycled.

Does this same AC controller control the heat from your Webasto? If so why wasn't your webasto heating and not relying on the heat pumps? Do all three units have heat pumps? Check the serial numbers of your units to the CrusiAir website to make sure that are all heat pumps and they are all three set up to heat.

GregM

[Kevin Erion]

My 99XL 45 and my 01XLII Marathon has 2 of the cruise airs behind the front bumper and the 3rd located in the 1st bay on the curb side. I found running 2 out of the 3 with the invertors works fine. I think the trick is to try and start the day keeping the bus cool, don't wait until it's hot inside, it won't cool it back down.