http://www.rheem.com/product/air-conditioners-classic-plus-series-two-stage-ra17

Anyone?

For your house?

You have zero idea what tonnage your house needs. The last AC could have easily been wrong or your requirement might have changed.

So you should have first gotten

a manual J

Then a manual M

Then you gotta make sure your Flex is in  good shape. around 50% of installers would rather never bother because it's hard long work with essentially zero profit. Make sure the flex is correct.


Afrer all that I think that is a good brand. I would personally get the highest seer possible. Those 2 speeds are great as well. They are gonna be good for energy as well as humidity.

Great advice.

I don't know what these manuals are or flex is?  I'd be replacing a 16 year old Lennox single stage.  My furnace is a two stage Rheem.  My house is a 2500 Sqft two story.

I have a 23 seer 5 ton Nordyne..with IQ drives..it is extremely quiet as it is placed outside out master bathroom so it is close to our bedroom.  It keeps my house at a steady 70 degrees when it is 95 out with 90 % humidity. .typically S Fla weather.  I upgraded it with dual UV lights in the air handler along with an Ozone Generator. ....so it smells like it does outside after a rain storm and a HEPA..filtration system. Then got the green safety duct system that is near bullet proof. Fuk you racoons..

Air conditioning in your house is 50% correct airflow.


The manual J is an engineer or someone who knows the program telling you what tonnage your house requires based on different variables. The Amount of people(~500btu of heat per hour per person), type and amount of insulation, trees covering your roof, cubic feet, window type, window size, which way the sun hits your house, etc.

The manual M kinda finds out what the flex in your house is worth. Like total volume and length and stuff. Flex is the silver tubes in your attic/walls.

Finding out if your flex is too thin or full of wholes or undersized for your correct tonnage is just as important towards the performance of your AC as is the amount of zeroes you pay for the unit. It is just filthy, hot, miserable work. If it is undersized in return or supply it hurts your unit and your electric bill the entire time you have it.

lots of good advice in the thread.  
I will add.  I have a similar Rheem Ac unit along with a 95% Rheem furnace.  Trouble free for several years

Great suggestions so far. I had my whole system replaced including ductwork about two years ago. The guy who I chose wanted to guess what size the house needed. I insisted that he do the calculations. Came out pretty close to what he wanted to put in to begin with.

I have a 16 seer two speed Traine. Costs me about an add'l $80 a month to keep my 2000 sq foot house at 72.

Cost me $300 with the old system (30 years old)

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Getting those workups done in great but they are a lot of work and time and that is added into the cost of the unit if your AC company does them.  When I was looking around the places that would do those were up to double what a regular installer that would just match the size of the unit would charge for identical equipment.

Lets say the inefficiencies add 25 bucks a month to your electric bill averaged over the year (my bill is about $175 a month average including water/sewer). That means looking at some of the prices I was quoted it would take over 10 years to make up the difference even if additional work was not needed to correct any deficiencies. By that time I might need to be replacing it again. I figured doing them would be a break even proposition at best.

Just something to think about, perfect vs good enough.

That's a nice condensing unit. Two stage Copland scroll compressor is very nice. Rheem builds quality stuff.

My original was builder grade 2.5 ton with the air handler in the closet, also a heat pump.  Lasted 13 years but was a POS.



New one after all the manual calcs came in at 4 ton and I added a NG furnace this go round with a humidifier.



All new flex since the original airflow design was a hack job and also all new registers with two additional air returns in the cieling insted of a central one through a vented door in the closet..



Cost a shitload since it was all Carrier and all the highest SEER and furnace efficiency available as of last year.  Dropped my electrical costs by over $100 per month.



I would say the install was about 75% of the actual home comfort improvement.

REAM units are junk.

 

In the circles I travel in 16 seer is general considered the breaking point on cost vs return