My house was built a good five years ago and the builders were careless in placing where the AC vent. I know better now the next time I have a house built! Anywho, I had carpet upstairs and it the vent was on the floor pulling in dirt right through the darn filter! 2-3 months, it would leak from the top down to the bottom floors. O it aggravated me very much! As you can see, I don’t have carpeting anymore. I have hardwood flooring done months ago and to my amazement, now more clogging of the evaporator. Not to mention we don’t use it because it’s the winter time so that could be a factor not put into the equation. Every time it clogs up, I had to remove the metal shroud from the AC unit to clean the evaporator with a brush and a detergent to get it draining correctly!

Not anymore! I’m going to move the AC vent to prevent future clogging of the evaporator and I am also putting a pan underneath the evaporator to save my 1st floor from water damage. I took everything apart to get to the box lying underneath the evaporator:

Here is what I pictured it to be: Moved from the bottom to the top near the ceiling where it can suck in clean air.

I made the aluminum drain pan (19.25×23.75″) so just in case the evaporator decides to be naughty again. I’ve been meaning to do this for quite a while now and I have finally done this because currently, I have a lot of free time. I decided to use aluminum because it’s rust resistant. I did not want to use galvanized steel because it will rust with time and the way the pan sits, you’ll notice it would be a PITA to change out. The pan is at an angle so that way any leaks would follow the direction of gravity. I’ll need to connect this into the drain. I should finish this tomorrow. The pan was the only obstacle holding this project back.

UPDATE 01/27/08

AC leaking | AC evaporator leaking | moving AC vent | moving AC duct