I am not aware of known issues or class action lawsuits with that system. I do know that it is crucial that they be installed correctly by a TALENTED contractor. If they are installed wrong you will end up with a poorly performing, unreliable mess. That actually goes for any HVAC system, but due to their complexity these things are particularly sensitive to their installation conditions. At this point, I would get out another contractor to take a look. They need not be a Maytag dealer, but they should be IQ Certified on one of the brands.

Thanks for your response. Actually the company that handles the warranty work for these systems has gone bankrupt, which may be an indication that there are problems with the system. It also seems the equipment is not up to handling the Florida weather conditions.

I believe you're talking about Equigard? Their bankruptcy filing has absolutely nothing to do with this system. First of all, they have nothing to do with honoring the standard parts warranty, that is the responsibility of the manufacturer, Nordyne. 3rd party warranty companies only come into play if you buy an extended labor warranty. Also, Equigard handled warranties for tons of manufacturers and products, IQ Drives were a tiny percentage of the products they handled extended warranties for.

An HVAC system is not like a refrigerator or a car. Those things are completely assembled in factories. The assembly of an HVAC system is only started in a factory. A significant portion of it is done inside your home by a local contractor. There are many possible mistakes that can be made during this installation that would lead to the system performing poorly or being unreliable. The IQ Drive system is a very complex system, that there are a lot of steps that need to be taken in its installation that aren't required on other systems. Unfortunately, many contractors just have the mentality of slapping systems in without bothering to pursue training or read the manual. If a traditional system is installed like this, it may work OK, but an IQ Drive needs to be installed by someone trained and experienced. Mistakes made in the installation will lead to a poor experience with the system.

Sometimes systems leave the factory with a manufacturing defect that leads to an issue. However, chronic, repeated, trouble with a system, especially after replacement of multiple of the same part and the condenser, suggests one or more installation problems.

Who has been coming out and looking at/fixing your system? Just the installing contractor? Have you gotten a second opinion from a different contractor, or had a manufacturers rep out?

@hvtech42: "The IQ Drive system is a very complex system, that there are a lot of steps that need to be taken in its installation that aren't required on other systems."

Maybe it's too complex - not really worth the complexity. If it's so complex why would Nordyne allow anyone other than a person who is thoroughly versed to sell / install / warranty this system.

I'm an engineer - not a HVAC engineer - but when I keep hearing how 'complex' something is... I wonder why you would 'put it out there' unless there is some significant benefits.

If you google Nordyne or IQ drive - you get a lot of sad stories.

When installed properly, there are significant comfort benefits. I live in a cold climate, where a fancy A/C is not worth it, and heat pumps are not common. Therefore I have never worked with the IQ Drive. That said, I do know a couple contractors in hotter areas whose opinions I trust, and they have said great things about the system.

If you google any HVAC brand, you get a lot of sad stories. From the most simple equipment, all the way up to the highest end stuff. Most of those cases were caused by incompetent contractors.

There's only so much a manufacturer can do to make sure good contractors put in their equipment. Nordyne does require that a company send some people to a training class before selling the system, but that does nothing to ensure they do a good job putting in the system. What if they didn't pay attention? What if they cut corners anyway to get the job done fast and maximize profits? This stuff happens all the time with all brands and all systems.

Well we are general contractors (in fact I do manual j calcs), and had a highly competent, factory trained team of people install this system in our house. From all we have seen and heard, these should not be installed in Florida. They were not tested in Florida, and really are not up to the job here. Perhaps the system has been changed from the early days, as we have one of the early units.
And yes, it is a complex set of machinery, maybe too complex for the real world.

You can believe all the hearsay you want, but that does not change that:

-There are no recalls or known issues on this system that fixes have not already been issued for

-There are no class action lawsuits relating to this system

-There are many happy customers with this system

Not what you wanted to hear. Sorry.

Maybe you got a lemon unit. Maybe you got a lemon install. Hard to say over the internet. I asked earlier, and I'll ask again:

Have you had a 3rd party (manufacturer's rep) out?

No contractor worth their salt would keep blindly changing parts without bothering, even after 7 years of the same, to do a deeper investigation into the repeated failures and/or help you, the customer, escalate matters with the manufacturer.

This post was edited by hvtech42 on Thu, Nov 6, 14 at 21:51

You don't seem to understand that these systems have a lot of problems around here. Because there is a 12 year Maytag warranty, which covers parts, and this contractor has been covering much of the labor there has been no cause to "escalate matters" to the manufacturer. But that is exactly what I was inquiring about in my original post. Has any one "escalated matters"?
Because of the 12 years of parts replacement I would imagine many people haven't been complaining.

I don't care what anyone says, the problems you are having with this system are not normal. There are other installations, in Florida and elsewhere, that are not having these problems. As I said before, isolated problems may be due to manufacturing defects, but repeated problems with the same parts are usually due to installation errors. Doesn't matter that it's in warranty and you haven't had to pay for the repairs, there is 100% cause to escalate this to the manufacturer. You need a second pair of eyes (manufacturer's rep) who knows the IQ Drive system inside and out and can figure out what the ROOT cause(s) of your issues are. I would think by now the contractor is getting sick of running warranty calls on his own dime, and I don't understand why he hasn't already gotten a rep out.

The advice I'm giving is just standard advice for getting ANY repeated HVAC issues resolved. As I said earlier, I am not a Nordyne dealer myself, so I don't know the specifics of the potential failures and how often they occur. I will refer you to hvac-talk.com and recommend that you ask the same questions there, as there are professionals there who are IQ Cerified and experienced with this system. But I stand by my advice to get a rep out, and I suspect they will tell you the same. Good luck getting this resolved.

Here is a link that might be useful: hvac-talk.com

@hvtech42: "I don't care what anyone says"

Yeah, that's the problem. From your comments, it seems that you are deeply vested in the IQ Drive System.

The problem is you. You don't listen. Even when you do listen you deny the peoples reality and real world experience by continually discounting them and the installers (which you do not know).

I am not vested in the IQ Drive system at all. I do not sell them, and have never installed or worked on one. The only connection I have with it is taking a training class. I have heard positive things about it from friends in the industry (unaffiliated with the manufacturer), whose opinions I value much more than random people on the internet. If you don't believe me, you can look through my past posts on this forum, I've haven't recommended an IQ Drive system and I'm pretty sure I've never even mentioned it outside of this thread.

I AM deeply vested in eradicating poor experiences with HVAC equipment due to poor installation and service procedures. Trane was the first manufacturer to come out with variable speed air conditioners and heat pumps, back in the late 80s. They were way ahead of their time, and were quality products that worked well. In fact there are still many running out in the field. However, Trane discontinued them after a few years because many of them weren't being installed properly, which led to problems. The fact that most people did not know how to work on them made matters worse. It was almost 20 years before Trane brought back variable speed technology.

BTW, IQ Drive is not even my favorite variable speed system. I prefer Trane's due to their better build quality, thermostat/zone controls, refrigerant cooled variable speed drive, and past experience making them. But I know for a fact that it is not normal for the IQ Drive system to behave as the OP suggests, and I hate the advancement of technology in this industry to be withheld by people blaming avoidable problems on "all this new-fangled computery stuff". IQ Drive has been out for 8 years now, if all of the systems they sold were as unreliable as mucky's, they would have either discontinued it or resolved them by now.

If mucky decides to try and get a class action lawsuit together against Nordyne, it's no skin off my back. But, class action lawsuits usually benefit the lawyer more than they do the consumer. I think it would help him more to take my advice before going the legal route:

-Get a manufacturer's rep to take a look at the system

-Post on hvac-talk.com where there are contractors who are much more experienced with this system than I

I know it sucks to have a lemon of the system, whatever the cause, and as I said before, I wish you luck in getting it working.

This post was edited by hvtech42 on Wed, Nov 12, 14 at 13:33

I'm having the same issues with my IQ Drive I installed in July of 2007

These posts to old threads accomplish little to nothing.

IMO

Thanks tigerdunes.

Start your own thread rather than piggybacking onto old thread that is dead...

Thanks tigerdunes.