I'm hoping someone here has someone they can recommend, or works in this field themselves and has any ideas.
This afternoon we noticed that our house wasn't cooling, and the thermostat showed that it was 83 in the house while it was set on 74. That number continue to climb slowly. Air was blowing out of the vents, but was just barely cool if at all. I checked the attic and the unit up there was running without any issue. I then went outside and noticed that the blades on my outside unit were not running. That's pretty clearly the problem, but I'm at a loss as to what is going on. I saw some troubeshooting videos on youtube, and one suggested trying to manually move the blades if you can hear the compressor running. I did that, and while the first few times it didn't work, on one attempt it did start the unit up and it ran for about 10 minutes before dying again. When the blades are stopped like this, at times you'll hear a buzzing sound coming from the unit, like it's trying to run but can't. Other times it is silent.
The other kicker to consider here is that today we had a swimming pool guy out to install a new pump. He mentioned that the wiring for our heater was all screwed up, and that he went ahead and fixed it for us. The pool heater is on the side of the house, just like the a/c unit in question. I don't know if the two are related, but it seems like quite a coincidence if not.
So any ideas on things to try? People to call (I'm in the Clear Lake area) ? Does this likely sound like an electrical problem caused by the pool guy screwing around, or something else just happening to fail at around the same time?
Thanks for any input. I'm not handy at all and welcome any input or assistance. We have a 3 year old and it's hot enough that we're going to go stay at my mom's place tonight. No A/C in Houston summer. Just when you think it can't get any worse, the ultimate kick in the nuts lands solidly.
Thanks!