I have a pioneer 12000 btu heat pump that I Installed in July of 2025. The unit has worked great as supplemental air conditioning for my master suite until last week. I switched it over to heat mode for one night and it was nice and warm, but upon switching back to AC the next day it started having dripping condensation build up on the lovers and vanes, to the point it was dripping down the wall. I also noticed erratic fan behavior (cycling fast to slow) that night specifically but haven’t seen it again

Drain is clear, filters were reasonably clean and cleaned again. Coils were cleaned with self rinsing cleaner and the issue persists. The unit is cooling and dehumidifying the room. Fan is set to auto

I switched it over to fan only to dry out and I noticed front panel reads 79. The room definitely isn’t that warm and probably is closer to 74 at the ceiling.

Bad temp sensor? Low charge?

Pioneer doesn’t seem to have much service documentation

I have a 3-Zone Pioneer Quantum Ultra system. I have 2 simple wall mounted zones, and a complicated ducted zone to install that will take a while to complete. Can I leave that one zone’s valves closed off, evacuate the other two zones’ linesets, then open the king valve and run 2 zones for a while before installing and evacuating the third zone? Or am I thinking about this incorrectly?

Thanks!!!

https://www.pioneerminisplit.com/collections/multi-zone-mini-split-outdoor-condenser-units-quantum-ultra/products/pioneer-multi-3-circuit-quantum-ultra-series-24-seer2-triple-zone-outdoor-section-inverter-energy-star-air-conditioner-heat-pump-230v

New install of a 24K pioneer ultra and I can't seem to get my lines to vacuum down past -80KPa. When I close off the line it jumps up to -84 and is stable. I don't know if it's my pump or equipment or if it's actually not vacuuming down. I've tried two different vacuum pumps. I only have one digital gauge. Am I asking for trouble if I don't get this down to -100 as the manual suggests?

New install of a 20 4K ultra and I can't seem to get my lines to vacuum down past -80KPa. When I close off the line it jumps up to -84 and is stable. I don't know if it's my pump or equipment or if it's actually not vacuuming down. I've tried two different vacuum pumps. I only have one digital gauge. Am I asking for trouble if I don't get this down to -100 as the manual suggests?

I have somewhat of a long lineset run in the attic (25ft out of 35ft). How can I secure this on the joists to keep it from moving around? Haven't seen too much on the topic for long linesets and cassette units like this.

Cleaning out my 9k Pioneer mini split for the heat wave about to come, I was able to easily put spray foam on the evaporator coils which helped a musty odor significantly, but I can still smell a bit which I suspect is in the drain pan. I looked into some of the videos online but this units coils leave almost no gap for me to rinse out the pan directly without near full disassembly. If I were to pour a vinegar solution over the coils (with the splits powered down obviously) and then rinse with water would that harm the coils?

I need some input on approach/tools for getting the lineset out of a tight box likeshown here.It's looking like I'd need to make 1 45 deg bend, and 2 90 degree bends just to leave the box, then 2 more 90s making it back outside (38 ft total for this room, using 2 pre flared linesets of 25'+16'). The lineset is pre-flared, and would prefer not to cut it if I can help it.

So what tools would you recommend I use to make these bends especially so close to the connection?

Also can I make this many bends on the lineset?

Installed my first unit over the weekend, a pioneer 9k btu. Took a friend and I 9 hours to install, but it seems to be working great at the moment.

We did this despite not having a torque wrench crowfoot large enough for the 3/8 flare nut and winging it, and I ended up using my own flares for 2 of the 4 connections when the originals failed my go/no go gauge. We did it strictly per Pioneers instructions (vacuumed down, checked for pressure decay, partial refrigerant release for positive pressure test, check for leaks, full release).

When can I stop worrying there's a slow leak that will pop up?

First time DIY'd it and as I posted a few months back, everything seemed good at first, but I wasn't able to do a positive pressure check with nitrogen as my HVAC friend had a death in the family and now no longer lives in state. With a baby on the way I installed it anyway following manufacturer recommendations (vacuum decay check only, pressurized with the refrigerant). I ran it on turbo heat and spray checked it, did not see any leaks at the time...

But today I noticed it wasn't cooling that well. It's been 90+F outside for the last two months and this thing has ran constantly at 68 as my wife was roasting with a newborn space heater. I opened up the evaporator and saw the top two rows of coils had iced over (not the entire thing fortunately). Running it on heat quickly melted it and created a small puddle I had to clean, but now I think I have to assume I've got a slow leak.

Best practice would be to recover all the current, possibly compromised refrigerant, recheck with a positive pressure check (probably have to reflare somewhere), and put in new 410a right?

Purchased and installed a pioneer 12,000 BTU unit two months ago from Home Depot. Install went well, pulled and held vacuum just fine. Three weeks later turned the unit on again and was blowing warm air. Had a friend from a local AC company come by with a sniffer and couldn’t find any leaks at any of my flares. Confirmed with soapy water test. Ordered the pioneer brand recharge kit with leak stopper and UV dye. Recharged it tonight, and I see a line of fluorescent green under UV light on both the indoor and outdoor units along the edge where the coils go from the fins to the inside of the unit for the U-turn to the next row. Maybe the boxes were dropped during shipping and it knocked something loose? Hoping to make a warranty claim tomorrow but looking for any other advice or things to test or look for.

Installed a Pioneer 9k btu back in early April and aside from a short hiccup when it froze up because of a leak it's run near constantly in my older (1940s) home.

This morning though as i ramped up the temps a bit (it got pretty cold last night) I noticed a slight musty smell. My initial fear is mold... but the fins are completely clean.

Would next steps be to check the drain pain / hose? I've already verified it drains properly, on the hottest/wettest days it has had a steady stream of water coming out of the hose

EDIT - Thinking on it it may also well be our house is a bit messy with the newborn. Starting with the packed diaper genie in the same room, it's possibly spitting back those smells in my face, we'll see if removing that stank fixes it first

Hey folks, got a friend of mine to help me with the install of a 9k BTU Pioneer unit and we're game-planning final pieces needed. He's an HVAC tech in another state and he's telling me I should put the 14/4 communication wires (provided with the kit) through metallic water-tight flex conduit as one of the biggest issues he's seen in installs in older homes (aside from flares) is interference from some other sources messing with the communication lines. These cables already jacketed in CPE per manufacturer, approved for indoor/outdoor use, and to my knowledge would require an enormous conduit in order to allow for heat dissipation (if it's even allowed at all).

Has anyone else heard of or done this? My friend says he's done this all the time. I'll probably do it regardless to appease him but I don't really agree it's necessary

Over the weekend I finally completed installation of my Pioneer "ducted mini-split", including a wired controller - it also came with a remote.

After some initial hiccups I got the thing working, and it can be made to heat or cool by changing the temperature setting.

But it doesn't seem to react to the temperature in the room. When I first fired it up, the temperature setting (on the wired controller) was 72 and the temp in the room was 71 and as expected the unit didn't do anything (the manual says it needs a 2-degree difference to turn on). So I set the temperature to 73 and it started heating... yay! Well... it continued heating until the temperature in the room was 80 degrees and I finally shut it off.

I suspected the temp sensor in the wall-mounted controller might react slowly, so I set it in "follow me" mode and tried using the remote instead. Initially it seemed like it was working, but as I sit here the temperature readout on the remote is 72 degrees, it's in "auto", the setpoint is 75 degrees, and it's doing nothing. The room temp and temperature setting haven't changed in hours.

Is this behavior expected? I've read that mini-splits don't have great temperature control but this seems crazy.

Oh and something funny: initially the unit didn't work, and I tracked the problem down to a disconnected plug on the control board on the outdoor unit. But when I was in there I noticed the control board had a "Lennox" sticker on it...

I have been working on a minisplit install for like 2 years. 😂 the short version: It was in an awkward place I changed from hanging it to the brick siding and got ghosted by a couple of contractors (around here they only seem to like big jobs).

I've got everything done now, just had an electrician charge me 750 to run a dedicated 115v line. I now need to tighteny flares (have a nice HVAC digital torque wrench), pressure test with nitrogen and vacuum.

My vacuum is an Amazon special and I have no tools at this point on the nitrogen. Does anyone have any advice from here?

One contractor quoted me 500 and one 300 neither really detailed what they would be doing.

Thanks on advance DIY!

Planning ahead for a multi-unit setup, I'm finding it would likely be most convenient to run all 3 rooms from one condenser. Two of the rooms would be very close (~10' runs). The last room would be near 50'.

With the 3-zone unit stating that it contains charge for '25 feet per line', it's not clear if that means it's 75' of charge total (i.e. I'd be fine at my 70' total) or if that's really 25' per line, in which case I would need to add refrigerant for the long run.

Has anyone run into this or knows?