How To Reset The Breaker

If your air conditioner is not coming on at all, you may be able to get it running again by resetting a tripped breaker. However, you first need to be able to recognize a tripped breaker and some reasons as to why your air conditioner may have tripped the breaker.

At your breaker panel, you should see all the switches are turned in the same direction. They are all very uniformly in line with each other so it is very easy to tell when one is not pointed in the same direction.  If you see a switch that is not going in the same direction or somehow looks different than the rest, it has tripped or turned off.  Sometimes a tripped breaker will have a loose feeling.

To reset the breaker that has tripped you’re going to turn it to the off position then you’ll feel it kind of click.  Then you reset it by turning it back on.

Why Your Breaker May Have Tripped

Your breaker is a safety device so it usually does not trip for no reason.  There is a couple of reasons why your breaker may have tripped where it would be fine to reset it yourself.  For example, you might have had a power outage where your lights flicker off and come right back on while your air conditioner was running.  That could cause a breaker to trip.  Also, your air conditioner could have short cycled due to someone turning down the thermostat at the same time that the air conditioner was coming on.  In strange cases such as the ones described above, it will help you to know how to reset your own tripped breaker to get your air conditioner working again.

How Many Times Should You Reset The Breaker?

You should never tolerate a breaker tripping repeatedly.  If your breaker trips more than once we recommend not continuing to reset it.  The breaker is a safety device so we recommend having a professional come to investigate what could be causing the breaker to trip and how to fix any problem with your heating and air conditioning system.