Everyone, thanks for all your great help. I want for you to know it is super, super appreciated. I managed to get the outdoor unit running! I put in a new contactor and a new capacitor about three hours ago and have been diagramming from my notes in the time since to post in this thread.
@ cowboybob - I decided to go out and buy a one plus pole contactor after all with the metal shunt, so it is an exact part match without having to do the jumper wire. I have the two pole contactor also bought and will keep it and your wiring diagram with the #12 AWG notes printed out and handy in case I ever need to use it. Thanks again for your help and great diagram.
@ jpanhalt - If I ever see those blue and white food barrels when out and about, I will think of you!
@ KISS - There is an outside disconnect already installed, but it doesn't have those cool 120V convenience outlets. The resistor formula makes me wax nostalgic to my math school days (not!
). I don't have a large size resistor handy, but I was watching a troubleshooting video where the tech said there is one in the multimeter itself that should discharge things. Anyway, the long and short of it is that I lived.
@ GromTag - Thanks for all your excellent help. Your technical explanations are super appreciated, even if I don't understand all the mechanical specs about how heat pumps and the internals work. It may take me a few
years to fully understand this stuff, seeing as how I am not at all experienced with HVAC and electrical engineering. Basically, I just know that this color wire should go here, that color wire should go there kind of stuff. But this is great education and I've probably read over your posts 50 times by now.
Here are answers to your questions:
1. Is it only operational in cooling mode?
No, it is both for cooling and for heating.
2. would the thermostat happen to be an older 2 wire only model?
It is a newer Honeywell programmable thermostat with a green LCD display and several colored wires when you pull it off the wall.
I found the wiring diagram for the outdoor unit on the inside of the panel cover (doh! can’t believe I missed it before). I scanned it and attached it here. Even though the job is completed (for now…), hopefully, the documentation and diagrams will be useful for others looking this up for some DIY help and advice. Goodman's factory wiring diagram from the inside of the service panel is below:
I finished late at night (it's now past midnight here), so I posted a 3 image composite of the capacitor, the contactor, and defrost board. (I know, I could've waited until morning to take a full scale shot, but didn't want to keep you waiting.) Note where I've circled in green "lower right box" and "circle hole" for the next diagram. Here is the composite image:
I also saw a YouTube video for the defrost board which also helped, located here:
It’s my understanding that all the terminals going horizontally across the defrost board (C, Y, O, O, W2, R, R, and DFT) are 24V low voltage, except for the two Potter and Brumfield's (black box relay’s) two terminals (DF1 and DF2), which both take 120V black wires.
I took a look at all the wires and where they go, and diagrammed them. I think the two questionable wires you pointed out are actually wired fine after all, but please correct me if I'm wrong. To check the wiring, I removed only the service panel, and didn't disassemble the whole outdoor unit further, so I will refer to two places on the diagram again as the "circle hole," which is the bundle of cords on the bottom left, and the "lower right box," which is the portion on the lower right that has a bunch of wires spliced together with wire nuts. DF1 goes to T2 on the contactor (120V). The second O wire goes to the "circle hole" in the bottom left.
Here is my drawing of the wire diagram as it is currently wired, with notes on the two wires you pointed out:
For the two loose yellow wires, I put electrical wire caps on them. Still not sure where exactly they are supposed to go to, but I think they may have been clipped by the service technician who installed the unit years ago. They don't look burnt, and were tucked away, so I guess they are not needed.
I wire stripped the burnt white 120V feed wire and also stripped the black 120V feed wire for a fresh copper connection going into the bottom L2 and L1 terminals. The white one was badly pitted.
Fingers crossed this holds up! Thanks again for saving my butt!