Not mine -- a central air unit at work has failed, and the compressor supposedly just hums a lot. That's all the detail I have. No smoke, no tripped breakers. We have a maintenance crew to solve this.
I'm wondering -- in a typical AC system, what happens if / when the blower fan on the compressor fails? I don't mean the compressor unit itself, just the fan that blows air across the fins to cool the refrigerant. If that fan dies, would the system 'know' to shut down, or would the compressor keep running? In that case, since the refrigerant is still carrying almost all of its heat, could the compressor even get it back to a liquid? Is that fan also critical to cool the compressor?
I'm just wondering if the failure of one component can lead to the destruction of another; if the fan quits, does the compressor just run until it overheats and dies?