Best Retrofit AC/HEAT 16,000 BTU UNIT

[Maybe A Dancer]

The compressor on my 26 year old factory salon A/C keeps getting louder and louder and I fear a failure could come sooner than later.

This is a 230volt, 16,000 btu under the setee mounted unit in a 450 DA

I'm hoping y'all could share your experiences with what's available today so that WHEN it happens, I can simply pull the trigger without doing any research.

Size/fitment/reliability.

Do you feel that 16,000btu is adequate?

Dometic & Webasto seem to be the most available

I'm in S Florida. Perhaps a bump up to a 20,000 btu like this closeout?

Webasto FCF Platinum Air Conditioning Unit - Cool w/ Rev Cycle Heat - 20K BTU | Defender Marine

BEST !

RWS

 

[Strypes]

Is it split or contained?

 

[Maybe A Dancer]

Not sure on that answer.

Everything is in one unit, compressor, blower, coils - all fits in the "tray"

Raw water pump is separately mounted in the engine room

RWS

 

[Stee6043]

I think the general feeling is that going bigger is not ideal since the unit will potentially short cycle, not running long enough to effectively dehumidfy.

 

[LMBoat]

I think if you go to a 20 BTU unit the ducting is bigger, you would need to re-do all your duct work, plus a bigger SW pump. I looked at this a few years ago and decided to stay at 16BTU and it was the right move. The newer ones are much better than the older ones. Quieter and cooler.

 

[hottoddie]

I would check into Flagship Marine. Option for electric heat and made in USA (Florida I think) with good warranty.

 

[dtfeld]

I just replaced a 16k BTU 120V unit in my main salon with a Citi Marine unit. Pretty much a Dometic knock of best I can tell. 2 year warranty. Biggest issue is getting a unit shipped with out shipping damage. I’m pretty happy with it and the new touch screen thermostat.

Thing pumps a lot if cold air, to the point I thought my front 8k was in need of service. Turns out nothing wrong with it, just doesn’t have to work as hard with the new unit in the back.

 

[Maybe A Dancer]

I found this as posted by Frank W in 2019:

"Noise when running is one of the first symptoms of a failing compressor. Another one is a loud bang (louder than a relay closing) when the compressor cycles on.

The good news is that the fix is a new Dometic air conditioner. Dometic has slowly acquired the makers of marine air units and has redesigned then using a turbine type compressor that is whisper quiet and smooth. The domestic units fit in the same footprint as Marine Air system and are almost plug and play. The bad news is that changing one out is easy in some boats but hard in others..........oh, the other bad news is the $3500 check you will write to get the problem solved."

 

[ocgrant]

This is what my buddy just replaced his with. I am very impressed with their quality and how quiet it is. Not to mention built in gauges...come on you can see issues before they become problems. This is the brand I am going with next year as I swap out my units.

https://www.marinaire.com/Marine-air-conditioner-16000-btu-230V-p/msba16c2.htm

 

[Creekwood]

Marinaire is what I replaced mine with. They are in south Florida. 3 years and no complaints from me. I downsized mine from 12k to 9k and do t notice any issues. In fact I can get the cabin down to 52 on an 80 degree day (I mistakenly set the unit to get to 55 percent humidity on a hot humid day. It did it but the temp got down to 52 inside LOL.

 

[Risingson]

This is what my buddy just replaced his with. I am very impressed with their quality and how quiet it is. Not to mention built in gauges...come on you can see issues before they become problems. This is the brand I am going with next year as I swap out my units.

https://www.marinaire.com/Marine-air-conditioner-16000-btu-230V-p/msba16c2.htm

Great unit plug and play. Plus shield and remote

 

[Sgrochow]

The compressor on my 26 year old factory salon A/C keeps getting louder and louder and I fear a failure could come sooner than later.

This is a 230volt, 16,000 btu under the setee mounted unit in a 450 DA

I'm hoping y'all could share your experiences with what's available today so that WHEN it happens, I can simply pull the trigger without doing any research.

Size/fitment/reliability.

Do you feel that 16,000btu is adequate?

Dometic & Webasto seem to be the most available

I'm in S Florida. Perhaps a bump up to a 20,000 btu like this closeout?

Webasto FCF Platinum Air Conditioning Unit - Cool w/ Rev Cycle Heat - 20K BTU | Defender Marine

BEST !

RWS

If you are leaning towards Webasto, might be worth a call or email to their tech folks before ordering to size properly.. I bought one of their units several years ago and went with a 12K to replace the 12K in the salon. The unit works great and is very quiet. However, the logic in the board is run for 6 minutes and then and then only then shut down if set point has been reached or exceeded. Works great when the ambient temp is really high or low. Cannot override the six minutes. Not uncommon for the unit to over shoot the set point by 5 degrees.

I realize you are in south FL with a larger boat and your cooling needs are much different than mine, just wanted to share what my experience was.

 

[firecadet613]

I think the general feeling is that going bigger is not ideal since the unit will potentially short cycle, not running long enough to effectively dehumidfy.

This... there's a workaround but it's a pain.

Marinaire is what I replaced mine with. They are in south Florida. 3 years and no complaints from me. I downsized mine from 12k to 9k and do t notice any issues. In fact I can get the cabin down to 52 on an 80 degree day (I mistakenly set the unit to get to 55 percent humidity on a hot humid day. It did it but the temp got down to 52 inside LOL.

Did that and went to sleep. Woke up freezing!

 

[bahamabreisus]

WE actually just replaced our salon unit, 16k 230v with a 12k 230v. We went with our 2nd Webasto from Citi. I was concerned about going down in size, but 16k was not available. The smaller Webasto does a better job than the old unit. We are in coastal NC 90s and humid.

 

[carterchapman]

I just replaced a 16k BTU 120V unit in my main salon with a Citi Marine unit. Pretty much a Dometic knock of best I can tell. 2 year warranty. Biggest issue is getting a unit shipped with out shipping damage. I’m pretty happy with it and the new touch screen thermostat.

Thing pumps a lot if cold air, to the point I thought my front 8k was in need of service. Turns out nothing wrong with it, just doesn’t have to work as hard with the new unit in the back.

David = were you able to use the existing RG11 wire to the new thermostat?

 

[ranger58sb]

Size/fitment/reliability.

Do you feel that 16,000btu is adequate?

Dometic & Webasto seem to be the most available

Dometic acquired both Marine Aiirrr and Cruisair.

We replaced Marine Airrrr Vector Compact units with Dometic Turbo (now Dometic DTG) units -- descended from or renamed Marine Airrr Vector Turbo units -- in the last boat. They are indeed an improvement: more air flow, quieter, rust-proof drain pan, etc.

On this current boat, we've replaced one 16K BTU Cruisair Stowaway with the Dometic DTG, ditto all that improvement stuff, and we could re-use the existing SMXii ir control panel.

I'm considering replacing the rest of the 126K BTU Stowaways with the CTM 16K units from Citimarine, about $1K less expensive each even after Dometic's "boat show discount." The CTM units are very similar to the Turbo/DTG systems in design and execution. Our local installers say they have installed several CTMs now, haven't had any bad reports... but they haven't been doing that long enough to know the CTM track record.

If you had 16K BTU before, a new 16K unit will be adequate, better even, and your ductwork is sized for that. And if you want to go with the CTMs, 16K is the largest they make so far.

-Chris

 

[carterchapman]

My bridge 24K unit is getting loud - probably near failure. Looking at the MarinAire 24K.

 

[ranger58sb]

My bridge 24K unit is getting loud - probably near failure. Looking at the MarinAire 24K.

Ours too. Just made arrangements to replace with a Dometic DCU27... whenever our installers can actually get one.

-Chris

 

[Maybe A Dancer]

WOW - lots of info shared here

THANK YOU !

Installed a new DOMETIC/CRUISAIR in my 10 meter in 2006. Evaporator coil began leaking in less than 1 year. Installing dealer Blue Water Marine in Ft. Myers attempted to COVER IT UP as to avoid the labor a second time (difficult split unit) I caught him on it. In the end DOMETIC took care of it and the dealer begrudgingly handled the install but it took numerous certified mailings to accomplish.

Seems DOMETIC used to be the GO TO product, however what I've read on boating forums is that the quality advantage has now disappeared.

Here's my collection (to date) of NON- CSR comments , none of which are my own:

MABRU 17,000btu

SELF-CONTAINED 17000 BTU 230V 50/60HZ MARINE AIR CONDITIONER COPPER FI (mabrustore.com)


Quality can't be represented by shows, Dometic, bought every one including us, but quality came down big time.. A condensing coil is no longer CuNi 70/30 now is the economical CuNi 90/10.
Compressors are noisy, not efficient, and not very reliable.. How good are their 12v units? How far behind are they getting? Solar units?
Are they paying a fair amount to their dealers for warranties? I believe that now the paperwork is too complicated, the rate fees and times allowed for warranty are not Helping the Dealers.
Definitely Dometic is not the worse product, but also far from been the best.

--------------------------------


MARINAIRE $2,169 has both pressure gauges built in

16000 Btu, 230V, Self Contained Marine Air Conditioner System. Best marine air conditioner for cabin cruisers, sail boats, yachts and house boats (marinaire.com)

This is really the only choice here.

They are super quiet, newest tech, and able to be controlled from a smart phone w/ very little effort. With the app that it uses, when I'm on the way to the boat the AC kicks on by itself, when getting within a certain radius of the boat. It's awesome! I also sleep on the boat and with how quiet it is you barely hear anything but the wind noise from the vent. Heat works fine too.


The Wifi thing is cool because I can leave it in humidity mode when not at the boat but set it to cool off before I head to it.


My marineaire unit has been working flawlessly for 3 plus years it never has been shut off for any extended period of time. Not as quiet as advertised.

I owned a marine aire unit (classic naming scheme intended to confuse people into thinking it's the real thing). I was downright amazed at the poor quality. I was attracted by the low price point (really the only reason anyone would buy one). what complete garbage. I ended up throwing it all in the trash but before I did I tore everything down to look at how it was designed & built (I have been in product development my entire career). "wow" was all I could say as I looked at the crappy design under the hood and the clearly abysmal quality. really really bad. pure junk.

if you like yours, good for you, but it is still junk. and the control & remote pictured above is the same as I had. you're right, it isn't toy-like...most toys are much better made (no hyperbole).


Show us a better system with a better control..

Again, with this one I touch nothing.. I have it set to turn on when I'm about 10 mins from the boat.. and it turns off when I'm ten mins away from the boat and heading home.

Show us a better system with a better control system than that.

The other systems I've seen have metal pans that rust and fall apart, they vibrate like crazy and make tons of noise.. this one has a plastic pan that doesn't fall apart, and is nice and quiet, 3 speeds and a few different modes.. I have a hard time believing you tossed it out because it was too "cheap"


--------------------------------------

FLAGSHIP MARINE

Self-Contained Water Cooled - Flagship Marine




They're crap. They don't use any isolation between the compressors and the pan, so when the things running it sounds like your running a sawzall through the entire boat. A household thermostat that doesn't display any fault codes, and one fan speed. Good parts, poor execution.


----------------------


KING AIR

Marine Air Conditioning units, Semi Truck HVAC, A/C Systems from KING-AIR, Cooling the World since 1947!



--------------------------------


WEBASTO


I was going to go with Webasto since their engineering depart in near my home town, but couldn't get over the made in China factor.


DOMETIC/CRUISAIR

$2,253 + shipping at Defender BACKORDERED


CruiseAire Dometic....I would just stick with that brand. 99.9 percent of the boats I survey have them. It's really a benefit to stick with the known when problems arise. On a side note, I have seen some Dometic units with a composite pan which I think is the way to go.

I have replaced 5 domestic air conditioners on my 2016 big horn 5th wheel under warranty, all due to freon leaking

When my Dometic 16K died after 2 years from new, I contacted Dometic and was essentially told "sorry, out of warranty" but they did tell me they would supply me with a list of vendors where I could order a new one.

I did find a great deal on a NOS one, and bought it as it was previous to the models that are failing. If and when it goes I will go to MarinAire.


yeah maybe I started out the thread with the wrong question. I should've known Dometic would be the "a/c of choice" because they pretty much dominate the market. Perhaps I should've asked, "what a/c do you think is the best?".
I tend to agree that sticking with Dometic in this instance might be the smartest, mainly due to service/parts availability.
But some of these other brands offer compelling packages at competitive pricing.
I do like that MarinAire unit with the standard sound cover, the gauges built in to the unit, the remote control/wifi, etc.
The dometic with the composite pan was the most expensive one I've seen, if I remember correctly.
I guess I'm trying to justify if paying another 1,000 dollars for that dometic is the right thing.


Comments about Dometic 16000 BTU EnviroComfort Air Conditioner Reverse-Cycle Retrofit Kit

I work as a marine electronics and a/c installer and have over 25 years experience. I have installed many Dometic a/c units and had, up until recently, found them to be reliable and well made. The 16k BTU Marine Airrrr (Dometic) unit used to be a reliable workhorse. Unfortunately, my recent experience ihas proven otherwise. Three of these 16k BTU units that I have installed, two on my own boat, have failed in a very short amount of time. The first one, installed on a customer's boat, failed in 16 months with a bad electronics controller. The second, installed on my boat, failed 53 weeks after purchase (Get that PLUS Plan!) when all the coolant was lost due to a leak. Most recently, another of these units, installed on my boat, failed after less than a month in service, again due to a coolant leak. I chose the Dometic unit because, unlike the Webasto unit, it has service ports that allow the refrigerant to be recharged. I bought my a/c's at West Marine because of the great coverage afforded by the PLUS Plan. I was able to return defective units and quickly obtain replacements with no hassle. Thanks West Marine!



Originally Posted by bms1939

Ocean Breeze is another brand to consider, good product and customer service.

Yeah, except the way their self contained units are mounted to the pan, they'll vibrate everything within 10' of them..........Dometic is still the best way to go for the package units, BUT, it's the best of the junk because I've seen a lot of defective ones on yachts I manage that are 2017-2020 boats.

Quality can't be represented by shows, Dometic, bought every one including us, but quality came down big time.. A condensing coil is no longer CuNi 70/30 now is the economical CuNi 90/10.
Compressors are noisy, not efficient, and not very reliable.. How good are their 12v units? How far behind are they getting? Solar units?
Are they paying a fair amount to their dealers for warranties? I believe that now the paperwork is too complicated, the rate fees and times allowed for warranty are not Helping the Dealers.
Definitely Dometic is not the worse product, but also far from been the best.



MERMAID

I’ll brag on the Mermaid unit for a bit.

stainless base with compressor mounted with bushings for quiet operation. Stainless drip tray under the evaporator - completely separate from the rest of the unit to keep water away from the compressor.

Full installation manual and factory support for any questions. Uses any household thermostat so replacement is easy. 5 year warranty!


Again, not my comments, but I thought it would be nice to share these with the CSR FORUM

BEST !

RWS

 

[dtfeld]

@carterchapman The Citi marine units will work with a bunch of different remotes. Not sure what you have or what you want to go to, but I think these AC units will work with pretty much anything on the market.

The touchscreen has a 6 pin RJ45 and 8 pin RJ45 version, but I choose the Wi-Fi capable version, and it requires a 8 pin RJ45, and I pulled a new cable.

There was a 4pin molex to RJ45 patch cable already installed on the old system which I think was necessary to connect the old AC unit to the SMXII remotes.

if you are considering a CTM unit, call them, they pick up the phone and will likely know the details.