Hello,

I was planning to fix my AC, but I have a fairly old AC home system so I decided to call a company this time. The outside unit was not working properly but it was not the fan so I figured it could be the capacitor or compressor - so, anyway I had the AC company coming and look at it. Long story short, the guy comes in, gets a new capacitor installed, but as soon as he re-latches the service disconnect outside the house, the unit goes for like 5 seconds, and then I have sparks in my electrical panel, and the breaker is gone. Now my whole house is without electricity. After an electrician came by to reinstall electricity, I connected to a different circuit breaker and it seems it's ok.

My only question is: could a wrong capacitor do something like that? My capacitor had three push-up terminals on top, what the guy put in (and then removed) was a 5 one. I am happy to pay them for the diagnose, but they have been oddly defensive and I would like to get an understanding of what happened before I do.

Sorry if my terms are not accurate- I do a lot of DIY stuff, just not so much in electrical.

Thanks,

Gabe