I have has a long, bad relationship with the air conditioner at the apartment I rent. It has broken down several times. Last fall, the rotating fan in the unit stopped rotating and the air being distributed throughout the rooms of the apartment was not cold. The landlord said he would order a part and fix it, but put it off until very recently. It started getting pretty warm, so I decided to test it. The rotating fan was still not functioning. I emailed him and asked him if he could take a look at it again. He came over and got it started. It worked for about 5-10 minutes and then it stopped rotating again. He came over again and it worked again.

Later that evening, I realized that the apartment was getting very warm. I went and checked the unit and it seemed to be working. I went and checked the vents in the apartment and there was no air coming through. I tried the fan and had the same result. I then checked an online board and it instructed to turn the air off-- that there could be a problem with the circuit board. I turned the switch to off and went to bed. When I woke up I had a note from the landlord saying to keep it turned off and he would check it when he came over.

Problem: Though I had turned the cooling feature off, I forgot to turn the fan function off. When the landlord stopped by he told me that because I did this the compressor and other things broke.

My question: Did my failure to turn the fan off result in these other parts breaking? The primary reason to turn the unit off according to the message board I read was so the coils wouldn't freeze. That was obviously not the issue because I had the cooling feature turned off. So what do you think... did my actions break these parts or is my landlord trying to bully me so he can seize my security deposit?

Fan switch only control the fan not the compressor. Last year you got air but not cold mean something already wrong with the compressor. The whole system was already broken. There is nothing left for you to break.

Chances are your handy man do it yourself landlord blames you for his own inability to fix the AC unit because he didn't want to spring for an expensive tech who could have properly diagnosed and repair/replaced the unit. Your problem though is to prove this to be the case and that may cost more than your deposit(?)!

If he doesn't return it when you leave, sue him for it, and the burden of proof would be on him. I doubt seriously you damaged the compressor but here are a few articles to get an understanding about them,

8 Preventable Causes of AC Compressor Failure (http://aristair.com/blog/8-preventable-causes-of-ac-compressor-failure/)

What Makes Good AC Compressors Go Bad? (http://www.ssihvac.com/blog/what-makes-good-ac-compressors-go-bad)

This one is pretty deep, but illustrates that without proper inspection and diagnosis you simply cannot say what the cause of failure is so unless he is a certified, qualified AC technician, his opinion means squat.

https://donan.com/knowledge-base/article/compressor-failure-in-hvac-systems/

But the same goes for your opinion also, without FACTS, which can only be supplied by a TECH. LOL, the landlord is just as likely, more so in fact, of causing this failure with very poor maintenance practices. If he cannot prove at least a once a year preventive maintenance/inspection, you may have him as far as your deposit goes, or any other charge he brings against you.

STUDY the articles, I hope they lead you in the right direction.