SaferProducts incident

Failure type

Fire / ignition

Incident narrative

SaferProducts.gov consumer incident report 20230724-EA000-2147346237. Severity: Incident, No Injury. Product: American Standard AUD2C080B9V4VB (This is the furnace portion of an HVAC system, and the failing part is the blower motor for the unit. The model # and serial # listed in the boxes below is for the entire unit, not for the motor. The original blower motor is a Genteq Eon made in 2016, model # 5SDR39RL V5228. This motor was selected, programmed, and built into the HVAC unit by American Standard/Trane. The manufacturing date listed below is from the motor. I do not have the date for the entire unit, but it was in 2016. The serial # provided below is for one of the two HVAC units installed. They are identical and were installed at the same time.). Incident: I have 2 American Standard HVAC systems installed at my home (installed in December of 2016), with the furnace units and blower assemblies in the attic. In September of 2021, one of the blower motors suffered a catastrophic thermal failure and began filling my home with toxic smoke. In spite of this failure, the HVAC unit did NOT shut down. I had to shut off power at the breaker box and then guess what the issue was. It turns out that the electronic control module of the motor was the issue. That motor was replaced with a different type of ECM motor back in September of 2021, and that replacement just failed in a similar manner although not as severe. This time I recognized the smell much sooner and shut the unit down. Based on these 2 similar failures and some additional research, I believe that there are tens of thousands or more American Standard/Trane HVAC units installed in homes that pose a toxic smoke hazard and a fire hazard as well. Thus far Trane has failed to address this safety hazard with me.