Rectorseal 97647 Safe-T-Switch Ss3

Great for the price. Like others similar switches, you can flip magnet to either normally closed or normally open. Adapted great for my application. Used on my Watchdog sump pump. Did have to flip the magnet on the slider portion. Easily popped off keeper, flipped and reapplied the keeper. which is perfectly fine and a nice feature with these types of switches.

item does not work

Last summer, a clog in the condensate pan drain resulted in my having to fix a ceiling and a wall. To prevent that from re-occurring, I installed this condensate pan float switch. The switch is well made and very simple to install. It clips on to the pan and acts as a switch on either the Red (Rc) or Yellow (Compressor) wires from the thermostat. Takes less than 10 minutes to install - you will need a single marrette (wire-nut) for 18 gauge wire. I also installed a Rectoseal SG1 condensate pan overflow alarm at the same time. The SG1 alarm sounds when the switch is open.

If you use this with a solenoid or a motor, make sure you use a flyback diode at the solenoid to protect from the coil's reverse voltage spike or you will probably fuse the switches contacts. I forgot the diode while testing, luckily a few taps unstuck it for me, and has worked fine since with the diode in circuit. 5 stars for sure because this is just about the only cheap float switch I could find that handles more than half an amp.

My initial thought was to use this switch as the first line of defense. It won't work, thus it can only supplement the draining holes. Fundamentally US HVAC design is flawed on secondary drain pan. The pan is flat, meaning any meaningful water sensing, draining will require "enough" depth. To make things a bit worse, this float works to shut off the circuit with half an inch movement, meaning the best way to install the switch would require touching the bottom of the pan. The enclosed clip sets the switch too high thus I need to flatten the metal clip and drill holes to install it. Since it is hard to drill stainless steel, I ended using the two clipper points as my drilling point, which set this switch a bit up from the bottom. The good news is, the bottom of the pan is filled with debris from Attic, thus getting away from the bottom might help to reduce false alarm. It all depends on how do you want it to work. So, this switch sets a bit too high thus it works only after secondary drain hose is blocked instead of sensing if there is any water inside the pan.