Concerned about my AC/furnace

I have a central heating/cooling system.

So about a week or so ago, I noticed a rumbling/knocking sound and vibration in the floor in my kitchen. I thought it was from some construction up the street, so I thought little of it. Then I noticed the sound in the evening after the construction had stopped for the day. I finally figured out that it was either the furnace or the air conditioner, and called my property management company the next day (I am renting this house).

They sent a technician out that afternoon who spent a few minutes looking at it, and said that there was nothing seriously wrong but that the furnace blower needed cleaning. He didn't have the tools with him he would need, and said that they would call me to schedule another time to come back out in the next few days. I specifically asked if it would be safe to run the air in the meantime, and he said that it wouldn't be a problem. The next day I noticed that the noise seemed significantly worse, but I trusted the word of the technician and assumed that I was being paranoid.

Later that afternoon I was in my bedroom and smelled a smoky/burnt smell, though I saw no smoke. I ran downstairs and turned the thermostat off, then ran to the basement where the furnace is. Still no sign of smoke or fire, and I didn't really smell anything anywhere else either until I opened the panel to where the furnace filter is. I never saw any smoke. A few minutes after turning it off I could smell the burnt odor elsewhere in the house, though it was fading. I called the property company again and told them what happened, and the same technician was sent to my house later that evening. He took the blower out of the furnace and took it to a shop somewhere, saying he would clean it out and replace the motor. He brought it back maybe an hour later and put it back in, and it sounded much better. He said that the burnt smell was probably the motor, but didn't sound very certain or interested.

Now I'm a bit paranoid. I had to run out of a burning apartment building in the middle of the night a couple of years ago and I'm not keen on doing it again, so I won't deny that I'm more than a little cautious. Perhaps I'm overreacting to the burnt smell, but the fact that it happend leads me to believe that it was not in fact safe to use as the technician claimed. I'll be the first to admit that I have little experience with this kind of thing, so perhaps it's unreasonable for me to expect him to have been able to predict what happened. Either way, I don't feel terribly confident in the current state of this air conditioner and furnace. So I'm going to list some things I observe now, and I'd appreciate it if anyone can tell me if I have anything to worry about.

• When I stand in the kitchen I can feel some vibration with the air running, but I don't hear that rumbling/knocking sound that I heard before, at least not as loudly. Sometimes I think it's there but I might be just trying too hard to hear something.

• When I'm in the room with the furnace I sometimes think it sounds like it might be running irregularly, but again I may just be paranoid and trying too hard to hear something.

• There is condensation on a pipe going from the outdoor AC unit into the house. I've never checked this before, so I don't know if it's always been that way or not. It's the darker colored one near the bottom of the pic linked below.

• there is also condensation on one of the ducts directly above the furnace. I pointed this out to the technician when he was here but he didn't say much about it, and it's still there. Perhaps this is normal?

• Outdoor unit is a Rheem RAFB-024JAS

• The furnace is made by Bryant, haven't found model number info on it yet

• pictures of AC and furnace here

Sorry for the long post.

submitted by /u/dysburg
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