The intake on my new unit was covered with a panel. Why would they do that?
Got a new unit in my condo in Jan. It was running "ok" until this week. We checked the filter. A metal panel was covering it completely. We called and sent a pic to the company like, ...we can't even access the filter, where is it? The previous unit was like, ok take off the panel with the vents and the filter is right there, which makes sense, it lines up with all the vents of the exterior panel, the painted one that matches the walls.
So, it was completely choked. If you looked at the filter you could see dust shaped like 4" circle it was managing to suck air through, air which was the closet behind the unit. The hole was underneath the filter/unit that I guess they cut to run wiring through.
Way more air started blowing after we removed the metal panel. Why the heck would they install it like that?