Hey this is the HVAC school podcast and I'm Brian, and this is a quick podcast or a short podcast. As we like to say, and sometimes I make short podcasts just by talking really fast and not taking spaces or breaths in between the words that I say, but today is not one of those days because today I want you to be able to understand me. I want to take a chill pill, I'm actually headed to North Carolina for three days to play some golf with my dad at Pinehurst, and I asked the question, or I made the mistake of asking a question on the Facebook group about how many golfers of you Are out there and I got some responses, but I got a lot of nay saying: okay. Yes, I do golf, I don't do it very often.

I have been practicing more lately because I didn't want to make a fool of myself at Pinehurst, but Pinehurst is a pretty historic place. I like it for the history. I like it cuz it's a pretty place. I love North Carolina.

So, okay, maybe I'm a little bit of a yuppie all right! You already knew that you knew. I was a little bit of a snowflake and now you know I'm a little bit of a yuppie there you have it. I like to get out and knock the old pill around the old course every once in a blue moon, but that's not what we're talking about today today we're talking about some commissioning. Yes, you need to do some commissioning.

You know this is ever gon na. Be a very simple episode, but hopefully it will hit home and before we do that, I want to thank our sponsors, our sponsors, being air, Oasis, air, Oasis, comm makers of the bipolar Nano. You can get a special deal from air Oasis, and I would just say the first place to go, would just be to go to arrow a sitcom /go. Let them know you have some interest in their products.

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The type of chemicals that you want to integrate in your business and then finally, Who am I forgetting Oh carrier and carrier dot-com I mean how can I forget them? That would be weird they're. My number one line that we sell here at kylo services. So, thank you to those guys all right, so we're gon na talk about commissioning and instead of going through, I'm not going to do a commissioning checklist. I'm not gon na go over different types of equipment and how you Commission every different type of equipment.

That would not be a quick episode and this is a short, quick episode. I want to give you a commissioning mindset, because I just was at a job today and I was watching not our technicians, but some other technicians start up a decla system and they didn't Commission it at all. They did not Commission it, and how do I know that? What is the demonstrate, commissioning and not commissioning? Alright, let's get to the heart of this thing. Commissioning is all about making sure that equipment is working as designed design means a couple different things.

Design means, as the manufacturer designed the equipment to work, that's important, but also working as designed for the application if you've ever looked at a set of plans and there's different air flow CFM designed for each room out of each vent and so on and so forth. There's all these design specifications and if system doesn't achieve the design, then it's not operating as designed and therefore is not fully or properly commissioned, at least not in my book. So what is commissioning commissioning is making sure that the equipment is working appropriately. Is the manufacturer specified and as the application specified give you another example in Florida, where we live high relative humidity, we design systems to run about 350 CFM cubic feet of air per minute per ton, as opposed to 400 that you see around the rest of the Country, well, why do we do that? We do that because we want better latent heat removal, and so when we design systems when we designed them properly - and we don't always, but when we do when we design systems for an application, we're taking that into account we're looking at what we call the sensible Heat ratio, how much of the heat is dedicated to sensible heat, changing the thermometer, changing the temperature in the room and how much heat is dedicated to latent heat removal? That's taking water having it stick on your coil run down into your drain pan and after drain line.

That's heat that takes heat energy in order to get that out, and so we can account for that as well. So when we design a system, we want to make sure that we're designing not only for the overall capacity but that we're designing for the sensible and latent capacity. Well, let's say that we design a system for 350 CFM per ton and we actually, when we install it, we don't pay attention and we produce 400 CFM per ton. Well, what happens? Sensible capacity goes up, latent capacity goes down, which means that thermometer thermostat changes more quickly, don't remove as much humidity, so cycles more quickly, get more short, cycling and you're, not removing as much humidity when it's running so what happens? Your humidity rise as a customer is uncomfortable.

They're, not happy. You didn't deliver on the promise. You did not commission the equipment that doesn't mean you didn't design it properly, although maybe you didn't, but if you designed for it, but you didn't commission it properly, then you didn't achieve that. So what are some things? We get a look at when you're commissioning.

We have to look at. Is the equipment setup properly, based on what the manufacturer says, that would be things like refrigerant charge. That would be a common one. You don't check the charge when you set up as a piece of equipment, you're not checking it properly.

A lot of people say: well, it's a ductless unit. There's nothing to check yes, there is. You still can check the suction pressure. You can still check the outlet air temperature of that air handler.

Make sure that that's within range. You can look at what the manufacturer charge say. Did you weigh in the proper charge? Did you pay close attention to that? Did you just assume, give you a perfect example of this that happened with our crew. I don't know that this is what happened, but I suspect this is what happened.

They look at the data tag. They see how much refrigerants in it. They see what line length, that's rated for and so on so forth for ductless system they install it. They release the charge and they leave.

We go back two days later and the system is nearly flat almost has no charge in it. We do a leak detection. We can find no leaks other than a factory Schrader inside the condensing unit. That's leaking.

So what would likely happened there likely happened is that factory Schrader was probably always leaking inside that condensing unit. It probably lost most of its charge before we even opened the valves, but rather than actually testing the system, because we said what most people say, which is you can't check a charge in a ductless system, nothing to check right. We just opened the valves and we look at the chart and we leave. We don't check to see the target air temperature.

We don't check the charge all we don't check the pressures, we don't check, hardly anything, and you may say: well, maybe the manufacturer doesn't give you a lot of information. Well, there's some good common sense readings. You can still take. So you get a commission the equipment.

Now, if you want to get real fancy, you could actually do delivered capacity on ductless system. I did a video showing how to do that. If you want to make that part of your commissioning process. Well then, my alt means have at it and that will solve this problem all together.

In the case of our installer, you clearly didn't really check anything. If my theory is correct - and I don't know for a fact that it is but it bothers me right, bothers me when systems are not commissioned, it bothers me when we don't do it, it bothers me when other people don't do it. Why is a huge part of our industry's making sure that we deliver on the promises we make? The equipment needs to deliver on the promises that the manufacturer makes that the salesperson makes when they are representing the manufacturer specifications. We have to deliver on the designs that we make.

Did we size the equipment properly, they be size, the ductwork properly. Did we install the proper copper lines? Did we insulate those lines properly all those ways in which we apply a design that we create because we're always creating designs out there in the field, always so commissioning is huge and what is it really? What is commissioning really? It's making sure that before you leave that that equipment is working to the standards of the manufacturer into the standards of a proper design, the design that, hopefully, you actually thought about beforehand - and that's things like telling an installer. This unit needs to deliver 700 CFM. Well, that installers gon na look at you, like you, have two heads and one of them is on fire.

Unless you tell him exactly how to measure the airflow, so you got to show them how to use static pressure, charts or maybe a being anemometer or a hot wire anemometer. Whatever system you want to use, maybe a true flow grid for that matter, but you've got to show them how to do it. You can't just go out there and say: hey sort of the unit make sure it's working properly. What does that look like that looks like measuring voltage? That's making sure that the utility is delivering the proper voltage that the manufacturer requires.

It's making sure that you don't have excessive voltage drop because of poor connections or whatever the case may be poorly connected breakers. So you have to check voltage, you have to check amperage, you have to check and make sure that the refrigerant circuit is working to manufacture specifications. You have to make sure that your air flow is to manufacture specifications. You have to make sure that your duct design is correct and that you're delivering the proper amount of equipment, CFM cubic feet of air per minute or even better mass flow rate of the air.

And then you have to make sure that you're also distributing the proper amount of air to each actual vent point tool and use point whatever you want to call it. Does he call things so many different inks vents diffusers registers, whatever you want to call it? Okay, getting to where it needs to go. You need to make sure that you have balanced ventilation so that you don't have areas of high pressure and low pressure that results in leakage and all that stuff. You have to make sure that you're removing the proper amount of latent and sensible heat.

Those are all things that a salesperson sales manager, installation manager, service manager. These are things you have to communicate to the installers, not just rely on them to Commission. If they don't have that information or they don't know how to do it, because otherwise, whether they gon na do open the valves, they might look at the pressures they might check. Superheating some cool, if they're a little bit better but they're not going to do a full commissioning, because a full commissioning is all of these things and finally, somebody's got to read the manual.

I mean we would love if it was installers. That might be unrealistic. So somebody's got to read the manual and has to clearly communicate what is the checklist for this piece of equipment? What are the manufacturer specs that we have to go through for this piece of equipment to make sure that it's operating the way the manufacturer said it would and then finally the way that we designed it to work? And if we're not thinking in terms of commissioning, then we are not delivering on the promises that we're making and I am imperfect at this as well. Let me tell you what so again, I the reason why I want to talk about this, as I saw this happen today.

I saw some really nice guys do a nice job of installing a system, and then they just started up and walk away, and they really don't know whether it's working properly other than to just throw their hand in front of the air handler throw their hand in Front of the condenser and say yep, she sounds like she's running good, no amperages or check no voltages, nothing else. It's a shame and it's not necessarily their fault. It's probably our fault as leaders of organizations, because we don't think through not only clearly communicating what that commissioning looks like, but then also providing all of the tools and education necessary to make sure and also, frankly, accountability to make sure that it actually happens in the Field all right, thanks for listening to my musings, we will talk to you again next time on the HVAC school podcast.