Bryan explains some best practices for installing a heat pump condensing unit in Florida. He walks through the installation process from the warehouse to the final inspections.
The installation process truly starts at the warehouse, where we must make sure we have the correct unit and everything we need, including the concrete pad, heat strips, an appropriate circuit breaker, tubing insulation, UL-rated silver tape, and duct sealant. Some particularly Floridian components include duct board, hurricane straps, plywood, and corrugated tubing.
When you get to the site, confirm that you have the correct unit type by looking at the existing unit’s tonnage, the new unit’s tonnage, and Manual J and S calculations. Then, you check the disconnect to see if it needs replacement before removing the disconnect and making sure you don’t have 240v between legs or between one leg and ground. Check the data plate to make sure you have the appropriate circuit breaker and wire sizing.
Once you’ve verified everything, you can prepare for recovery. We recommend removing Schrader cores from both lines and using an inexpensive analog gauge manifold for recovery. Make sure you know the contents of your tank; if it’s empty, pull a vacuum on the tank to get the air out. Be sure to pay special attention to the water capacity (WC) and tare weight (TW) values on the tank, as you only want to fill the tank 80% for the refrigerant you’re recovering.
When recovering the refrigerant from the old unit, some best practices include using a liquid line filter-drier and inverting your tank while recovering. Keep going until your recovery machine reaches or goes just below zero. After recovering the refrigerant, you disconnect the electrical components.
When replacing an old heat pump with a new one, you may either reuse or replace the copper line set. If you reuse the copper, you would need to do pipe-wiping to remove residual oil and clean out the lines with a foam pig, nitrogen, and a hose. If you need to replace the copper, you need to expose the chase and make sure you have enough room to run new copper. In either case, you will need to cut the copper and must take measures to reduce contamination.
We must also consider the drain. In Florida, indoor traps are uncommon, but they are industry standard. If you’re reusing the drain, you’ll need to clean it well; we recommend using water and a shop vac to clean the drain out well. Refill the trap when you’ve finished.
If you place a new concrete pad or route a new drain, try to keep those two feet from the house, each other, the dryer vent, and your disconnect.
When it comes to brazing new copper, the torch is critical to the success of the operation. Make sure everything is snug and that you turn out your regulators before opening the oxygen and acetylene tanks; try to keep the oxygen and acetylene both around 10 and 10. You’ll typically start off by opening the acetylene tank first, lighting the torch, and bringing oxygen in, but you could start to open both tanks around the same time once you get used to your equipment. You’ll want a neutral or slightly carburizing flame, not an oxidizing flame.
When brazing, heat the copper to a dark cherry red color to draw the alloy into the joint. Allow the copper to cool, and route the copper lines as needed. Once you have enough of the copper line inside the home, you can start bending it with proper tools, sealing the chase, and using fittings or bent connections.
When installing a new drain assembly, we put the sealant on the male end and hold the ends together. You only need primer if the system is pressurized.
After you seal copper at the condenser, you can pull your Schrader cores out. When brazing the rest of the joints, be sure to cover the sensitive parts with a wet towel or Refrigeration Technologies Wetrag to prevent damage, especially indoors. Let each brazed joint sit for at least 20-30 seconds before cooling them off with a wet towel. Clean them and inspect them with a mirror.
When your joints look good, you can do your pressure test. Use a spray-on bubble solution to check for leaks. Make sure there isn’t too much pressure decay over time. During the pressure test, you can work on your electrical connections and anchor your new condenser.
Once you prove that you don’t have significant leaks, you can release the charge, check the thermostat wire, and assess your line lengths to see if you need to add any more charge. As always, you will want to inspect the entire system once it has sufficient charge and clean up your work.
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In this video we're going to show the installation of a heat pump unit and the copper line set, essentially, this is a video to help instruct the installers at klos services on best practices for installing heat pump, condensing units, specifically, this video will show typical install conditions That we see in florida there's always going to be a variety of installation configurations in any location in the country, but keep in mind that this guide is very specific to florida and even more so specific to our market in central florida. We're going to do additional videos on gas furnaces, showing typical floor, mount side, return, type of applications, but don't get too fixated on the specifics of the layout instead focus on the best practices of the install itself, which applies to many different types of systems before you Leave the warehouse you need to make sure you have the correct unit check the model number against the proposal to ensure that you have the correct equipment and all the correct accessories. Whenever you're going to be loading, a truck make sure to do it safely, use a forklift or a team lift. Here we show the air handler we're going to show portions of the air handler installation, but we aren't focusing on that in its entirety.

Next, we show the prefabricated concrete pad you'd bring that if one is required here we show our hurricane straps heat strips thermostat float, switch circuit, breaker of the proper size, copper tubing, insulation sheets of duct, board, mastic or duct sealant white fab, which is a white sticky Mesh tape, ul rated silver tape, plywood corrugated tubing for covering the line set outside and the copper line set itself. If we're replacing the line set, the corrugated tubing, plywood and duct board are very florida. Things that we use in our market. The corrugated tubing is for code compliance and protecting the lines when they come out of the ground.

We use plywood, for our platform tops here, we're just showing all these necessary items that we want our installers to bring with them once you get to the site. The first thing you want to do is identify the application check to see if you'll be replacing the concrete pad or not safely unload. The condenser then confirm that it's a match for the replacement unit, the 36 and the model number means these are both 3 ton units because it's 12 000 btus per ton check that the tonnage is correct by looking at the manual s and manual j calculations. For the job next unbox the unit, where possible, use the box as your garbage bin to keep your workspace neat check your disconnect.

The proposal will dictate whether or not it's to be replaced, but inspect it to make sure that it is in good in serviceable condition. In our market we're licensed electricians, so we can replace those if they need to be replaced. Other markets may be different, always safely, remove the disconnect and test to make sure you do not have 240 volts from leg to leg and then also check for 120 volts from leg to ground, as shown next confirm your wire sizing. This can be done by referring to a wire sizing table which is based on nec table 310-16.
Make sure you have the appropriate wire sizing or larger going into the disconnect and out, as required by the data plate. That will be listed as your minimum circuit and opacity. It's also going to list your maximum circuit breaker size on the data plate, ensure that you have the appropriate circuit breaker that matches the data plate next you're going to prepare the system for recovery. Here, i'm showing the use of core remover tools to remove our cores.

We remove cores to speed up the recovery, so we don't have that restriction to refrigerant flow you'd, remove those schrader cores from both service valves, the suction and the liquid, suction being the low side and liquid being the high side here, i'm showing the use of an Analog manifold set: you could also use a set of probes and hoses to do this or use a digital manifold for recovery. I prefer using a simple analog manifold because it's always possible that the existing system has contaminated refrigerant or oil, so i'm less worried about contaminating my inexpensive analog gauge. If you're, starting with a fresh recovery tank, you want to make sure to pull a vacuum on the tank before you recover refrigerant into the tank. That way, there's no air or moisture in the tank take note of the wc or water capacity of the tank.

That's the amount of water, a tank can hold also the tw or tear weight the empty weight of the tank. In order not to overfill a tank, we suggest using the recovery tank calculator on the hvac school app or similar, for example. If this tank is empty, it will only weigh about 16.6 pounds, because that's the tear weight or empty weight. You would then zero the scale and begin your recovery.

If it had refrigerant in it beforehand, then you would need to take account of how much refrigerant was in it, and the whole point of this is to ensure that we don't overfill the tank beyond 80 full of liquid. You want to pull a vacuum below 500 microns on the tank. Here we show a vacuum pulled to 300 microns. Next, you close off the tank and disconnect your vacuum pump.

You're going to save the vacuum pump for pulling the vacuum on the system later now bring your recovery machine and refrigerant scale. You can see that i put the tank on the scale and zeroed out the scale to begin receiving refrigerant into the tank now's a good time to note the designed factory charge for the unit you're. Removing that way, you can know what to anticipate you're going to get out of the system in terms of refrigerant weight. Again, you may get more or less depending on if the system had a leak, if somebody over charged it or if it has a long line set once you get all your hoses connected, remember to attach a liquid line, filter dryer in line to protect the recovery Machine open your core tools on the system and open your hand, valves on the manifold purge the hose going into the recovery machine to make sure you're not bringing in air.
Then you purge going into the tank now you can recover here. We show inverting the tank. First, recovering into the vapor side of the tank with the tank inverted has been shown to be the fastest way to recover, because you don't have a dip tube on the vapor side of the tank and inverting. It just ensures that you're filling from the bottom up, which helps dissipate heat a bit more easily.

It's not a huge difference, though, if you invert the tank or keep it right side up so do whatever seems best to you. You can start your recovery machine now. Wait until you recover to zero psi or slightly below zero psi make sure you don't overfill your tank by monitoring the weight of the refrigerant going into the tank. Next, you purge your machine and shut off the tank.

Not all machines have a purge option, but this navac nrdd machine does. At this point, you would want to note how much refrigerant you removed from the system to stay in compliance with epa regulations also tag the tank with the job equipment and amount of refrigerant put into the tank. This way you can keep track of. How much refrigerant is in your tank? You can now disconnect everything, because the system is now empty of refrigerant now begin disconnecting all of your electrical connections.

At this point, you would have already tested to make sure that everything is electrically turned off by testing from leg to leg and leg to ground, as shown before before you disconnect your low voltage on the outside. You would also want to make sure your disconnect is turned off to the inside unit, your furnace or your air handler that way, you won't create a short circuit on your low voltage controls. At this point, you need to know whether you'll be replacing the copper or reusing it. In the case of reusing it, you'd use a process called pipe wiping to remove any residual oil from the existing copper lines.

If you need to replace the copper in an underground application, you need to dig down to the chase and expose it to begin preparing for running new copper. Here we show how a typical chase application would look. The one shown here would be a very short chase application, regardless of your process, you need to cut your copper at the inside and outside here we show cleaning the copper before you cut it with a proper tubing cutter. This is one of the best practices, because it ensures that you don't have to clean it when it's already been cut, which can result in pieces of copper and contaminants falling into the lines when working with copper.

One of your most important tasks is to ensure that no solid contaminants make it into the lines when using a tubing cutter, cut the copper slowly with many rotations to ensure that you don't bend or oval the copper do the same on the inside and outside of The copper line set now you're going to cut the drain using a pvc cutter in this video we're showing an indoor trap. This is not typical in florida, but i'm showing this trap and vent application, because it is an industry standard and would also work just fine. If it were done this way, typically in florida we have a clean out and then it runs outside. That's because we don't often have room to put a full indoor trap in place.
Keep in mind that in this situation there is also a trap underground. So adding an additional trap isn't very valuable. Now we're going to show the pipe wiping procedure if we were going to reuse the existing copper. Here we insert a foam pig into the pipe wiper.

We put our catch at the bottom over an oil pan with a rag. This will catch any residual oil that would blow out of the system. We use a nitrogen tank and a hose typically set to about 100 psi. We open the valve and this forces the pig through the lines and cleans out any oil or contaminants in the lines.

You'd also repeat the same process on the liquid line, which we don't show here next, if you're going to reuse the drain line, you always need to clean it very well. The best way to clean the drain in this application is by hooking up a shop vac to the outside and running water through it to clean it out. We don't show this here, but you'd also need to put a cap on the vent. If this were the application to allow us to draw the water through rather than just pulling air through the vent, there are some alternative methods we can use, such as nitrogen or co2.

But even if you use those methods be sure to finish up using this procedure of flowing water through with a shop vac, always refill the trap when you're done and make sure the water pours out freely. Sometimes this may be hard to observe, and so you could simply put a dry rag or a cup underneath the drain in order to ensure that water did come out. When you look again outside now, you can pull out the old, copper and drain line if you're replacing both and prepare to run new copper. This is, if you're, not doing the pipe wiper procedure.

This is in cases when you're replacing the copper line set and not reusing it. Next we're going to show what to do if you're going to replace the concrete pad. We would often do this if the existing pad was prefabricated and damaged if the existing pad was insufficient in some way, maybe well below grade or if the existing pad was made of plastic. Here we show a good procedure, if not maybe a little bit overkill for leveling the pad.

First, using a level then moving some dirt around to improve the leveling of it. A rake and a tamp can be used to create a nice firm foundation. Then use the level to determine that we're level in all directions. Next, install the pad and check the level once again in general, it's a good best practice to have about two feet of clearance from the condenser to the wall and about one foot in all other directions, but that can vary based on manufacture, specs and application.
You'll. Also want at least two feet of clearance between your dryer vent and your disconnect and the edge of the condenser that gives you proper service access to your disconnect and ensures that you're not going to pull in a bunch of lint from your dryer vent. Now we're going to show preparing the copper to push it. One of the best practices we found is looping your liquid line around and pinching it down into your suction line.

We find this to be one of the best practices, even if you're running, attic, copper because of the possibility of caps coming off in the copper becoming contaminated. The loop in the liquid line makes it a little easier to pull through. But again you can push the bare ends. Just make sure you braze them shut before you do so.

The plastic or rubber caps can easily come off which can result in the line set being contaminated. When you use a torch for brazing, we recommend using an ir3 tint set of safety glasses, like the tightest glasses shown here, as recommended by osha, wear appropriate gloves and have a fire extinguisher handy here. We're going to show you a basic procedure for setting up torches in the first place, make sure everything is nice and snug keep in mind that the acetylene threads are reverse threads, meaning they're left-handed threads rather than right-hand threads. We're going through and making sure everything is nice and snug, but not over tight.

All the way around we don't want to have a gas leak. Also, keep in mind do not use any sort of oil unless it's specifically designed for it on your oxygen regulators, we're turning out or counterclockwise our regulators and then we're opening our tanks. We're doing that. First, to make sure we don't have leaks where the regulators attach to the tanks themselves again.

Some of you will believe this is overkill, but for somebody newer in the business we want to get them in the habit of setting up their torches appropriately next turn in or clockwise your regulators, so that you have a bit of outlet pressure. Then test for bubbles. On the outlet side, as a general rule, when you're setting up the outlet pressure on your torch regulators, you need to do this with the torch handles open, meaning with the gas flowing. You want to set your manifold somewhere around 5 and 5 or 10 and 10 for your outlet pressure.

Some people will set them to seven and seven. I was taught to set them to 7-eleven in general. It's gon na be in that range of five to five and ten to ten some of the torch manufacturer. Literature will tell you that it should be balanced, but, as i mentioned, i've done it at seven acetylene and 11 oxygen for most of my career and it works just fine.
Now we're ready to light our torch. Most books will tell you to open the acetylene first light. It then bring in the oxygen. That's a perfectly fine way of doing it.

It does create some carbon that can tend to float around, but if you're outside that's totally fine, once you get more used to brazing and specifically with your own torches, you'll be able to open up both the oxygen and the acetylene at the same time and light It this is something that comes from experience, so here we show lighting the torch straight away, but generally you would just open your acetylene first light. It then bring in the oxygen quickly the ideal flame is a neutral flame or slightly carburizing, also known as a reducing flame. That means that you have a slight secondary, feather, really you're, going for as neutral of a flame as possible. You don't generally want to use an oxidizing flame because it produces oxides that can cause issues with creating a good bond.

An oxidizing flame is excess oxygen and a carburizing flame is excess acetylene. We recommend using a fifteen percent silvos rod, silver and phosphorus alloy here, we're showing that you heat the base material to dark cherry red and then apply brazing material. We do show this quickly. Some people will note that we did not flow nitrogen for this, and that's just because this section of the tubing is going to get cut off before we do anything with it.

So nitrogen is a non-issue at this part of the process. Now we're going to shut off our tanks and our regulators allow our copper to cool and tape up the ends, so they don't get damaged as we pull them through we're also going to attach our thermostat wire to our drain. In some cases, some people run them together all the time some people run them separately. Do whatever works for the application here we show pushing it all the way through and pulling it up.

In many cases you won't be able to do that with the drain. You'll get in the part where it hits the 45 and put a 45 on it to bring it up. If you are going to cut the drain below the platform, be sure to glue it properly and make sure that it doesn't leak once you get more than enough excess, copper drain line and thermostat wire above the platform, you can seal the chase sealing. The chase is mostly just to keep insects out.

It really isn't going to be completely watertight, but foam we find is generally the best policy. Next we show placing the plywood platform top in place. This is more of an air handler installation procedure, so we're not going to focus too much on that here we're using a tubing bender to bend the copper in place. We show how to change the different sizes to bend both the three quarter inch and the 3 8 copper whenever you're going to pull insulation over the tubing put the cap back on.
First, that way, you won't get shards of the tubing insulation into the copper. We use inexpensive metal clamps to hold back the tubing insulation so that we can work without damaging it. In some cases, if the tubing insulation is close, you may need to put a wet rag around the tubing insulation to prevent yourself from damaging it. While you braise here we're showing using fittings to make the final connections in some cases, you can do this.

Just by bending the tubing with a bender, we always install our liquid line, filter dryer on the inside nearest to the air handler for optimal protection of the metering device and to keep the filter dryer out of the elements which prevents rusting now we're going to bring In our entire drain assembly, at once, as we discussed before this indoor trap, is something we really don't do in florida, but we showed it this way because it would be a traditional setup in other markets. This is our clean out, and this is our vent when gluing copper apply glue to the male side of the connection and hold it in place whenever possible, give it a quarter turn once you insert it into place here, we're not showing using a primer. If it were a pressurized system, we would definitely use a primer. We find that as long as the pvc is clean, a regular medium cement works.

Okay. I know this may be somewhat controversial. So if your company or your local authority having jurisdiction, requires primer, then use primer prior to gluing, because we install carrier units we're showing using an outdoor heat mode piston. Not all of them have this anymore, but this is a traditional part of a carrier.

Heat pump install that piston needs to be in place and we need to make sure the teflon seal is also in place because that's what actually seals it. We also use a little bit of nylon blue on the threads just to make sure it all goes together. Nice and smoothly tighten it down with a wrench at the end to make sure it's tight, but again it's the teflon seal that does the ceiling in this type of chat, lift connection. This is not a flare.

Next, we're going to use the tubing bender in both the inward bend and the outward bend we're showing how to use the adapters in order to bend the tubing in the opposite direction. We do the same with a liquid line. Now we cut the tubing to fit making sure you leave plenty of excess at this point, you're going to pull the schrader cores out of the new system, now we're showing this using the full core remover tool, but you could use the one on the back of Your screwdriver, whatever you want to use, but at this point there's no refrigerant in the lines it's all stored in the condenser, so it's safe to pull those cores out now we're going to prepare the system to flow nitrogen while we braze, as you can see, we Attach to the suction line, which means it's going to flow in the opposite direction through the evaporator coil and back to the liquid line you're going to want to protect everywhere. You work as you braise.
You can use a rag, that's soaked in water or wet rag by refrigeration technologies, which is a heat blocking putty. That does a similar job and it's a bit easier to get into tight spots, so keep in mind that wherever we show wet rag by refrigeration technologies, you could also use a normal, wet rag. Now we're going to prepare our torches similar to how we did earlier in this video we're going to light them by opening both at the same time, as i already mentioned, but in general best practice is to open the acetylene first and then bring in the oxygen. We're going to do another video at some point showing the setup of brazing torches in more depth.

This is a rather simplistic view of it, but we do want you to get the neutral flame as seen here, not the tiny oxidizing flame and not the big secondary feather of the carburizing flame. Here we show the western enterprise's nitrogen flow regulator that allows us to flow a very small amount of nitrogen through the tubing. If you don't have a special flow regulator like this, you can use a separate regulator on top of your regular nitrogen regulator that will flow at three to five scfh of nitrogen during brazing. Now we're going to heat the connection by starting on the male end, getting it nice and hot to that dark, cherry red and conducting that heat into the joint connection.

The color we're showing here is about the color. You want it to get it's hard to represent this on a computer screen and there will be some variation, but that color is called deep cherry red or dark cherry red. That means our base. Copper is around 1200 degrees, which is also the melting temperature of most brazing alloy rods.

Our goal is to get that entire joint hot enough to draw our solder in via capillary action, as shown. Getting a good cap on the end is nice, but it's much more important that you get the joint to the right temperature so that you can pull the alloy into the joint next we're showing moving to the inside to braze. But, generally speaking, you'd do the inside. First then, you'd go outside and do the suction and liquid line at the same time.

Here we're just going to continue showing the process kind of following the flow of nitrogen through the system when working indoors make sure you're protecting all the surfaces and areas and that you still have your fire extinguisher handy. If you have a txv indoors, protect the txv and the txv bulb, you could also just remove the bulb from the suction line, to protect it, if that's easier, always be careful when handling a txv or a txv bulb. Now you do the same thing as before: you're going through the system getting each joint to that dark, cherry red to cherry red, color, making sure you're drawing the alloy into the connection. Generally speaking, if you braise a connection, you can let it sit about 20 seconds, and then you can go ahead and cool it off with a damp towel or rag here, we're showing brazing all of them before cooling them, but that's not generally how you do that If you find that refrigeration, technology's, wet rag has become hard or difficult to deal with, you can put a few drops of water in it once you return it to the container.
Now you go through the system with your damp towel cool off everything and clean off each connection. Again, you don't want to do that instantaneously after you finish the braze, but about 20 seconds, or so afterwards gives it enough time to set up and cool down so that you can cool it without stressing the connection now you're going to inspect each connection with a Mirror to make sure they all look as they're supposed to before. We move on to our pressure test now we're preparing our system for our standing pressure test, you're, going to pressurize the system to a fixed number in this case we're pressurizing it to 250 psi. A good rule of thumb is to look at the lowest pressure rating on both the evaporator coil and on the condenser, and use that as your pressurization pressure once we get it under pressure, we're going to test each connection with a leak reactant, some people call them Soap, bubbles, but this is a specially designed leak reactant to show even the tiniest leaks when you are pressurizing the system make sure you set it up to an exact number so that you can see even tiny changes in your pressure.

Your best bet is to use a digital, manifold or digital probes and to monitor the changes very carefully, keep in mind. If you have a hard shutoff txv, the pressures will become unbalanced on the high side and low side. Once you hit around that 250 psi number in some conditions, keep in mind that if you have a hard shutoff txv, an hso or often called a non-bleed expansion valve, the pressures will become imbalanced on the high and low side. Once you hit a particular point, so in some cases in order to hold a fixed pressure on both sides, you need to actually allow it to equalize through the gauges you're now going to leak test each connection with the spray on leak, reactant checking for bubbles visually.

Don't skip this step, look for even tiny microfoam in the bubble solution. Here we show what a good size leak would look like with refrigeration technology's, big blue leak, reactant next clean the solution off of all the connections. The next step is showing electrical connections. You could actually have begun some of these connections.

While you were waiting on the pressure test now, you can begin to make your electrical connections again. This doesn't need to be done before your vacuum. In most cases, you're going to begin pulling your vacuum. At this point, we're just showing this part here.

First, you connect your high voltage. Now you connect your low voltage snip into the end of the wire and peel back the jacket using the string or one of the unused conductor. Colors, then, you cut the jacket off and snip off the wiring portion you cut into initially. This ensures that you don't have any nicks in your wires when stripping back the insulation from each conductor.
Only do it as long as you need to to make a good connection. You don't want to leave any bare wire left over next. You connect each conductor, one at a time yellow for your contactor red for constant 24 volts black, because that's the color carrier uses for common white for your electric heat and orange for your reversing valve. Keep the wire nuts pointed upward to keep moisture out of the wire nut and put a zip tie around them, as shown to hold them in place.

Wire routing varies from system to system, but always keep your wires neatly, routed, leaving appropriate levels of excess wiring and not leaving any of your connections in tension, meaning where they want to pull apart with all of your conductors, always run them through appropriate grommets and strap Them so that they won't chafe creating a short circuit. Now we anchor down our condenser, we usually use the factory condenser base, pan screws, and we make separate holes in the concrete pad using tap cons if you're going to put screws into the equipment, make sure you're. Never going to drill into the condenser coil, the number of straps and the location will be dictated by engineering and or the local municipality. We also recommend sealing the outside chase.

In both cases, the ceiling is really mostly for insects, just to make sure we're not going to get them into the space. It's not going to do a whole lot for water when installing the drain in general ensure that it's about two feet from the house, if possible, you can bring it a little closer in some cases, but try to keep it away from the slab as much as You can once you've passed your pressure test now, you're, okay, to discharge your nitrogen and begin pulling your vacuum. A good nitrogen pressure test on a typical residential system will generally take about half an hour to prove no leaks if you're using a high resolution pressure gauge. If you're using something like an analog gauge, it can be much more difficult.

It's much more likely that you will leave a leak just because you don't see that small change in the needle first off vacuum is often called evacuation or pulling a vacuum before you pull your vacuum. You'll want to ensure your vacuum pump is working exactly as it should so step. One is to check the vacuum pump oil to make sure that it's clear and clean and that it's at the proper level if it's been a while since your last oil change now, would be a good time to change the oil in the vacuum pump. Next, take your vacuum gauge often called a micron gauge and hook it directly to the pump.
You need to make sure the vacuum pump itself will pull below 100 microns in less than 30 seconds. This is typical. A good pump will even pull down to 30 microns or less than that now connect your micron gauge to the liquid line valve. In this case, both of our schraders are still out of the suction and liquid line here, we're showing the true blue vacuum hose, which is one of the highest capacity vacuum hoses available on the market today and the ones that we use primarily at kalos, now turn On your vacuum pump and let the system pull down generally within about five minutes, you're going to be at or below 500 microns, and we try to get it below 300 microns you're, going to notice that this is significantly faster than when you're pulling on the entire System like your condenser coil, or your compressor after repair.

This is because the only thing you're pulling a vacuum on right now are your copper lines and your evaporator coil and since generally they're brand, new or they've been recently cleaned. It's not going to take a lot to get to a deep vacuum. Now, do your isolation test by shutting off the suction valve and ensure that the vacuum doesn't decay significantly. Decay in this case just means that the micron level rises rapidly.

Generally speaking, you don't want it to go above 500 microns in 10 minutes of decay time. If you pull down below 300. on a typical residential system. Staying below 500 microns in 10 minutes would adequately confirm that there aren't significant leaks and that you have a deep vacuum now: you're ready to release the refrigerant into the lines and into the evaporator coil, first open the suction surface valve, and then the liquid valve, as Suggested by manufacturers now put your schrader cores back in it's important that you get this sequence correct.

You do not put schraders back into the system until after you have released the charge, otherwise you're going to ruin your vacuum. Now the charge is released and you can put your schrader cores back in the system follow this process exactly. This could actually be done later, but we showed at this point that we're going to add the corrugated tubing that protects the copper from lawn equipment. That's the only reason: it's there, it doesn't create any sort of a watertight seal, make sure your thermostat is installed and wired properly, ensure that it's level and that you don't leave any fingerprints on the thermostat or on the wall.

Now we're prepared to run our condenser by setting down the temperature before we do, though, we want to take note of the line length, as well as the proper charging methodology for this system defined by the manufacturer. It's best to take both of these things into account. Generally speaking, you won't be adding any refrigerant charge unless your line length is over 15 feet. However, that's not always the case, especially in cases where the system has a micro channel condenser coil.
So you need to follow your manufacturer's literature. We also have a charging calculator for different line lengths on the hvac school mobile app, because you use line lengths to figure out how much additional charge to weigh into the system. In addition to that, you still monitor your pressure, sub cooling superheat and follow your manufacturer's literature for charging, get out the scale and place your refrigerant charging tank onto the scale here. We're showing how to use a core depressor to control the flow of refrigerant you'll also want to use a charging orifice on the tank, because you'll need to charge in the liquid state.

This ensures that you won't get liquid into the system as you're charging. While it's running it's worth noting that, if you measured your line sets beforehand - and you know you need to weigh in a certain amount of charge, you could do that before you even release the charge from the system into the line set. You can charge it into the line set when the system is still under vacuum. This will save just a little bit of time.

Otherwise you have to wait until you run the system in order to add refrigerant and you always add refrigerant into the suction line. While it's running again only add refrigerant, if you know you need to based on your line length and your readings, make sure your schrader core is on the side port, if you're using a charging tee here, we're showing a charging tee and field piece probes and hoses Because we find this to be a great method for testing and charging the equipment use your line, temperature clamps to measure your liquid line and suction line. Temperatures now place in your disconnect and the system should begin running. If all the time delays have expired as soon as the system starts running, you want to listen for any abnormal sounds and be ready to pull the disconnect immediately.

If anything goes wrong now, while the system is running, you'll want to see if we have proper output voltage from the contactor check, the amperage on your fan motor and the amperage on your compressor, those should be below the rated amperages listed on the data plate. Now monitor your system pressures and specifically watch your sub cooling you'll only want to make adjustments till after at least 20 minutes of runtime, but hopefully even more than that here, we're showing that we're measuring a low sub cooling using the measure quick, app we're showing a 7.3 sub cooling, with a listed sub cooling on the data plate of 10.. Now that's not really realistic here, because we know we only have a 15 foot line set, but we're showing adding charge for the sake of the video. If you want to know more about how to add charge to a system, we have a completely separate charging by sub cooling video that you can watch again.

We only do this once we've taken all of our measurements and the system has run a sufficient amount of time, but we're going to show adding some refrigerant until we get to the target 10 degrees of sub cooling. Here i show only having put in 4.75 ounces and you can see we achieve 10 degrees of sub cooling. Now again, only do this after appropriate amount of run time. Now we're going to quickly show how we would use digital psychrometers, one on the return and one of the supply duct in order to monitor the delta t, which is the difference between the return and supply temperature.
We're using measure quick and you can see that we're in the green zone at 20 degrees for this particular situation, which is what we're looking for now we're going to use manometers in both return and the supply in order to measure our total external static pressure. Generally speaking, for these types of systems, a total external static of 0.5 or lower is what we're looking for. But you need to look at the design literature to see what's appropriate in your application. Once you've done, all your tests and you've ensured that the system is performing properly, you can go ahead and reverse the process, remove all your ports and probes and reassemble the system completely, making sure you clean up everything before putting caps back on, make sure the rubber Seal is still in the caps finally test.

The drain make sure it drains properly by filling the trap and when it's running make sure the condensate drain is draining if you're running in cooling mode. Again, we focus primarily on a heat pump. Condenser install with a central florida style application. We didn't focus a lot on the things you need to do for the air handler or the furnace we'll do those in some future videos thanks for watching our video, if you enjoyed it and got something out of it.

If you wouldn't mind hitting the thumbs up button to like the video subscribe to the channel and click, the notifications bell to be notified, when new videos come out, hvac school is far more than a youtube channel. You can find out more by going to hvacrschool.com, which is our website and hub for all of our content, including tech tips, videos, podcasts and so much more. You can also subscribe to the podcast on any podcast app of your choosing. You can also join our facebook group if you want to weigh in on the conversation yourself thanks again for watching you.


38 thoughts on “Condenser install 3d”
  1. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Steven Robertson says:

    11 degrees superheat with 10 degrees subcool?? Low airflow? Weak txv bulb?

  2. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars СаШАй плюс два says:

    now homeowners watch this video and then torture you with advice.

  3. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars 69Sixpackbee says:

    Awesome ! These are really helpful for us DIY guys as a basic learning tool. Thank You!

  4. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Chuck DeArruda says:

    Wow! A lot of work went into this video. Great job! Thanks

  5. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars K Marrast says:

    I was taught to open the gas based on the flow of refrigerant…Is that incorrect? Thanks for replying in advance.

  6. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars g3ultra says:

    Excellent video! You guys have some really slick video production these days! Service area Ottawa??

  7. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Guy Heon says:

    Thanks Brian! It sure help to do better work!

  8. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Hola! Charles B says:

    Everyone is good with that drain sticking out of the ground waiting to be busted off

  9. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Matt B says:

    This is fantastic! Thanks for the hard work you all put into this. Are you in Nepean ?

  10. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars neilvester victor says:

    Great visual educational video

  11. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars ELTorro717 says:

    This was one of the most satisfying HVAC videos I’ve ever seen! Thanks for the good content

  12. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Arthur D Dockery says:

    I’m sure you pulled the vacuum down to 500 microns and held for 15 minutes

  13. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Arthur D Dockery says:

    I’m sure you pulled the vacuum down to 500 microns and held for 15 minutes

  14. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Arthur D Dockery says:

    I’m sure you pulled the vacuum down to 500 microns and held for 15 minutes

  15. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Arthur D Dockery says:

    I’m sure you pulled the vacuum down to 500 microns and held for 15 minutes

  16. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Eassyheat/ Cooling says:

    This seems like an I told you so video!😂
    Thanks again for the videos!
    🍺🍺🥃🥃🏌🏻‍♀️🎯
    Stay safe.
    Retired (werk'n)keyboard super tech. Wear your safety glasses!

  17. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Peter Mendonca says:

    Thk u for the instalation Are you in Orleans ?

  18. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Yaya P says:

    I drop the condenser from my tailgate to a dolley.
    I don't put no seal tape, I just twist it.
    I bend the copper with my hand.
    I don't even put a wet rag. I just spray it with my water bottle.
    I don't braze with the nitro hose connected or near the flame.
    I get to house and the cement slab is nut to butt against the house.

  19. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Raid One says:

    This feels illegal to watch. Its like stealing

  20. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Ahmanuel Wedi says:

    Good stuff as usual. I learned a lot from the podcast and videos. The animation is very insightful hopefully you can give us a virtual tour of the refrigerant flow through the system with 3d cutaways. Thanks again. Oh and the latest podcast with the data analytics was Awesome! Service area Orleans??

  21. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Richard Sims says:

    Outstanding training, I highly recommend all HVAC school courses.

  22. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Ginger Strand says:

    Wish you would do one with low voltage testing, troubleshooting etc. Great video!

  23. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars A1 Beltran says:

    Can we do one on pressure and charging methods 🙏 Service area Barrhaven??

  24. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars A1 Beltran says:

    This video 👍🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

  25. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Bob Gall says:

    Great video😎

  26. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Aaron Burke says:

    These videos are awesome. Keep um coming 👍

  27. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Fer A. says:

    This video was amazing 👏 step by step a new tech. Really i Appreciate it…all the tips to do a better job…thank you,

  28. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Carlos soto says:

    Wow Bryan , the videos you guys are putting out are getting better and better. Thanks for sharing. Are you in Kanata ?

  29. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Ms says:

    Please more videos like this. They are so helpful!!!

  30. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars HVAC with Greg says:

    Here in Tennessee there are several cities where we have to use k-flex rubatex by code. The UV-proof stuff. We also have to wrap the liquid line every so often.

  31. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Peter Yachymczyk says:

    Well if it is a heat pump not really a condensing unit? In cool mode yes but in heat mode it becomes the evaporator that is why they are just called indoor or outdoor "heat exchangers" now if they are heat pumps. Anyway just a gripe of mine sorry excellent videos though.

  32. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Stormchoirs says:

    You forgot about using a reamer for inside the copper pipe.

  33. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars AJ says:

    I'm a tech. I like to charge videos like this so my family and friends actually know what I do.

  34. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars LledStudent ZGP says:

    Clutch…

  35. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Tom Pelletier says:

    Ductboard really, that’s what you guys use down there? Ductboard is cheap and awful, when not sheet metal? Idk different markets meet different standards I suppose…🤷‍♂️ Another note why would you double trap the system, underground and near air handler? I really like your videos and learn a lot from them but those things don’t kinda make sense to me.

  36. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Lost in the woods says:

    Still in trade school so this helps a ton, thanks so much for this detailed video

  37. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Richard Domasig says:

    Great video! Thanks…

  38. Avataaar/Circle Created with python_avatars Michael Matute says:

    The 3D makes it so much easier to understand 😊👍🏽

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