So so, hmm, ah it's time to chill out and get ready for a mediocre q, a live stream if you're old enough grab yourself your favorite adult beverage and if you're not stick with apple juice, put your feet up and relax. If you have any questions, feel free to ask them in the chat and now, let's queue up the intro music, hey everybody. Hopefully you guys are doing well, i'm doing pretty good over here um. It was a crazy week for me last week, super busy at work.

Super stressful, too um, even through the weekend, the calls just kept coming and it's not it wasn't like - and this is just the the intro to summer for us right, but it was just a weird series of circumstances. I had a guy that was out sick and you know we had our first like uh our longest heat wave. So far of the season, we've had a few like one days where it gets hot, but it was a consistent. You know probably 10 days of upper 90s, so it wasn't even the the big part of our summer but um, because you know, like our max temperatures during the summer is like 115 to 120, like right in that range, so um but yeah.

It was just hot. We were busy lots of service calls we're still kind of started this week, a little bit better everybody's back to work and uh. You know we're kind of uh trying to get a handle on all the craziness that happened last week. You know when we have these big heat waves, we kind of go into triage mode.

Where um, you know, we just literally run around putting fires out when we get so busy. So it's just like boom. You know reset the pressure control rinse, the condenser will come back to follow up, you know, uh, you know and just kind of moving along and then we'll go back the next week and be like all right. I need to go through this system.

You know and start addressing some concerns that i had on the the service called day and that's kind of how we do it uh. You hope, though, like right now i kind of like this time because we get a big heat wave and then it's mild this week you know and then it's like boom, then it's going to pick back up, so it gives us a little bit of time to Kind of get into the groove, so that's at least how we handle it. You know, though uh you know you, you midwest guys, you northern guys, you guys get to do that in the heating season and in the cooling season, see for out out here in the west um or southwest whatever you want to call us. It's uh.

You know we don't have a cooling, i mean a heating season very much. So this is our our money-making time. You know so um, but it's been a great week other than that. You know.

Uh started out today, really cool and got home. A little early was able to get ready for the stream which it's funny, because i've been so busy. I've been missing streams and it's like i went to my scheduling software to to make the stream today and it was like you know i hadn't streamed in a couple weeks and it's like oh wow, you know just just been nuts, you know it's how it goes So um had a really cool question: hello to everybody in the chat. Uh.

Remember guys, um, if you guys have questions that you want me to cover uh put them in caps, lock in the chat and i'll try to get to them. If i forget to get to your question - or i don't have time shoot me - an email, hvacr, videos, gmail.com, okay, so curtis um had asked me a question and i'm just gon na kind of read his uh his email to you guys and then i'm going to Address a few things in it: it's it's a great email, so um he's saying that he understands that we do pm service as service technicians, but he's questioning me now, as i was coming up in the field, was i led by a more experienced, often guiding and Helping on the jobs um and did i get a lot of service calls? Did i get a lot of hands-on experience outside of preventative maintenance? Did i get to work on different types of equipment, so he's just kind of asking about my my intro into the trade um and then he asks. How did i get so sharp sharp is a relative term um. I i don't see myself as anything special.

I just see myself as a person that has made a lot of mistakes and doesn't want to re repeat those mistakes um, it's just how i see it but anyways. Thank you for the sentiment. I really do appreciate it, but so i started working for my father in the trade and um from a young age. You know until about a year out of high school.

That's when i came to work for him full time i cut the you know, details out on that, but came to work for him full time and from that point forward i can say within working for my dad uh three years after i came to work with Him full-time he stopped working, he put the tools up um and then it was kind of it wasn't that i was ready to start running things uh and that by the way was in 2002 was so by three years later he was like he was checking out. Uh we did have someone else working for us, but basically it kind of started to fall on me and then i started taking on more and more so yes, i mean i i was. I observed my dad for many years as a kid previous to coming to work from full-time. I was mentored by him then.

So when i did start, i had a pretty good foundation, of which you know my dad had required that i go to trade school too. So i went to trade school at the same time at night time went to work during the day and i slowly started taking more and more of the business. Did i get you know hands-on, walking me through everything? No, i was the person that had to figure it out with what i had. I didn't have very much my dad there to come and walk me through things.

It was, you know, i had basic guidance and it was just. I was just kind of thrown to the wolves, okay um, which is ironic, because i don't really like to throw people to the wolves and it's not saying that it didn't work for me. It did. I did fine with it, but i realized that there's a lot of technicians that can't handle that anymore.

You know so i don't want to do that to someone, because, even though i made it, i felt like i'm a small percentage of people that actually make it and don't get burnt out and quit the industry um not saying i'm anything special. I just think it was just an abnormality that i didn't quit um. I did not have someone to guide me and show me all these different things. It's just how it was, and it wasn't anything intentionally meant.

You know by my dad or anything like that. It just just the way that it works. You know now. I also came up in a time even before the 2000s.

You know people knew me, and so i had relationships with a lot of my customers. I was able to get away with things with not being able to fix it the first time, so it was a difficult transition for me and i kind of had to claw my way out um my apprenticeship process that i do right now uh. This is the second time that i've done this. I think second yeah.

This is the second time that i've done this, where i'm training an apprentice for an entire year. Now i'm just starting to release my apprentice. I don't even think i should call him my apprentice anymore, because he's a service technician right if we give him levels from service technicians, he's a beginner but he's a service technician now he's out. You know majority of the time um that about a month ago i started releasing him and i'd say that i may occasionally run into him here or there um.

You know twice a week or something like that, but for the most part he's by himself i've given him tools and then he still has me and then you know i kind of help them through things. So i'm trying to do things a little bit differently, but curtis. No, i did not have someone walking me through every single step. Okay and then i want to talk a little bit about the preventative maintenance side that you were kind of asking questions curtis so um.

I i i observe you, i know who you are curtis and um. I see that you're getting a lot of great experience, um maintenances. For me they were boring. They were tedious, they were long, but i was also benefiting from maintenances, okay and maintenances um.

They preventative maintenance as it that is um. They help to train us as technicians, because you know you go to the same place multiple times right if you're lucky enough to have contracts like i do you go to the same place as many times right over and over and over, and you start to pick Up on things, so i started picking up doing those mundane, boring maintenances. You know noises that didn't sound normal vibrations that weren't there the last time - and you start it's like muscle memory kind of happening right now that still doesn't give you um the ability to say or to to know exactly what's going on, but those maintenances help to Build you up as a technician and help to train you um, so uh. I don't know if i'm, if i'm going in the wrong direction, with the way that you were asking this question, but i do have to say to everybody so much preventative maintenances when they, when they feel like they're, boring, they're they're long.

You know they just want to throw their headphones on. No, you don't don't. Preventative maintenances can be the best place to protect the customer and build relationships with the customer, because you can start bringing things up to them and it actually helps. But then you get used to the locations.

Okay, so pms are really really important um. But hopefully i answered your question kind of there curtis i kind of went off on a little bit of a tangent, but all right, let's see um, let's see matthew lopez in the chat says. How does my pay scale work for my shop new starting wages? Well, everything's changing um. So honestly our wages um are changing all around and we really don't have a set thing, but in the past um we're not at this anymore because of inflation and all that stuff.

But in the past you know we would be starting a technician fresh out of trade school at about 18, an hour um and then as a uh. That would be your starting wage right and then, as your experience goes on and you become a full journeyman technician. You can make in excess of 35 36 an hour or higher the sky's, the limit. Then you start taking on supervisory roles and different things like that.

Um. But i mean that's our general pay scale. Uh, let's see what else um you rarely work with uh, i'm just reading through the chat scene. What i'm missing have i ever been shocked? You farm and work with 480 volt irrigation sprinklers and your boss had been shocked by 483 or four times now.

Um yeah kyler crane. I have been shocked, but not by 480 um. Never that high uh the highest i've ever been shocked by was a single leg of 120 volts um, and that was just you know, grounding myself out on it, um nothing more than that. Uh.

You've got to be careful with that stuff, because 480 is not something you want to play with ike. Thank you, uh. So much for being a continued supporter man. It's awesome, um, let's see what else we got going on in here, uh.

Yes, this is a happy dysfunctional family. Here, that's right! Uh, let's see what else uh jason johnson, actually bro um. You were the first person to answer my movie trivia question. Uh, the the i'm sorry tv series.

I made a joke uh in one of my videos and said the first person to answer the question or the name of the sitcom correctly i'd, send him a sticker, so jason. I know you're in the process of moving around and stuff. So um. Let me know when you settle and give me your address and i'll get you all the stuff um, let's see what else i'll get you the sticker uh, let's see what else we got going on in here.

Ah, my buddy ralph is in here what is up. Ralph works for honeywell refrigerants lots of great people in here cool all right, so um. Let me cross curtis's question off my list so that way i already know i covered that one um kenny had sent me an email or a question. I can't remember if it was questioning an email but um.

He was kind of curious as when he's charging a system, he was charging a particular system and, as he was charging it, he was just monitoring the system operations and he noticed that uh he had his his amp clamp around the compressor, as he was charging refrigerant In the system - and he noticed that every time he would add refrigerant his current draw on the compressor would go up, and so he was kind of curious about that um, so kenny uh understand um. I may not have the best way of explaining this. I may not be the perfect person at explaining this, but i mean it's it's i can give you some basic general ideas, okay and as a compressor is moving refrigerant. It moves refrigerant at a pretty consistent uh rate.

Okay, so it's it's pretty darn consistent when you're, adding refrigerant to the system. You are changing that consistency. Okay, then also the compressor is having to uh work harder to move that refrigerant, as you change the density by adding other refrigerant in there. So when you're doing that um you are going to make the compressor work more, so it is normal as charging a system for a compressor to slightly go up in current okay things that you want to pay attention to obviously lean on the compressor manufacturers.

They have some of the best information on how to work on their compressors, but you know um, just like you're doing, amp clamp on the system. Listening to the sounds feeling things using your senses and as you're charging just go. Slow. Okay always make sure that when you are charging with the system 2, typically, you don't want to see it going over the rla of the compressor for very long okay on startups and things like that.

There's different ways that we can control that cpr valves some other components, but basically that can reduce the amount of refrigerant coming back to the compressor and do it in a more controlled in a way. So that way it brings the current draw down. But with that being said, that's something you have to add to the system, but so it is normal for current draw to go up, as you are adding refrigerant in increments all right. So, let's cross that one off.

Hopefully i answered your question uh properly, for you kenny. I do want to say many thanks to several of you that have reached out to me i've gotten tons and tons of emails uh, because i mentioned i was curious about a new flag, crimping tool. Um. The consensus is that there's several different crimpers that have different types of dies that go in them and those seem to be the most popular and the best they're ratcheting crimpers.

So i will be looking into one. I haven't settled on a particular brand yet, but i do appreciate when i ask questions in the videos, those of you that reach out whether comments emails or whatever, to send me information, it's very, very great uh awesome to have a community like all of you and You know i have a lot of lofty goals and ideas and different things, but um they're in my deep thoughts file. You know i mean i just have a little file of things that i write down and uh um the. I would like to make this channel a little bit more of a community somehow.

So that is something that i'm thinking about. I get weird ideas like this sometimes, but i think it is awesome because the support that we get from then the people in the comments is amazing and they help each other in the youtube comments which is really really cool. So thank you, everybody for being that. Okay and thank you for answering the questions and helping me out, let's see what else we got going on in here.

One of the things that i brought up in a recent video was uh, the one where there was sand blowing everywhere and we had a bunch of uh contactors that were bad. I mentioned that i'd love to find a solution to eliminate these problems in these dusty conditions, and while i did get some feedback in in different things, realistically, what i'm finding isn't really what i'm looking for at the moment, like i understand - and i know i even Made a comment in the video, but i understand: there's contactors that we can get that are totally sealed. You can get vacuum contactors and different things like that, but i mean we're talking three to five hundred dollars, my cost for a contactor and while in the grand scheme of things, that's probably still a good idea, i'm still kind of looking for a little bit of An easier solution um, but that may be the way that we go. The other thing that i a lot of people brought up was maybe put it in.

Like a um, a pvc box electrical box put all the contactors in there or something like that um. I have too much fear in a pvc box with the insulation value and everything it's going to get way too hot in a box to put a contactor without any kind of ventilation moving through it. So i wouldn't put it in a totally enclosed box, um the ideas that people had of putting like weather stripping behind the electrical cover. Yeah, that's a great idea, unfortunately, that i, like electrical covers, beat to crap and it's all bent.

So that is something that we can do. Some kind of i really didn't want to tape the boxes from the outside, though, because it just sucks having to cut it all out. It just looks like crap, but you know lots of great ideas. So thank you.

Everybody. I'm still trying to figure all that stuff out um. I am waiting, though, for emerson uh to start making their um sure switches in three-phase uh recently just put a sure switch on my house, as i was just doing some pm work on my unit and clean the condensers and stuff and then threw a sure switch On there that i'd honestly had in my garage for at least a year just sitting there uh finally threw it on. It was a little complicated, because my system had like this weird little circuit board that wasn't being used.

It had a core sense controller and you know anyways. I took all that stuff out, just put the the sure switch in with just the standard pressure controls and uh. Once i did that it was a little weird having to unwire everything, but once i did it, it was just easier just to boom make it work. The way i wanted to so far the sure switch is doing great so sure the sure switch is a totally enclosed contactor.

That's basically meant to handle the current of a compressor, um i've. I've looked and heard about different things about totally enclosed relays, but i haven't had very good feedback about totally enclosed relays that can handle the current and the in rush and the kind of environment that we get from starting refrigeration equipment. So i don't know if i'm wrong about that, but so far i haven't found anything really good um, let's see what else we got going on in the chat um right on uh a grubby. I really appreciate the support man um, looking through the chat, seeing what i'm missing in here uh.

Let's see, um yep, okay, cool we're good there uh would, i ever add, die to a system to find microleaks. If so, what brand? Thank you in advance, uh matthew? So um i have used i okay, but i don't like it uh. I have used um, you know acid scavengers and other additives. Ac, renew and i've used all kinds of different things: um and uh.

I don't like doing it. It just doesn't feel right. Okay, let's get down to the bottom line: copeland, compressors, okay other than die. I don't think copeland approves any additives for their compressors and i think the die.

I can't remember even if they approve die, but it's a really interesting story. Okay, when you listen to a copeland service person or educator, talk like don gillis or formerly trevor matthews, the educator formerly known as oh wait. No no, never mind the educator that formerly worked for emerson. I was trying to make a joke but didn't work there um but uh reach out to those guys and ask them too.

But when you hear the stories of what it takes to get approved by copeland compressors to be in their systems, whether it be oils and all these different things, copeland basically does extensive research into the tunes of tens of thousands, sometimes more dollars, uh. Actually, i know it's more than tens of thousands. I think it might even be close to the hundreds of thousands in research. They do an analysis before they can approve things.

So, therefore, if you want to be approved by copeland, this is what i've heard correct me. If i'm wrong, if you want to be approved by copeland, you basically have to pay a crap ton of money to make sure that they can do all the testing they need to do before. They'll give you approval and there's not many additives of any that are approved by copeland compressors. It's very slim, because a lot of people aren't willing to invest that kind of money on some of the things that they sell.

The next thing you know again: i've used almost all the additives in different circumstances, not usually by choice but by customers, demands or different things like that. The one thing that drives me nuts about dye is just it gets everywhere, and it never goes away even after you change out a compressor put in a different compressor, you think, oh maybe it's going to dilute in the oil. No, the oil is still green. It's like good gosh that stuff is just horrid.

I just can't see that stuff being good in a system, but i'm not a chemist, so i don't know about that. I just i like to i've. I've changed my ways and i really like to stay with what the compressor manufacturers want in the system. So i don't use flushes, don't use anything.

I just will purge the system with nitrogen evacuate it new oil and that's all that i'm gon na put in a system um, let's see uh beau, had asked me a question um. His hood system at his restaurant has gone down and when he called someone to take a look at it, the the contractor insisted that he needs a new motor, i'm reading his email. So he went ahead and replaced the motor 20 minutes into running the motor goes off uh and uh. The motor was just really really hot is what he's saying uh the contractor is insisting that maybe they need a smaller motor now, okay, so and then the contractor.

Never came back so what it sounds like bo is that your contractor doesn't really know what's going on and how to work on exhaust fan systems. Okay, a lot of people think that an exhaust fan is it's not a big deal. It's super easy, but there's a lot of stuff that goes into them and they're not as easy as they look to work on. It's not just hey motor change boom go on, there's a lot of factors that go into it.

So you need to find a contractor in your area. That knows what they're doing okay. The next thing is is that he even called the electrician out and the electrician checked to see if there was any shorts on the wires said, there's nothing um. And then he says that you know, because now the breaker's tripping for the exhaust fan and then so.

The electrician said: maybe he should just keep resetting the breaker um yeah. I think you need to find a new electrician too. Okay, um no offense don't know, but i don't think they from what you're telling me it doesn't sound like your contractor or your electrician knows what they're doing. Okay, if a breaker trips, i will give my customers permission one time to reset the breaker.

If that breaker trips again, i tell them, do not touch it ever again until you get an electrician or a contractor out there, that's the way that i fly with circuit breakers and that's just in a restaurant situation. Now you get into different areas: hospitals, different things like that: you're never allowed to reset a breaker until you go through full massive procedures and there's nothing wrong with those massive procedures, but it's to protect human lives, so um yeah. I think you need to find a new contractor. Okay if your motor is getting too hot and basically it sounds like there's uh plugged up duct work, hood filters are plugged up or the motor is just massively undersized.

Okay, because your motor should not be getting that hot uh, it could not. You know maybe they're not using the right type of motor, it's hard to say, there's a lot of factors that go into it: okay, um, let's see uh, let's see, let's uh get to the chat, real, quick and see what i'm missing in there uh. Let's see, will a cold liquid line ever be a symptom of a low charge. Hmm, let me think about that a cold liquid line.

You know my gut is telling me no. My gut is telling me no. I i my gut is telling me, without thinking about this too hard, that a cold liquid line would indicate some sort of a flashing off of gas in it. Uh like a restriction causing that or something like that.

That would be the only reason. I would think that a liquid line would be cold, uh, cold being a relative term right so obviously cold to your hand, is going to be anything below what 98 degrees or something like that, and it's going to start to feel cooler and cooler um. But i i don't think that a liquid line would ever be frosty or a cold liquid line. I don't know, though, that's an interesting question.

I could be wrong. Um, let's see. Oh there you go jason johnson, said and tell your facilities guys to stop resetting units or alarms it's a pain to show up with no alarms and the equipment is running so jason. I don't know if you're talking about something that i said or if you're i'm assuming you are because you put it in caps, lock um but uh yeah working in facilities, um, there's, there's, there's a flip side to having facility service engineers right because, as an outside Contractor you'll go into a hospital or school or something like that.

I've been that person and they have their own on-site facilities, guys and those guys, whether they're just curious or they're, trying to prove that they're worth what they're getting paid they like to push things they like to reset things and not remember why or what was going On when they did it um and then it makes it very difficult for the service contractor who, by now the customer's fed up because their facilities, people haven't been able to fix it. So now they call us in - and you know and then there's pressure on us and it's like well, then you got to try to undo what these other guys did. This isn't resetting an alarm, but i've told this story many times, but i used to work in a hospital and one of the funniest things that just blew my mind. One time was when they had me, go do uh emergency work on their.

They had a liebert um, no, it wasn't a lee bird, it was a climate master, water source heat pump up in the attic, and it was for the server room. It was like a secondary one, but it's interesting when these hospitals they have a primary and a secondary. If any one of those goes down, it's a 9-1-1 emergency. It's not like! Oh yeah.

You got time. No, they always have redundancy, which is a good thing, but they called me out one time and i go over there and i'm checking the system out now. This is down in their basement. Okay, so they have a uh open loop, water system, cooling tower right and they just add chemicals and different things to the water but um.

It's it's an evaporative cooler, so they do get mud in different things, different debris in the system through the cooling tower. So what happened? Was they fouled? Well, they didn't. They plugged up the strainer on the water source heat pump so many times that their service technician was getting sick and tired of having to come downstairs to the basement. So he decided that he would solve this problem.

It was happening like every week they were plugging up the strainer, so his solution was to just shut off the water. Take the strainer out, put the cap back on and turn it on fast forward. Three weeks later, they call me out - and now i have a completely fouled condenser uh, a coaxial condenser, and i have to clean a coaxial condenser which are a nightmare to clean and let's keep adding to it right. If you're going to flush it out put some rid lime in a pump, i had like a custom pump.

I made and everything you put rid lime in that, whatever this water source heat pump is for the server room, but it's over the ups room, like i'm literally standing over the ups devices that power the entire hospital. That's the battery backup systems. So it's just like those things were such a nightmare and then it's funny too, is, as i'm doing, that they're telling me don't do what the installing contractor did and i'm like. What's that and yeah, he ruptured a water line on top of the all the ups's and uh they lost them all so anyways, it's like now, they're giving me pressure and all this stuff and then come to find out that their solution for the strainers plugging up Was just taking it out, it's just like it caused so much trouble, and so much grief but anyways getting back to it.

Hospitals can be awesome, facilities can be awesome, but then they can also be a pain when you have contractors or other service technicians, because it just gets to be a headache. So i just thought that was a funny story. Let's see what else uh! Thank you very much. Uh jelly or jello youtube um for the super chat, but uh about to start supermarket hvacr and never worked, hvac any tips, any tips, oh man, you're about to start supermarket and you've, never even worked in the trade boy.

Whoo get ready. Man get ready, it's gon na be busy you're gon na be uh. You're gon na be moving your butt supermarkets uh you're you're good for you, man, uh, hopefully you're young. Hopefully, you can take some intense work because that's gon na get you but supermarket dudes they're a different breed.

Those dudes are they're. They're super knowledgeable. You got to do what you got to do: get equipment running so any tips just keep your eyes and ears open pay as much attention as possible and do research when you get done with work. You don't know what it was.

You don't know the new equipment. You were working on research, it you know. So when you go home works not over. That's when you start studying.

Hopefully that helps for you but um all right. So let me cross those ones off my list right. There covered those ones and let's look at the chat, real, quick, hmm, yeah, chanel lakes, refrigeration. I just read your comments.

Again. I don't know man, that's an interesting one. It's cold to touch in the attic! That's interesting, um i'd start uh um, maybe doing digital temperature clamps uh at the liquid line downstairs at the condensing unit and then get it out one into the attic and then get it at the the you know the txv and then see where the temperature changes. Uh, maybe maybe someone left a plug-in or something and it just got released.

I don't know that's an interesting one um. I don't think it's a low charge thing though so uh, let's see question 20 year old, lennox 10 ton package unit r134a hole um lost charge in one week. Pressure tested at 350 today could not find any leaks, got some wires, wet and found the leak from the wired. Oh 134a hole uh dude.

I have found that before. Did that not blow your mind, so he's basically saying that he couldn't find the leak and then he found it. It had an encapsulated pressure control and it was coming out the other end of the wires from the encapsulated pressure control. I have seen that it is crazy when that happens.

It blows your mind like take as many pictures and videos of that, if you ever do, it is the coolest it. That is a really cool thing to see when you find that you're like dang, it's running through the jacket, the encapsulation is that good. So that's that's crazy man, absolutely bonkers! I that was one of the coolest things. I've ever seen so um any favorite tools.

This past week that made my day easier, matthew, lopez, um, well, i've written. No, i wouldn't say this last week, um well, i mean there's a couple new tools that i've been using. I there's another one that i haven't shown you guys that i've been using a little bit just kind of getting comfortable with it is. I also got.

I actually have the box right here, the navac swaging tool. This thing right here i had happen to have the little box, the the nte11l um. I got that from truetechtools. I seen it at uh, ahr and uh.

I held it at hr and then i knew i wanted so i pre-ordered it with truetech tools um by the way, if you guys go to truetechtools and you purchase any tools, there use my offer code. Big picture you'll get an eight percent discount and i get a small commission from that. It helps to support the channel so anyways, but i bought that from true tech tools. I want to say it was like four or six hundred bucks somewhere.

I can't remember somewhere in there um, but it goes down to three eighths. I got ta say: okay, first off, i appreciate the swaging tool, okay, and i really would like to make a video on it and i'll probably talk about this in the video too. But i do appreciate the swaging tool and i appreciate it what it does, because before that i was using the spin swage and i just don't care for the spin switch. My drills are never fast enough.

It's a pain in the butt, especially when you get into bigger stuff, so this swage, when i picked it up it felt like i was holding an impact gun for diesel trucks. It was huge when i got it. I i must have felt it at ahr, but i didn't realize it was so big, so i was very disappointed with the size of it uh. The next thing is like the half inch and the 3 8 swages they're horrible, and you have to spin the swage tool uh halfway through or it'll crack the pipe.

So again. I appreciate this because this is the best battery swaging tool on the market right now. I think it's the only one, but i mean it's it's innovating and i'm still going to use it and i like it, but i feel like there's some some stuff that needs to change with it. So i'll do a video that was an interesting one.

So i appreciate it and it's awesome. I've used it many times. It's just uh, just a little disappointed in some of the the functions that it has, but it's still going to serve a purpose. I'm not going to get rid of it.

I'm going to continue to use it for years, probably um, but the new ones that come out are going to be awesome, i'm sure, because there's always you're always going to try to be better right. So i'm sure navac is already probably working on something new. You know so we'll see, but um, that's the one thing i kind of been getting working out with the last couple weeks. So um, let's see uh, might be, have a drink and celebrate that leak find hard to find.

That is absolutely right. Mike um see what else i'm missing in here, um jason johnson says he likes the hillmore swage, it's compact and it works great. I was just kind of worried about the carpal tunnel issues with the hand ratcheting i mean i guess i'm not doing it every single day. So is it really going to be that big of a deal but yeah? I just went straight to the battery.

I think i just got big tool eyes when i saw it and i was like i got ta have it and then it's like. Oh okay, you know i'll still use it. Um. Let's see samuel had asked me a question uh.

When he's working on static, cold rails, so if you're working on some of the refrigerators for some of the restaurants, they have a us a well up in the top of the box and it's just a static, cold, wrap right. It's a wrap that goes around a pan, so you just put pans in there no ice or anything like that and just off of natural convection, it's going to bring the temperature. So we call it static, though, because it doesn't have an evaporator fan motor. So his question is: is when you're charging a system or checking the pressures when you have a static, cold rail on the top, with no fan motor and a normal dx, you know evaporative coil down below with fan motors.

How do you charge that um? If your system doesn't have a sight glass right is the top supposed to be running, or is it just the bottom running because oftentimes, when you call manufacturers, they want you to charge the pressures, they don't tell you superheat sub coin. Anything like that. So really the answer is, it depends on every piece of equipment. I work on dell field units.

Okay, dell field doesn't publish pressures for the cold rails up, or at least they didn't used to it's been about a year since i've called them and asked them, but they don't publish pressures when the top sections are running, so their published pressures as where they should Be are only with the bottom running, so then you charge according to pressure that way oftentimes these manufacturers. They beat to the tune of their own drum. They don't follow standard refrigeration practices, they install txv systems, they have a receiver, but they don't put a sight glass or they don't put a receiver or a sight glass or they put a receiver dryer good gosh. If you guys have ever worked on a glass tender unit they're, what looks to be like a dryer is a receiver dryer.

It's huge! You can't just replace it with the normal dryer, because then they're not going to have enough refrigerant in the system, so they beat to the tune of their own drums. They do things to save money, always lean on the manufacturers. Okay, so each one does their own thing and it's always really weird uh todd baier. Thank you very much for that super chat man.

I really really appreciate it. Um, you said uh todd bear. I know you thanks bud. I know you right.

Yeah, um anyways. Have i ever used any products from open or uh? No, i hear my friends talking about the open or products um. I have friends that do a lot of the residential high-end residential stuff and i hear them talking about them, but i personally have never used those products so um, let's see what else uh i'm reading through the chat right now, um hillmore hydraulic, not much pressure needed To swage right on okay um, let's see uh javi, i'm assuming that's how you pronounce your name. You'd sent me a question asking me what my preference was with field piece or testo and in his email he said he knows that i'm sponsored by field piece.

I'm actually not sponsored by field piece to be clear. Okay, i do kind of like piece work with field piece when they want to work on a campaign or a project, then i work on a specific project, but i'm not under contract with them. They don't pay me monthly. They pay me whenever i do work for them: okay, but anyways, not not that it matters.

Okay, i think that majority of you that know my content and watch my videos on a regular know that i try to be as sincere as possible and i don't let anybody buy me out or influence my decisions. In fact, i i mean, if you talk to some of my friends, i've turned down some pretty big offers because they didn't want me to be able to do things. The way that i do them: okay and um. I just try to stay real because the moment that this becomes a job for me, i just have no interest in doing it anymore, so i like to have fun with it and do what i want to do my ideal goal.

This is where um you know. I'm going off on a tangent right now, but my ideal goal is that this channel still have hvacr content right and then i want this channel to have a tool like i already have a youtube channel, the hvac our tools, but i haven't been posting on it. Lately, but i want to have a fully self-funded hvac tool review channel where basically, i still have to do sponsorships and things, but i want to be able to buy every single one of my tools and be able to give genuine honest responses about those tools. Unbiased.

That's something that i want to do it's i'm not there yet, because i don't have the capital to be able to start just buying everything that i want to buy um. But i know it is possible uh, ironically, because of a local radio, show that i listen to that. I've listened to for like 10 years, it's leo laporte and he's a tech guy, and but he he self-funds all of his own computer stuff. He doesn't take products anymore and he just uses sponsorships and different things, but um.

I want to be able to do that. So that's something that i want to do in the future and sorry, i'm going off on a whole tangent there, but anyways about field peace and testo. So um it really depends on what is is available to you. Okay, each one is going to have an up and a down okay testo uh, especially with their manifolds, the ones made in germany, they're ha they're, they're they're, one of the best manufactured the german ones, are from what i've heard the one of the best manufactured digital Manifolds out there and they're very, very functional and a lot of their other tools too right.

The testosterone has always been very, very high quality, but it's not always the same with the probes. From what i hear, i've had the testo probes. I think i gave them away um to a viewer, actually a friend of mine, anyways um. I sent them all to him just because i don't like them the field piece ones for what i do they're.

What i like, i like their probes, i like their manifolds they're local to me, they're in anaheim, california. I have a great relationship with them. I know that they are have great customer service. Anybody that lives in southern california has probably in hvac, has either heard of someone or has been themselves to the field peace office.

You take tools when they're damaged, they have a great great warranty policy. I love field piece stuff and their probes just kill it with their range and um, whether you use the joblink app, which they just updated and changed, i'm not being paid for any of this either. By the way, i dig the new joblink app for certain applications and then i also use measure quick for certain applications. There's two things not either the job link, app or measure.

Quick is perfect in my eyes, but both of them have features that make me still want to use both of them um and i like them. So i i'm personally partial to field piece, but it's not because i'm being paid to do so so, let's cross that one off troy had mentioned in one of my videos that uh when i did an exhaust fan video. He said that uh i mentioned in the video that the filters were done. They needed to be thrown away and he was saying well, they can still be cleaned if they use the right cleaners in the right amount of temperature, and i agree i have one of my restaurants that actually that i do service work, for they have a giant.

Well, it's a heated well that they drop their hood filters into every night and it heats them up to like 200 degrees or something like that and just sits there and boils and crap off of them. So they just pull them out, rinse them off and call it a day. So yes, i know that those filters could have been saved but understand something again. These videos are not scripted and they're not meant to be like i don't film them like i'm talking to you.

I film them, like i'm talking to my employees and um, knowing this customer they're never going to clean them right. If i tell them to clean them. They'll say they clean them and then i'll be back multiple times versus and what i learned was to start going to the higher ups at the corporate office and saying dude. You got to figure this out because these guys are ruining stuff for them.

So i look out for the corporation too, by recommending things, and so what i'm saying is in the video i was more or less saying you know to my employees yeah these aren't salvageable the restaurant. I wasn't giving context really is what i'm saying i know they could have been clean, but i know that this restaurant is not capable of cleaning them the way that they need to. So it's easier just to tell them to replace them, because the amount of money they're gon na spend on my service calls are gon na it's gon na, be so much cheaper, just buy some new filters and move on. So i don't sell the filters by the way either.

So i'm telling them you know buy them. I don't care who you get them from just get the dang filters, so i'm not benefiting from it at all. I'm talking them out of work, basically um. So, let's see what we got going on here, i do that a lot actually talk.

My customers out of work, i'm a crazy nut like that. Uh oscar had asked me a great, a great question, so he was asking me about an exhaust wheel and i'm gon na i'm just paraphrasing his question. He was asking how to measure an exhaust wheel um, so i'm gon na kind of go broad with that and let's talk about sizing, an exhaust fan, okay, all right! So with an exhaust fan. First, off in a perfect world, you have engineered drawings in front of you.

You know how much the uh, the hood canopy, was designed how much air it was designed to pull through it. You can just basically look at that. Go to the exhaust fan manufacturer say here's the power i have at the building 208. 3 phase.

This is how much air i need to move. What do i need to do when they custom build an exhaust fan? Okay, that's in a perfect world that never happens when you're out in the field when you're out in the field, the customer calls you go out there, this exhaust fan's, 10 years old, it's beat up, there's no data on it. It's not running you don't know you! Don't have drawings anymore, you don't have any of that stuff and you got to figure something out. Okay, so here's how you do it.

This is kind of like the roundabout hack way to size exhaust fans when you don't have all the drawings and perfect world in front of you, okay, so the first thing you do, you have a non-functioning exhaust fan. You take down the voltage. Okay, once you know the voltage just measure it or um, just look at the panels. You'll find out.

208 3 phase is most common in my area. Okay, so you know you need a 208 volt, three-phase motor, okay. The next thing you're going to do is you're going to measure the duct the curbing coming up through the roof: okay, not the exhaust fan, but the outside diameter of the duct coming up through the roof. Okay measure the outside diameter.

So you know what the fan needs to fit over. Okay, then, what you do you may need a curb adapter that sometimes happens too. Once you get the measurement of the diameter of the curb. So that way, you know what size fan to put over that.

What you need to do is take the existing fan and measure the wheel. Okay, you measure the height of the wheel and you kind of got to guesstimate a little bit and then you measure the diameter, and if you have the diameter and the height, they can match that wheel up to an exhaust fan with that same wheel, size. So what the exhaust fan company will do is say you have this kind of power. You have this size breaker, so that gives them an idea where they need to backwards calculate some things.

Then you know that the ductwork is this size. Okay, um. As far as uh, you know, if they ask you how you want to design the static, it's pretty safe, to say for most kitchen ducts that if you design at one inch of static, if you just say one inch of static, it's a pretty safe bet. Now you can't make estimations in other situations and understand this is kind of a redneck way of doing it.

Okay, so once you have that information uh, if you still want to backwards, calculate further, take the motor rpms, the wheel, size and uh the pulley sizes and match all that up on the new fan, make sure you get the same size pulleys. Then you can kind of guesstimate and round about come up with the same exhaust fan, so the new exhaust fan will be able to somehow fit over a curb it'll have the wheel, that's the same size as yours. Uh you have the motor information. You know so.

You're, basically just backwards building a fan um with what they have available and that'll get you in the ballpark and that's the easiest way to kind of come up with a new exhaust fan size. So i know i answered your question there oscar, but then i added a whole bunch more to that. So hopefully that makes sense any of you guys and isn't just my rambling that nobody understands uh, let's see what else we got going on here. Um uh jesse is saying thoughts on weighing in the charge via vapor on the low side, with a cap tube system.

Only so the compressor doesn't start against a full head of liquid jesse uh, don't sweat it bro you're! Think about it. I mean when you're charging a system, what you need to do first off, don't sweat so much about the compressor starting up. Okay. So what you do, when you say charge is a vapor, it's safe, just assume every refrigerant you use just charges a liquid dude, it's just easier.

I mean you still got to be careful in certain situations. I get what you're saying, but also you need to remember. There's not many refrigerants out there that you can charge in a vapor form anymore, because most of them are all blends, and if it's a blend, you always have to charge it in a liquid form. Okay, so the only refrigerant that you are possibly even working on is r12 or r22 that's a or 134a technically you can charge 134a as a vapor um, but just charges the liquid man.

It's easier turn the system off, pull a good evacuation. Put everything on there. Let the scale run let it suck in as much refrigerant turn it off turn the high side off turn the system on start it up and slowly meter it in through the low side. I think a lot of people get a little too paranoid about charging liquid on a compressor.

You really really need to be careful about it on semi, hermetic, compressors, but scrolls and recipes at least the modern ones they can handle a little bit of charging on the low side. I mean you, don't want 100 liquid going back to them, but give them a little bit. They'll be okay, so um, let's see what else we got going on in here, captive air is cool. Their hmi is nice you're more of a rapid fan, though um.

I don't know who a rapper that fan is. I do a little bit of work with captive air. I do a little bit of work with greenheck. I've done work with cook um couple different ones.

I mean uh i'll, be honest. My favorite exhaust fans out there are the utility set fans so captive air greenheck. They all make them, but i like the utility fans because especially uh there's a company that was out here in southern california, called central blower and they're custom and local, and they just make utility fans and the cool thing about utility fans is they're just easy. They have standard pillow block bearings, they have room to work and they're just easier.

They take up more space they're a little bit more ugly when it comes to high rises and different things looking down on buildings, but utility fans just seem to be the easiest to work on. Maybe that's just my old school i'm asking in the chat right now. Do you guys prefer, like a mushroom style, exhaust fan versus a utility style with a you know, a donaldson or a supreme, or something like that or uh central blower? I prefer the utility ones um. I, like full-size pillow block bearings i like to be able to get to a shaft and a wheel.

You know and not have to be like tucked down in a mushroom. Let's see what else we got going on here: um uh! How do i braise copper to brass matthew lopez when you're using dissimilar metals, whether it be stainless to copper, stainless to brass copper? You know, and vice versa, all the way around you need to use a high silver content solder. So what i'm going to use is me personally, i use 56 silver solder, so that's a very high silver content. You need to use a paste flux, that's made for silver soldering gon na clean the heck out of the pipe flex it and get it nice and hot the key to using silver solder, and this is the tricky thing when you're using high content or high silver Content solder, 56, 45.

Whatever it is, you have to get it so unbelievably hot to get the solder to flow, but then once it flows it flows like plumbing solder. It's really interesting how it works um, but you got to get it like uncomfortably hot to get it to flow and then boom. It just goes. You know, unlike silphos, where still foss you've got to kind of work with it a little bit when you're doing copper to copper but silver solder man.

It's just whoosh, wraps right around. It's really nice, but it's kind of tricky too um.