Ah, it's time to chill out and get ready for a mediocre. Qa 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! Welcome to the HVAC, our videos livestream, I'm gon na kind of enter this a little bit different.

I want to start out with a little intro because we have a lot of new people to the stream into the channel. My name is Chris. I'm an HVAC are service tech here in Southern California, and I make these YouTube videos to just share the little bit of knowledge that I have with everybody else. I also do these live streams to kind of answer.

The questions that I get from the videos that I post, because I do a lot of I get a lot of questions I should say between the instagrams, the Facebook, the YouTube comments and emails. So you know I kind of take the best of the best questions. The ones that I get the most often and try to address them on the live stream, so I have a couple things that I want to cover as usual, I start out with a list of things that I want to talk about. Just a list of questions.

Talking points, I guess you can call them, and then I also get to the the chat. We have a live chat for those of you that are watching this after the fact, if you come to the live, show there's a live chat going on to within YouTube, and I kind of answer questions within there too. So for those of you that are in the live, chat, hey everybody, how you doing merry Christmas to everybody that celebrates that here in the States for for the people that aren't around here Christmas is in a couple days. Well, I guess not just for the States.

It's for the countries or whatever that celebrate Christmas, but you guys get what I'm trying to say there, some but anyways, so we're gon na get to this right now. So I see a lot of familiar faces in the chat hello to everybody. How you guys doing today, I'm in support of my good friend from up north, I'm wearing my v-neck shirt, just to support my buddy Joe, because he gets a lot of flack. If you guys don't know who Joe is I'm just messing with him? I was kind of joking around Joe's from the overtime show.

We got a lot of the overtime guys in here too, that are always inside this chat, so the overtime show is Friday, nights correct me if I'm wrong guys, 6 p.m. or 6 p.m. let's see 6 p.m. pacific 9 p.m.

East Coast time. I think is what time it is. Hopefully I didn't butcher that it's on the HVAC shoptalk channel, so definitely check that show while um. Let's see we got a lot of people in here right now.

Oh yeah today is Festivus. That's right! That's the fake Christmas holiday from Seinfeld right, that's going on in the chat again for those of you guys that don't know for those of you that are watching this in the recap. You know you're gon na see me constantly interacting with the chat. That's why I encourage you guys to come to the live show, because then you can interact with me and you know go through all that so as usual guys, the guys that are in the chat questions throw them in caps.

Lock, I'm gon na go through my list of stuff and then we will definitely get to some of your guys's questions. Okay, so we're gon na jump right into it. I had two videos that I released since the last livestream. The first one was.

Actually, I don't remember one what order, but I'm just gon na discuss the video, so I'm gon na talk about the HVAC. Thank you very much for that super chat man. I really appreciate it so the first video I want to talk about is my. I had a little delfield reaching cooler that I had a leak in the pan, chiller section or cold rail section.

Okay. That was a very interesting one, because I went ahead and took the box back to the shop and dissected it cut. It open cut the pan chiller off I've never done that before, but I was always kind of curious myself as to how delfield put their pancha lers together. Now I have built those units before with a stainless steel shop that I work with, where they'll fabricate him and we'll make a cold rail.

I was never really successful in making the cold rails because they just I understand, looking at the way that delfield put theirs together. Mine was nothing like that. Mine was just a simple cold wrap with some insulation on it, and I get you know: delfield totally encapsulated that thing in insulation, but it was really interesting because we had the the bottom or the yeah, the bottom of the cold rail expanded up. Now I never really found out why the bottom of the chrome grill expanded up.

I had a lot of people in the comments that had set. You know came up with some theories and some of them sounded pretty good. The most common theory that I had in the comments was that the refrigerant leak, because there was a refrigerant leak in it, pressurized that cavity and popped the cold rail up. But the problem with that is is that there was a pressure relief device held on by a little plastic cap that I just can't see that pressurizing with refrigerant.

I just can't see that pushing up the metal inside there. My theory was that maybe the temperature controller had stuck, and maybe the glycol makes sure isn't correct. I kind of regret not testing the glycol with a refractometer. I probably should have done that when I taken it out, but if you guys haven't, do me a favor and go watch that video and you guys will totally understand what I was talking about, but yeah.

I definitely pulled that thing apart and it was. It was interesting the way that it went together. So in talking about that, I want to go into a little topic that I have on my list right now and that's how to approach technical support. Okay, because I called technical support on that box.

But I went through a lot of tests and steps before I made the decision to call technical support. Technical support of any manufacturer gets tons of phone calls a day. There's no need to call them for simple stuff: hey what happens if my gaskets not working, I mean it's, you don't call them for simple things: okay, and when you do call a technical support. I I strongly urge you guys to make sure that you have all your ducks in a row, so I had a cold rail leak and I had a feeling because I didn't know if they were gon na warranty, the box or not, and in the end they Did not warranty the box to my understanding, but the customer buys direct from them.

So I don't know exactly what happened, but my understanding was that box was a couple weeks out of warranty and they didn't warranty it but anyways. I digress on that one. But before I call technical support, I went through all the steps on that unit. I checked the refrigerant pressures.

I checked the temperatures. I came up with the whole list of things so that way, when I did call technical support, I wasn't wasting their time. Okay, I had everything in a row and I literally said hey: I have a leak in the cold rail, it's verified, here's how I verified it. I isolated the top section, pressurized it with nitrogen I've watched it drop.

You know X, number of psi in the last X number of minutes. I have a video of it. I have pictures of it. How do you guys want me to approach this and they literally said we're gon na, send you a sheet and when they sent me the sheet to fill out, it was everything that I had already done.

So I literally just copy and pasted all the stuff that I had and sent it on over to them, and they had an answer to me within like an hour. Technical support is a good resource. Now I will say: there's some tech support departments that suck delfield is not one of them. Delfield has a great technical support department, even Manitowoc ice machines.

You know most of the the only technical support departments that I've real had a problem with was carrier air-conditioning and it's because again I'm not calling carrier direct. I'm calling my parts distributor and their tech support really isn't the greatest, but that's the only one that I really have anything bad to say about most the other tech support departments that I've called have been very knowledgeable and very good. But again, I'm not calling them asking them stupid questions, I'm really giving them the information that they thought. You know that they would.

I I kind of go to them and say here's what I checked. This is what I did to the point that they're like well sounds like you checked everything. I guess it's got that, but you know you get what I'm saying you know when you're calling and leaning on tech support you want to have all your information ready. The same thing applies to when you're, calling a service manager or someone for help.

Don't call a buddy or your service manager and say yeah man. This refrigerator is not working. What can I check? That's a stupid question. Okay, guys and I've said that there's no stupid questions, but there is a stupid question when you call someone unprepared and don't have information ready for them.

That's a stupid question. Okay! So have the information ready? What do you think they're gon na ask you most of the time when you go through a checklist of things, and you get all this information prepared, you're gon na present it to someone and they're gon na, say dude the answers right there and you're gon na Have it written down so a lot of the times people give you checklists and they ask you to check things because, most of the time, you're gon na figure out what it is before you even call them back or before you call them in the first place. Okay, so being prepared for a technical support, call whether it be to a service manager or a manufacturer. Whatever is very important.

Okay, that's that's! One of the biggest pieces of advice is that I can give you guys. It's just be prepared, collect all the information that you could possibly think they need. Even if you have too much information, it doesn't hurt. Okay, get it all check it all and then also one of the biggest things I'm gon na segue into a conversation too that I had with the manager and this kind of goes into another video, but communication with the on-site staff.

That is a very, very important thing. Okay, and I will definitely get to the chat here in a minute - I'm not really paying attention to that, but I'll get to it. Okay, communication with the customer is very important talking to the customer asking them what time things happened when it happened, were there any funny sounds. Were there any funny smells just talking to the customer and general building a relationship with the customer that definitely helps you.

Okay, that's gon na help you to excel in your troubleshooting techniques. Okay, I'm gon na go ahead and glance over at the chat and see if there's anything that I'm missing and Matt Gordon asked me. Was there any way to repair that cold rail or is there no way? No, it's all good Matt there's! You know you can ask any questions you want. I was gon na say, there's no stupid questions, but I did just mention a minute ago that there is stupid questions, but no that's not a stupid question.

No. There was no way to repair that rail. There was no way once I pulled that thing apart. I was not getting it back together.

Okay, that thing was sealed from the factory with insulating foam and all kinds of different things, and I had to pry up and Bend metal and all kinds of stuff to get it apart. So in that particular case, once that reach-in had a leak in the cold rail, there was nothing we could do. The customer actually already replaced it and we actually already installed it before. I brought it back to the shop and disassembled it so between the diagnosing.

The first part of the video and the last part of the video was probably about three weeks of time had passed, because the customer actually ordered a new refrigerator. There's a big national account, so they order everything themselves. They had ordered a new refrigerator and I had sent a technician out to go, install the new refrigerator already so their refrigerators already working, and then I had him bring it back to the shop very carefully, because I wanted to dissect it. In that same thing, I mentioned a few things in that video that I had some concerns because there was a big hole in the back of the box where a tech screw was attack.

Screw was a little long and I was kind of concerned. I was a little bit nervous that maybe we put a screw too long and pierced the back section. I never found out why, on the back of that box, there was pink what looked to be like glycol. I never found out what it was.

Maybe it was just the marker that a previous tech had used cuz. If you noticed on the back of that box, there was a bunch of writing where someone had written something with like a pan or something like that. My previous tech, that was there, had written on the back of the box, and I don't know I I he may be watching this. He may not I'll have to ask him.

Maybe he wrote in a red paint marker or something like that, and it just faded off. I never figured out why there was pink running down in the back of the box, because there was absolutely no way possible that the glycol had leaked out. I had originally thought it was a leak from the glycol, but no that was not the case and the glycol was super pink, meaning that it didn't even look like. It was diluted down very much so it was a mystery.

I never really found out what caused the unit to swell up in the way that it did so all right. Let's see what I'm missing in the chat here, yeah HVAC, our heat master. You said you thought it I step and the ice was as hard as a rock and expanded. That's kind of my theory too.

I'm thinking, maybe the glycol mixture. I really wish. I would have tested that glycol make sure with a refractometer, but I didn't before I got rid of it. I really think that maybe the temp control had stuck and the the liquid solution in the top, which would have been a mixture of glycol and water froze and possibly expanded, because the only thing that could lift the metal the way that it did, and it wasn't Just like the metal was popped up, I mean it popped, the creases up, so it had to expand with extreme force to be able to pop those creases up.

My theory is, is that it froze underneath there the solution of some sort. Now I don't know if a temp control stuck or what happened, but it's one of those things I'll, never really understand. Unless I ran into the same situation again, possibly you know so who knows all right? Let's see what I'm missing here, hate everybody that's coming in. Let's see, what's my opinion on the industry driving down restaurant p.m.

prices, Ryan, Tanner, that's an interesting question. So in general I deal with commercial. I'm sorry I do a big restaurant chain so in general, obviously they're concerned about the bottom line, they're concerned about driving costs down. Okay, so they're always looking for a lower preventative maintenance price if they're doing a preventative maintenance, and it's just one of those things when you deal with corporations, you have to understand now that doesn't mean you have to lower your prices, but you have to understand they're Gon na do everything they can to save money.

Alright, even sometimes they may even go with other companies that are cheaper than you, so you have to stand strong and hold to your own. If you believe in your pricing schedule, then you need to stick to your pricing schedule as far as preventative maintenance'as, most restaurants, the big national chains are getting rid of their preventative maintenance programs there's very few of them. So I deal with one giant chain: that's nationwide! Actually worldwide and they don't do preventative maintenance azat all they used to have a filter changing company. They may still have a filter changing company that changes filters, but I think that's about it.

They eliminated a preventive maintenance. As many years ago, I still deal with some bigger chains that still do preventative maintenance. Terry, thank you very much for that super chat dude. But you know it's it's just the trend right now, casual dining in general is hurting.

A lot of people aren't going to casual dining. The market is getting saturated with fast casual restaurants like Chipotle's and Rubio's, and different things like that, where you can be in and out really quick and it's not so much like the big fancy casual dining that were of the 80s and 90s. Those are kind of dying off, so they have to do something to save money, so they cut the preventive maintenance. -- is, and it leads to all kinds of other problems.

So it's fuller than pushing down the prices, there's really no winning with that one. You know preventative maintenance is I mean I don't give away a preventative maintenance for free as far as my company goes, but preventative maintenance? Is you don't make top dollar for a preventative maintenance? It's it's more or less away into the restaurant to be able to, depending on your integrity, to be able to be in the restaurant when something breaks now, there's some companies out there that just went away in the door, so they can. You know I don't want to point fingers, but there's some companies that you know don't really take care of the restaurant and create bigger problems than there really should be. But if you're an honest company, a preventative maintenance is a way to get into the restaurant.

Yes, you're not gon na make your top wage, your top hourly rate, all that stuff, but it's a way into the door. So that way, you can be the person that they're gon na call when something breaks. So if I have to discount a little bit to go change some filters and have a tech there that can make recommendations to say, hey, you've got contactors that are going bad, hey you've got pulleys that are going bad, hey, etc, etc, etc. Then I can sell them my service at full, hourly rates.

You know - and it's just kind of that you know thing you got to play with okay, so it's kind of a game you got to play when it comes to that and depending on the restaurant chain. You know it's a whole thing: I'm not gon na go into the business side of it, but it's definitely a fun game and I'm being sarcastic when I say fun Harry. You asked me: what is the best wireless probes on the market for the money? Okay? So here's the deal I have only ever used one wireless probe, and that is the field piece. No, I take that back.

I lied. I've used two wireless probes, the IEEE manifold system and the field piece, JobLink, probes, okay, the IEEE manifold system was revolutionary. It was amazing when it came out. Unfortunately, I'm not a fan of the new app, but I'm not saying that the probes are bad, there's still great probes, they have great sensors in them.

It's just lately. I've been using the field piece probes and those are my go-to probe, okay, without getting into all the politics of what happened with the IEEE manifold company. Here's what I don't like about the IEEE manifold and I don't mean to talk crap. They have still amazing probes.

Okay, but the software just not so much so for me, if I had to recommend anything, I would recommend the field piece job link probes. Now I will say I have never used the test. Oh smart probes, I have heard other people's reviews on the test. Oh smart probes, so I and I'm not a fan of tests.

Oh, I have used some of the test out products and again I don't like to talk crap on people, but I just whenever I have opened up like the testo app, it just seems like it. Wasn't made for America if that makes sense the units and different things? Yes, you can change them to standard units and inches, and you know all that fancy stuff, but it just doesn't seem like it was really made and it doesn't seem like it's tailored towards the United States. So being that I'm in the United States, I really like the field piece products. Okay field piece has been my go-to.

I actually. My office is like 45 minutes away from the field peace headquarters and actually work closely together with them, so maybe I'm a little biased. I don't know, but I prefer the field piece Jobling probes. Definitely a good good probe set to get.

There's always show link, show notes in my videos for different products. There's field piece probes, but what I would highly suggest is: if you're interested in the field piece job link probes, my buddy Zak has the HVAC shop Talk and he actually has a discount code with true tech tools. If you don't have a local supplier that you want to go through check out true tech tools, comm and use my buddy Zacks offer code shoptalk and you'll get like any yeah. It's a 8 % discount okay, shameless plug right there for my buddy, but I get nothing from that, but anyways I'm going off on a tangent again.

Okay, so I will go ahead and go back to my list right here and then I'll definitely get to some more questions inside the chat. Okay. So the next video that I released was an interesting one and it was on the exhaust fan that kept turning on and off. Alright, it was eggs, a whole exhaust fan system, so that one was a really interesting video in that I wanted to stress very much that we had good communication with the manager when I walked in the door very important.

Okay, again, no matter if I have a problem with the manager, no matter, if he's difficult, I still when I walk in the door, I greet the manager, I shake his hand, I say hey: what's up, we bumped fists whatever it is. We stop. We say hello. I asked him how everything's going how's everything running.

What did you guys call me about today? I said the service call was about exhaust fans. Is that what's going on, and then I asked him, what is your opinion? What's going on you quiz them in a nice way, is there a certain time that it happened? Is there anything funny that happened, and then the manager said yeah, you know what we had a power outage that day we had a power outage and then later on. In the day, our exhaust fans just started, turning on and off on and off on and off, ok cool. The most valuable information that manager could give me was that he had a power outage that day.

No, that did not answer my questions, but it gave me some knowledge to be able to approach the problem, so I walked up to the hood system. It was running fine, no problems, ok, but in the back of my mind I was thinking they had a power outage, so it's kind of a smart hood system in that it has some automatic features and it has a fancy circuit board in it, and I approached It and just said hey, I have, I already had a hunch when he told me that he had a power outage. I said I bet you, it has something to do with that power outage. So again I wasn't dwelling on the subject, but I had that in the back of my mind, so I went up, I checked everything out went onto the roof found a few loose belt.

It's nothing major went back downstairs and then I had. I had a pretty good hunch, the entire time I went ahead and man you before I even called technical support. I went in and pushed a few buttons check to see if I could figure out what was going on. Everything seemed to be fine and then I called technical support and I asked him about my hunch.

I had a hunch, I said: does this hood have an auto power-on feature and he said yes, it does and it's based off of temperatures - and I said, okay cool. So I said if the restaurant had a power outage and they didn't shut off their turn. Their hoods back on manually with the hoods have turned themselves back on automatically and he said yes, they would, and I said, cool and then we went through the process - okay and calling and talking to tech support, and we were just kind of reviewing the things that I saw I reviewed the error message that was on there. He said that error message was a little concerning, but we went ahead and cleared it out.

It could have been because of the power outage. Who knows so? We cleared the error message out and then we were kind of going through the sensor settings on that one, and we saw that we had a high room temperature sensor and I'm sitting here thinking. You know what the room temperatures is cold in that kitchen. It was like sixty something degrees because it was a cold morning and I go there's no reason for that room temp to be that high and then in talking to Technical Support.

We kind of confirmed that my possible suspicions now again possible because I never got to recreate the exact problem. So I was kind of going at it with a educated guess all right and I believe my suspicion was confirmed because it's been about a week and a half and we haven't had any more problems. And that was simply that the zone sensor or the room temperature sensor was located in front of a supply duct. So it was getting hit with the discharge air from the kitchen AC, all right and when they opened up the outside door, it was blowing air into the building.

The kitchen ec was cranking, and my theory was was that the auto power off feature was actually turning. The hoods off okay, so the whole point is, is I'm not trying to tell you that I'm absolutely correct with my diagnosis? Okay, it's not that it's how I approached the problem that I want you guys to take note of okay. I do not know everything. I will not ever know everything, but the way that I approach the problem was looking at the big picture.

Thinking about everything, educating myself, asking questions on the phone to technical or not calling tech support and saying you know this is what I think it is. I called them and said: hey, I have a theory, but what are your thoughts? How does this hood system work refresh? My memory explain things to me and we went through and we systematically broke down what could possibly happen and what could possibly make the hoods turn on and off. Okay, I went ahead and changed all the belts or adjusted and necessary ones and changed some of them too, but again big-picture diagnosis, guys just stepping back to looking at the big picture. Evaluating everything.

Communication is key with the management now there's another thing to understand. How far is too far when it comes to big-picture diagnosis, because there is a point when you're - and I have a good question about this - my buddy Stirling from over in France actually asked me this question. He says you know: what's what's the difference between a gut feeling and OCD or just obsessing about something all right, Tommy 6312. I will get to your questions.

Thank you so very much for your super chat. That is an amazing super chat. Dude. I will get to that right now.

Okay, so my buddy Stirling asked me, you know how far is too far and what's the point at which you're just obsessing about something versus double-checking, something and he's asking in question to my comment at the end of the exhaust fan video, where I was talking about Double checking yourself triple checking yourself in trusting your gut to make sure everything is back on, and that is a great question in an honesty, Stirling dude, I don't know, I have discounted hours off of bills that I have built because of my obsession because I have Driven back up to a customer's location after I left an hour-long drive back just to make sure I turn something on, because when I called them, they couldn't verbalize over the phone, whether or not it was working properly, and I just didn't trust it, and I just Didn't want the call back, so I'm gon na err on the side of my OCD and obsess about things versus I'd rather waste. My time then look bad in the customers eyes. I'd rather lose a little bit of money on my hourly rage wage than look bad in my customers eyes, because the customers perception of you is everything. Okay.

So hopefully I kind of answer your question there Stirling and that I'm gon na just I'm gon na obsess about it and make sure that I go back on my dime just to make sure that everything is good. Until I feel comfortable enough to know that when I say I shut or turn something back on, I turned it back on okay, so hopefully I kind of answered your question there, but so Tommy that amazing super chat. You asked me a question. You said you don't know how much you don't know much about refrigerants, but you saw a video where I vented our 290 in a building and you're just curious about how different refrigerants affect health long long-term as an HVAC technician.

First off this is gon na be kind of morbid and probably shouldn't say this, but I am sure pretty darn sure that I'm gon na die of some sort of a cancer because of refrigerant inhalation, okay, inhaling refrigerants, it's one of those things I hate to say It it's a horrible thing, you know whatever it is. What it is. I've been around many things that I shouldn't be around. You know ingested some things I shouldn't have you know breathed in that kind of sigh ingested.

It's not the right word, but so as far as venting art or our 290 refrigerant. First off. If you don't know anything about refrigerants, there's only a handful of refrigerants that we can legally vent into the atmosphere. Our 290 happens to be one of them.

Co2 is another one, water is a refrigerant. Technically we can vent that into the atmosphere, nitrogen, it's technically a refrigerant. We can vent. Add that into the atmosphere majority of the other refrigerants.

We actually have to recover the refrigerants and dispose of them in a proper way. Where we put them in a special tank and we send them off to be disposed of accordingly now, whatever the manufacturer does once they dispose of them, I have no idea supposedly they, whatever some safe eco-friendly BS stuff, but our 290 has been deemed legal by the Epa, the Environmental Protection Agency - that is, a federal agency in the United States and they're, saying that our 290 can legally be vented into the atmosphere. There is nothing supposedly dangerous about it. Our 290 is basically like 98 % pure propane.

It has no additives added to it and it's supposed to be super clean propane. So what are the health effects? It can't be good all right, but when I vent the charge of an r2 90 refrigerant currently in the United States right now we have a charge limitation of a hundred and fifty grams. That is like five point: six seven ounces of refrigerant that minimal amount. I don't think is really gon na make a big effect on it's, not gon na make it like a toxic thing to breathe.

In I mean, obviously I mean if you're in a confined space, it's not something you want to breathe in a perfect world whenever you're venting an R to 90 charge. You obviously want to take the unit outdoors, but sometimes you just can't. Sometimes you have to do it indoors and I'm not too concerned about it, but it's just one of those things. So hopefully I kind of answered your question there bud and I'll definitely get to a couple more of the questions here.

All right - and let me see - let's see, Kenmore refrigeration rookie. You said your father was an HVAC guy and refrigerants have chlorine, fluorine and hydrocarbons? Yes, they do. Yes, a lot of refrigerants have nasty chemical components to them, so they are not safe to be breathing. It's definitely something you want to make sure that you recover the refrigerants properly and dispose of them properly.

Okay, all right, let's see what else we got any questions guys. I'm gon na pay attention to the chat for a minute and then I'll definitely get to my list again guys. Questions put him in caps, lock, Nick 64, most expensive job, very good question. That line set job that I did very recently where I changed the line set.

That was a pretty pricey one. That was pretty ridiculous. I can't name the price, but I was a little embarrassed when I came across the price for that one. It was quite up there, so, let's see what else.

How do I know when to draw the line and condemn the unit? I cage VA C asked me that question. So that's a really good question and that's actually something that's on my list. So I got a question the other day too, that's very similar to yours, Ike, and it simply said: why are you fixing these units that unit and they were concerned about a 5 ton air conditioner, that I changed a compressor on fixed a leak on? I think I even changed a motor or something like that and they were like. Why did you fix that unit? It would have been cheaper to replace the entire unit, and while the question is somewhat accurate here in California, the replacement cost is stupid, expensive.

Alright, the government regulations in California are ridiculous to the point that most customers have been fixing their equipment lately, even though the actual equipment price is probably cheaper, the installation price, the permitting price and all the red tape they have to go through oftentimes makes it so Expensive that they opt to fix equipment before replacing it so know something that when I quote to replace a compressor in a five tone - air conditioner - I call my contacts at that particular company. I say: hey look, do you have any interest in changing this equipment and most of the time they say, don't even quote it just quote the repair, don't even quote a replacement. We don't even want to think about it. Okay, it's very rare that customers choose to replace equipment.

Now I do have some customers that are very proactive, but it's it's usually on the latter side, most of the time customers just want to repair equipment, so we just give them the option. We put it in the customers hands, I give them the facts. So to answer your question, I just give the customer the facts most of the time, the big national chains. They have a dollar amount that that particular piece of equipment is worth.

They have a shelf life for that particular equipment. It's usually based off of a depreciation time at which the tax, write-offs and so usually the customer, says hey. I don't have any more tax write-offs on that unit. It's fully depreciated and the cost is this much and the replacement is this much? Let's buy a new one, so it's really inevitably in the customers hands to make the decisions on whether or not it's time to replace.

If I had to say if a repair in a perfect world, if a repair cost was 80 % of the replacement cost and the unit was out of warranty, I would encourage the customer to go ahead and replace it, because the new box is going to get A warranty typically refrigerator warranties for the most part. These days are three year: parts and labor, warranties and five-year compressor warranties. But again it's not my decision to make. I make a recommendation and I put it in the customers hands.

I give him a repair price. I give him a replacement price and I say what do you want to do and then they make those decisions and it all changes, depending on the time of the year, how their budgets are going. There's all kinds of numbers and fancy stuff way beyond my head. That go into that one.

Okay, all right! Let's see what else I got going on in this chat. Okay, why are beacon so garbage Matt Gordon? So I honestly have never worked on a beacon system, but I have worked on the qrc system, which is a dumbed-down beacon. Okay, the beacon system is a heat craft manufactured control system for their evaporator coils. It usually communicates with the condensing unit on the roof communicates with the evaporator downstairs.

It has a central human interface and then you have some features on setting stuff up now I have worked with the qrc system, which, like I said, is a dumbed-down beacon system, so it usually doesn't have a user interface. It doesn't have any communication with the roof. The qrc simply has a circuit board in the evaporator and electronic expansion valve and a couple sensors and it acts as the temp control in the valve controller. I honestly haven't had too many problems with the qrc system.

Besides some sensors failing, so I really have nothing bad to say about them. I have heard some headaches and negative stuff about the beacon system. But again I will say that majority and I'm not I'm not dogging anybody on this, but majority of the manufacturers. Problems typically are because of installation errors.

Okay, but again I have no experience to completely talk about the beacon system. Okay, so, let's see what else I got going on in here, storm you've seen a few videos claiming improper installation was the cause of the failure. If that's the case, how does the unit run until then? That is a really good question and that segues into another question, so improper unit installation a lot of times stuff is installed incorrectly, like, for instance, in my exhaust fan, video that I just released where we had a zone sensor or a room temperature sensor that was Installed in the direct path of the supply duct, it never became a problem until the one time when they had a power outage and the power turned the exhaust system back on. It's just one of those fluke things that particular restaurant has been open for five years and they've never had a problem with that exhaust system like they did.

It's just that one fluke time that I was able to dissect it and figure out what happened. A lot of times too, you know when I take over a restaurant. I see potential installation problems too, and I will bring them up to the customer and say hey, you know this is a problem and the customer says well. Is it working, and I said yes, it is working, but it's not correct and they say just leave it alone until it becomes a problem again, it's all about the numbers, sometimes with these customers.

Okay, I have an air conditioning unit that I've showed a few times on different videos and it's a Linux packaged unit and the circuit board is completely disconnected there's wires going everywhere. Originally, when I took over that customer's account, the customer said: hey, go ahead and get it fixed, but I honestly have not had a chance to fix that unit yet, and it still sits that way. This day the heating works and the cooling works. So one of these days I'll get to it, but it's one of those things that I just haven't torn apart and it's a mistake and it's been operating fine for years now someday it may be a problem and to be able to fix.

You know, let's say something else breaks in that unit, but because the circuit boards all disconnected and there's all kinds of funky wiring, I may go to the customer and say: look dude. This thing's been torn up since day one. I can't fix the existing problem until we fix this problem, so that creates you know a headache too. Sometimes so, when there's improper installation, sometimes it just leads to a short equipment life, and you have to correct the installation issue once you install new equipment or replace a compressor or something like that, so oftentimes equipment will run for a very long time, and you know It just you just wait until things break, sometimes: ok, we try to bring it up, but sometimes the customer just doesn't want to spend the money.

So all right, let's see what else yeah exactly Kenmore refrigeration. He mentioned something about 30 pounds of negative pressure. Now again, that 30 pounds number someone else came up with that. That was for a different video, but I did mention that so all right on a compressor burn out.

What is the proper procedure to go about, besides replacing the compressor so great question Anthony? So here's the deal when we have a compressor burn out so assuming that you just came to this restaurant for the first time, let's just call it a restaurant okay, it could be anything though. So let's say you came to the building the first time. The first thing that I'm gon na do when I approach a situation where I find a grounded, compressor or a burnout. Okay is I'm going to quote the replacement to the customer and there are certain steps that I'm gon na take.

So if I'm dealing with a package unit like, let's just say a Lennox air conditioner, I I have some theories in my head. I have a Lennox air conditioner and I have a grounded compressor. Well, I happen to know that on this particular model of Linux, air conditioners not all of them, but on this particular model, I've seen a lot of expansion valve power. Heads fail, okay and then I have a grounded compressor.

I say: okay, you know what that model has an issue with the expansion valve, so we lose power heads because the way they run the sensing bulb for the power head, it rubs out on something okay. So when I change that compressor, I may go to the customer and I say: look: we need to change the compressor. I'm gon na suggest we replace the expansion valve. I'm gon na suggest we put in a suction line: filter dryer, that's a high acid core and I'm gon na you know suggest that we change a liquid line filter dry with a high acid core.

Now in the past, I would suggest an acid neutralizer and an acid flush. Now, lately I've been kind of leaning towards not doing acid, neutralizers and acid flushes. Not judging anybody for does that does those, because almost my entire career, I used acid neutralizers and acid flushes and I really haven't had any problems. But a couple years ago I heard a podcast with mr.

John Pasteurella from refrigeration technologies and he really kind of stressed something into my head on the podcast about not using any additives in the system and I've kind of been going that path. So today, if I was gon na quote a Burnout compressor dryers expansion valve on a like a AC unit depending on the unit, if it's a refrigeration system, I might not change the expansion valve, but it just depends. You know I just got to evaluate each one differently: you're, probably gon na get a new compressor contactor. You know, there's some things in there.

That's like hey. I got the system open. I got the system off. Contactors constantly fail will verify if it's bad, but I might quote for a contactor and then, very importantly, I'm gon na.

Let the customer know that this quote is only to repair the bad compressor. This is not to diagnose the problem. Alright and I'm gon na tell them, I've got either extra hours in this to diagnose the problem, or we can quote a diagnosis after the fact, but my quote typically is going to be blatant and honest and tell the customer look. I got ta fix this compressor before I can diagnose why it went bad, so you're gon na spend thousands of dollars whatever it is to replace it, and then I'm gon na tell you what caused it to go bad.

So you approach each one differently. You use your your senses, you kind of look at it and you say man that condenser fan motor looks like it might be, burning up or locked up or the bearings might be going bad. So you kind of just approach everyone differently, but again just thinking about everything that could possibly go wrong, cause that compressor to go bad and also letting the customer know that hey this might not fix everything. You know we're gon na have to do this, so we're gon na have to do that.

Okay, all right! So, let's see what else we got going on. Let's see it looks like someone already guessed yeah. Definitely so someone had already sent me an email with the movie quote and the movie quote was planes trains and automobiles, so I'm not doing a prize for the movie quote anymore. That was just like a one time thing, but I do like the idea of people sending me an email just because it lets me know that someone got the movie quotes so planes trains and automobiles is a great movie.

I Steve Martin John Candy loved that movie. So that's that's a really funny one. It's kind of funny too, because they kind of did a cheesy remake with David Spade and Chris Farley many years later called Tommy Boy, but it was nothing compared to planes, trains and automobiles, great movies. So for those of you guys are wondering what the heck is going on.

I in the in the chat, I always have a movie quote where I usually give like three or four hints to a movie with quotes, and I always just try to see if anybody can guess it. So alright, let's see what else, what is my preference for compressor, scroll, Bristol, etc? Okay, so scroll compressor is made by many people like Copeland, makes a scroll Bristol made a scroll to come, see made a scroll Danfoss makes a scroll as far as compressor brands, though I like Copeland, and I like Tecumseh compressors, I mean I've seen Bristol's last forever. So it really has, I really have no preference. When it comes to compressors.

I will say that you know I'm probably a little less likely to trust a Tecumseh scroll compressor because Copeland Scrolls I've dealt with them for so many years, but I mean you know. I really got nothing bad to say it any of them, so alright, I'm gon na go ahead and get to my my comment, my my things on my list of stuff to talk about here, real quick, too so um. Alright, I covered that great question. I had someone had asked me, and it had to do with my exhaust fans, keep turning off video and they asked me about circuit boards versus mechanical controls when it comes to exhaust fans so circuit boards versus mechanical controls.

I am an old-school person, it's much easier, in my opinion, to diagnose mechanical controls. So if you have a plain on/off switch that controls a motor starter or set a relays, it's much easier to diagnose a versus a circuit board that has logic to it. In my situation, with the exhaust fan, video that I had it had something to do with the circuit board logic that was potentially turning the unit off. Yes, we had a sensor placement that was bad, but it was the circuit board logic, the automatic on and off feature that was a little bit more difficult to understand what was going on now.

I understand the importance for automation and auto on and it's like safety features and circuit boards and all that stuff. It's all great right. I get it, but it's just from a mechanical standpoint. It's much easier to diagnose a power switch, a relay and a motor starter.

You know boom-boom-boom one works, one doesn't you know, there's no logic inside there. So alright. While I totally understand the need for a smart hood, it's safer. It has Auto on features, but it also has gremlins that can create problems that give you headaches da da da okay.

So my preference is old-school mechanical, but I'm old-school so alright, great question that I had and it was about altering factory specifications. Now this wasn't on an old video, and it was one that I had talked about where I bypassed an entire hood system with a bunch of mechanical controls. Ironically, it was a smart hood system and the customer decided that was too expensive to fix and they wanted us to bypass the entire system and put in mechanical motor starters and switches and relays and all that good stuff. So someone had asked me, you know: what's the legalities of bypassing that system.

That is a great question. That is a gray area right there, because I know that I set that system up correctly. I know that it'll work properly. I know that I set it up to follow all proper fire codes, but did I change the UL listing by bypassing the smart hood system? And yes, theoretically, I did.

I bypassed the smart hood system. I installed conventional controls. Starters contactors yeah. I guess that's a problem.

You know bypassing components or changing a unit from original manufacturer specs. You are changing the UL rating you're, pretty much, avoiding that you already and you're setting yourself up for a liability. So that's a whole thing. You know things are changing these days again, I'm more of an old school person.

So it's one of those things where I did it for the customer. You know. We hope that nothing ever bad happens, but I mean the way that I wired it and set it up it shouldn't. So it's one of those things all right.

Another great question that I had it's all my list of stuff to talk about was discuss my obligation as a service technician to report safety issues, fire hazards, health issues, that kind of stuff and I've been getting this question quite often guys. I see the chat passing by I'll definitely get to that in a minute. Okay, so I have several restaurants first off. If you do any work in restaurants, you're gon na realize that there's all kinds of safety things like, for instance, I showed a electrical room that was just packed full of crap.

That is so common. It's not even funny Terry. Thank you very much for that. Super chat man.

I really really appreciate. Okay, oh and you said you just bought the okay cool right on dude. Can I put it access yeah, you can definitely put an access to Yanam. Cps makes an access.

You can get it from true tech tools. So definitely do that so when it comes to blocked off mechanical rooms when it comes to grease that's on the roof, that's a potential fire hazard when it comes to food being left out, that's a health hazard. What is my obligation as a service tech? That is a gray area, because if I go around reporting every restaurant that has safety issues fire hazards, you know health hazards, I'm not going to be working very much longer. But on the flip side, if I don't report a problem liable, so it is a double-edged sword right there, okay, so typically what I try to do is if I find a restaurant that has severe health violations and I mention it to the manager and they don't Choose to take care of it, I will usually after many warnings.

I will usually separate myself from that particular customer. Now, when I show an electrical room that has some crap blocking the breaker yeah, I get why that's a fire hazard yeah. I get why someone, but that's not a 911. I see so many electrical rooms that are full of crap.

You know I'm not gon na report, something like that, but you know if I saw a restaurant that had a massive fire hazard and I thought human lives were a danger sure I would protect the customer. I would protect the paint you know the the patrons of that restaurant and I would bring it up to management or corporate. I have never reported anything to any authorities, but if I ever deem something so necessary, I would definitely report it. Okay, Joe.

Thank you very much for that super chat and guys I already talked about Joe's channel, but definitely check out Joe's Channel okay. I was joking with him that I was gon na plug his channel, but Joe is part of the overtime crew. Just like I had talked about in the very beginning, seven one, six appliance guy dude. Thank you very much for that super chat that it is amazing.

Super chat. Thank you very much, but what I want to do is I want to go ahead and plug my buddy Joe's Channel, and I know you didn't super chat for that reason, Joe, but I'm gon na go ahead and plug your channel guys check out Joe's channel. He has a YouTube channel called HVAC are north there's his link right there, Joe is part of the overtime crew. There's a bunch of cool guys on the overtime crew, Justin, Adam Joe and Bill and Zak are all part of the overtime crew really cool guys.

They all have the overtime the HVAC overtime show on the shoptalk YouTube channel. If you guys, I'm sure you guys are all subscribers to that channel. But if you aren't, I'm gon na put a link in there right now definitely check out the overtime show. Again.

I mentioned earlier, and hopefully I'm not stepping on my toes 6 p.m. Pacific time 9:00 p.m. East Coast time Friday nights is the HVAC overtime show so definitely check that out. Ok, alright, let me see what else we got in the chat before I go back to my stuff.

What is the longest install or service repair that I have ever done? Kevin brat? Hopefully I pronounced your name correctly. What is the longest install? That is a really interesting one. I would say I can't think of one in particular, but I would say the longest install or service call service calls probably been like 12 hours, probably like a big walk-in freezer compressor replacement in the middle of the night, or something like that. I think I have one of those videos in the very beginning of my channel, that was probably one of the longest service calls and then you know like a job in general, maybe like two days or something like that, where we, you know, went home, took a Break and then got back to it: Adam dude, Merry Christmas man, my buddy Adam from the overtime show.

Thank you very much for that super chat. Man. You are the man, you guys are awesome and really really appreciate these okay. What's my preferred method of finding leaks and why storm great questions so right now, I'm currently working on that segues into another thing, I'm currently working on a new youtube channel, it's called HVAC our tools, there's a link from the moderator.

That's popping up all the time. The moderation program that I use, but I'm gon na, be doing tool reviews on that channel, so I'm working on testing out some different tools. So currently I use a Detex elect leak detector. I really like my D Tech select link detector.

It's done me very well. For many years I've always been curious about an ultrasonic leak detector, so I'm investigating an ultrasonic leak. Detector potentially might try one out. So that is something that I want to do.

I have some friends or a buddy that is using an ultrasonic right now and I will definitely uh okay cool. I will definitely I got distracted my phone right now because it was a facebook comment, so it's kind of funny, but I will definitely be reviewing leak.