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 yo. What is up everybody? How you guys doing this evening, so uh, probably a little different here, i'm sitting next to someone. I've never actually had anybody on the stream before so uh.

This is my buddy brett. I didn't call him kevin this time. I keep calling him kevin, but uh. This is my buddy brett from the advanced refrigeration, podcast um, there's gon na be a uh moderator.

Bought posting, you know whatever the links to their website, but it's advanced refrigerationpodcast.com. If you go to advancedrefrigerationpodcast.com you'll, find links to their social media, you'll find links to their podcast and you can find out where to follow them. It's easier to do that. Just to direct you to his website, so absolutely now you guys just set up the website right, yeah um, my actually my wife's been working on it for a little bit uh.

We actually just opened up the merch store um, so we have a whole bunch of shirts that we were putting up there um truly, but slowly, just putting more stuff up there um any kind of articles we've ever been in kevin and myself uh. You know anything that has to do with the podcast. Well, eventually, what we're going to do is um is have a media portion of the page, so anything that we're talking about any kind of ioms or troubleshooting guys that we talk about during the podcast we'll be putting that up there, that's cool, so what what's the Whole reason behind why you guys started the podcast in general. I can't sleep, you can't sleep.

Okay! Is that a supermarket problem yeah? It is well no because your schedule gets all messed up right and so three o'clock in the morning um i got through like i'm, going through a youtube funnel and just checking out different refrigeration, stuff and a lot of it. You know people were just giving bad information, and so i had text to kevin because he usually gets up early in the morning to to work out, and i texted him like hey. I think we should start a podcast he's like what i was like yeah. I think it'll be really good.

You know, let's start a podcast, and you know it's not going to take. Take that much cash to to get one started um. You know, let's start one and see what is what happens, and you know nine months later. It's it's just blown up to this thing that isn't imaginable, like i never thought in a million years, we'd have such a strong.

Following that we have it's very similar. I never you know. I started my stuff just making videos for my employees and i was very anxious to make them public. I never really planned on it, and i i wanted to you know, and at the time i saw brian brian orr from hvac school was making his stuff and his stuff had kind of just started, and i was like you know, i think i'm gon na hit This public button and i hit it and it just turned into this machine and it just kept going - and i can't tell you for me and i'd, be curious to see how you feel about it.

But the the satisfaction you get just from being able to talk to people - and you know, even in my my little stuff, i do like commercial, refrigeration and air conditioning right, but even be able to help someone. You know understand something you know simplify things like. I explain things using what i call dumb logic like i try to break it down to the simplest forms when i've explained. You know it sounds silly but like when i explain how an expansion valve works right and why you have to have a pressure differential across an expansion valve.

I use a hose with your finger over the hose. You know you push it over. You got high pressure. It shoots it far, but if you don't have high pressure, it doesn't shoot it as fun.

You know i use that dumb logic to explain things, but the satisfaction that i get out of doing that is really cool. You guys kind of get something similar absolutely like. So the i call it the light bulb effect like like so this week. I'm i'm teaching in california, and you know the one thing that's extremely satisfying is just watching the light bulb go off where you know they're like i get it, i get it where they've struggled um.

You know, and i've told this story, this other story before, like you know the first guy that i worked for um, you know talked down on me all the time and told me i wasn't ever gon na amount to anything and - and you know i promised myself If i ever got decent at what i do um i was to change that you know and and not not make people you know afraid to ask questions. So, like i mean that's one of the biggest things like on the you know our site as well. As you know, the supermarket refrigeration tech talk when guys start bashing other guys, that's one of one of the biggest pet peeves. I have because i know that feeling and yeah you know no one wants to advance if they're being told you know that they're not doing good.

You know what i mean at least they're trying. I agree and i feel like you know, social media is a great thing, but i also feel like some people are just i mean you know i mean and it's a bummer. Some people are the smartest people out there, but they just don't know how to interact with people and um. It's it's hard because you know for for us to to spend a long day, working, frustrating right, i'm running a business, doing all my stuff and then and then you come home and you try to help someone and they they ask you a question online or whatever And they, you know, how do i fix it and they you could tell they're not even trying they just want you to answer it for him like it can be frustrating you know, and it's about learning how to deal with people and how to interact with people And you know, but at the same time it i've said this so many times context like if you ask a question you i i tell this to people, you know if you're going to call technical support before you call technical support, you need to seriously take a Notepad, whatever you need to do and write down everything, you could possibly think they're going to ask you.

I bet you if you do, that, you'll probably solve your own problem before you even get on the phone with them, but even still you have all the questions right in front of you right now. It also doesn't excuse people from being jerks. Okay, i can remember um. I've been driven by being embarrassed, a lot i've.

There was a lot of times in my career that i didn't know answers to things. There was one time i called. I was talking to hoshizaki ice machine technical support. I've told this story.

A bunch of times i was working on a flaker ice machine and uh. He asked me what the super heat was on. You know for the expansion valve and i i didn't know what superheat was and i said well, what's super heat and all i heard was the phone click and wow okay, you know but, but i tell you what i was embarrassed and i knew that i still Had to fix this problem, so i went home that night. I researched everything.

I knew how to check it. I knew how to do it when i called him back the next day. I knew it now, while i don't really appreciate the way that he hung up on me. I understand he was probably having a crappy day.

I'm not excusing him being a jerk, but you know the more information we give someone when we ask for help. I think the better um and you know sometimes people on social media. They can be kind of rude about things and you know it is what it is. It's it's kind of a bummer.

Unfortunately, um you know, there's such a uh, a big age gap in the skilled trades right now you know a lot of the senior mechanics i'd. Imagine in the supermarket side and even on my side, a lot of the senior mechanics are in their 50s 60s years old. You know, if not older, i mean sometimes you know and um you and i are about the same age and there's not a huge amount of our age people we're in just about in our 40s there's, not a huge. I mean there's, there's some, but you know it: it's there's a big gap and then we have a influx of a lot of younger people now and - and that's where we run into the problems when people aren't ready to you know, give us the information we need When they want to ask for help and stuff - and i feel like we need to you - know - help a little bit more, but back to the point that i was making when i started this conversation was i get this satisfaction from being able to help people, even If it's the simplest thing - and it's really cool too - and i'm curious about your opinion on this - to get an email from someone in australia or in wherever you know and or to find out, someone from australia is listening to your podcast or whatever, like that's really Cool to know people around the world are listening to this stuff.

It's a trip so um. So now, when you guys started the podcast and um did you? Did you tell your your work? Did you tell them you were going to do this? How did that come about? I mean no, we uh, you know we, basically just you know we're coming up with ideas and and and i actually felt like kind of guilty like out like i was debating on sending an email to you know, because before i have got this title, i was A regional trainer, so i was going all over the place all over texas and oklahoma and teaching guys - and i might say to the tech, but i was like honestly thinking about you know. Maybe i should pass this along to everyone, so they could listen, but i kind of felt like it was shameless publicity. I'm like hey, listen to my stuff.

You know just because you work with me um and i kind of refrained from doing that for a little bit, but then i was like no, you know what you know. Other people are saying that this is becoming extremely helpful to them. So yeah. Why don't? I share it, you know what i mean yeah when when i started my stuff for the longest time, and even still i don't advertise my company name like i don't go out there and say this is my company name, but everybody knows it because i stopped hiding It you know in the beginning i was kind of like i don't know.

If i want the publicity i didn't know, if it was going to turn negative and whatever, but it's all good, i kind of stopped being worried about it and it's pretty cool so um as usual, guys, you guys have questions, throw them in the chat. Let's put them in caps, lock, uh, we'll. Definitely if you guys have any supermarket related questions or anything that brett can help you out with. I have a question or two for him, and then i have a few things that i want to cover as usual on my stream.

So remember, if you guys do have questions put them in the chat in caps lock. If we don't get to them, keep reposting them. If we don't answer them during the stream. Send me an email to hvacr videos, gmail.com.

Okay, it's going to be hard a couple little things i want to talk and i'll bring some things up. So uh someone had commented something about uh the inficon stratus leak detector. Have you used that one? Yet? No i'm i'm still on my h10. Okay and then that's fine.

You know, there's there's an interesting uh shift. Some people really love the h10 and that all they use i'm more of a portable guy handheld, but something i wanted to point out was i keep seeing on social media. I have the inficon stratus, i have the stratus and then i have the field piece. Dr 82, which they're both the same leak - detector, just ones 500, more basically, but um on the stratus, it's a great leak detector.

It does everything i needed to do. You need to understand something, though the stratus had something called cloud hunting mode. Okay cloud hunting modes gives you a ppm readout parts per million readout on the leak detector. There's a digital display.

It says 600 parts per million whatever i can't. I see people all the time, posting videos and using the cloud hunting mode, and i don't know if they quite understand now. I didn't know this at first too, but the cloud hunting mode on the stratus leak detector is actually not the most sensitive mode. So people like to see the ppm readout if you want to get a more sensitive leak detector, you need to put it on the super mode or the high mode within that leak.

Detector uh, the cloud hunting mode. The whole purpose of that is actually for supermarket guys: okay um, if you're walking into a motor room and equipment room that has a giant leak. Okay, first off, you shouldn't be walking into a motor room without some kind of breathing apparatus. I know that's probably not going to happen, but i mean, if you're walking into a room that you have to put your leak detector on cloud hunting mode.

You need to understand you're, breathing that in too okay, all of us have done it, but when you put it on cloud hunting mode and you walk into a motor room, it gives you a ppm readout. So that way, as you get closer to the leak, you know - and it's not just going off with the audible tone screaming at you. Okay, so if you guys are using the stratus and because i've seen some people say it sucks, it doesn't work. You need to know how to use it right and the cloud hunting mode is actually a little bit less sensitive than if you put it on the regular leak, detecting mode which will not give you a ppm readout, just food for thought.

I was talking to someone in an email about that so now, every everyone that i've talked to, that that use the stratus. They absolutely love it um and i guess there's also you know, because now with supermarkets, you know we're dealing with co2 and there's actually, i believe, with the regular stratus you can buy it's like a module that you pop in or something plugs in that can allow You to do um, you know r744 and that's that's pretty cool the whole co2 thing, because that is the future guys. I mean that is what's coming: co2 and hydrocarbon refrigerants um. If, if, if the, whatever the hippie people had their way, you know co2 and and hydro actually be honest with the hippies had all their way, we wouldn't be using any refrigerant.

We wouldn't be using any air conditioning, but um hydrocarbons are what's coming. They're about to raise the charge limitations to hydrocarbons to 500 grams, i think for yeah, that's that's coming and it's uh. Actually, it's going to be 500 grams for open cases, which is interesting because in supermarkets, they're getting away from open cases right didn't have to put glass doors on all the yeah. I mean they're starting to uh, which which kind of dumbfounded me when they came out and said it's going to be 500 grams for open cases and it's like most open cases.

I mean you guys still use coffin cases, but most of your like ice cream, freezers and all that stuff are um and you know reach and grab ins. They all have doors on them. Now so anyways, that's a whole nother yeah, the government. Actually they can't they used to make these multi-deck frozen food cases that basically had three different air curtains, yeah, one that was basically right off the uh, coil um and then a secondary one that took a little bit of coil, coil, air and outside air.

And then the third one was the last ambient one, but because of now the government cracking down on the ul ratings, you know they're not even allowed to make those cases anymore. That's interesting, so um we're seeing a lot of government regulations coming up. They're telling me that your mic is low, so apparently my adjusting of the mic messed everything up, so we'll keep playing with it if it's too low we'll adjust it up. It was loud in my ears and i was a dumb, dumb and lowered it down too much so um hydrocarbons too.

I kind of wanted to get your thought about this, so i work with a lot of r290, the most common hydrocarbon that i deal with and um. I think uh. I think it is the future. I think it's going to be out there a lot as soon as they raise the charge limitations.

It honestly doesn't scare me too much it's just another refrigerant and - and i think that's important for us to understand uh. I go off on these tangents all the time, but you know we have constant uh we're constantly evolving in this trade, there's always new stuff and if we're afraid to embrace change, we're gon na get left behind. But i can promise you something if you're a service technician, and you know what you're doing you're you don't need to be afraid of losing your job as long as you're, not a jerk, and you know how to do your work. You're gon na have a job for life, but if you're afraid to embrace change like hydrocarbon, refrigerants, um, co2, uh, ecm everything vfd is driving everything all this different stuff yeah, it's something that's frustrating a new flavor of refrigerant every day it seems like there's new stuff Right if we carried every refrigerant in our vans, there there's no way well this this uh there's another youtuber um, i'm not going to mention him, because i don't want to get him in trouble, but he posted something about all the different refrigerants because he started doing Some supermarket work, but he still does light commercial and air conditioning and stuff yeah and i want to say he has like 30 bottles of 30 pound drums of refrigerant.

It's like dude where's the dot limit on that for that's a lot but anyways. What i'm getting at is there's so many different flavors of refrigerant they're, changing every day. We can't be afraid of that stuff, because guess what? If we're willing to embrace the change? It's just a money-making thing for us as technicians right because we're in demand we're constantly going to be needing to fix everything out there. You know and and change is here we just have to, and even i sometimes get a little stubborn like.

I don't want to you, know, change or i don't want to try this new thing, but inevitably you have to i mean you have to embrace it and sometimes it's you know. It's fear. I mean that's what the like. We have we're starting to do a lot more co2 in in texas, um and guys are just afraid and, like you know, mostly afraid, because of the pressures, so a cascade system you know, doesn't run you know.

Trans critical pressures transcritical is like 1200 1300. You know psi: um cascade runs on the suction side, usually it's about 200, 220 and then on the discharge side. It's you know, 450, maybe 500. If it goes off on high pressure, so it's not really that much different um, it's the fear of the pressures and then the other fear is um.

Basically, you know the fear of making dry ice, because if you have liquid co2 and you open it up straight up to atmosphere, it will actually turn into dry ice. There's a procedure that you have to follow in order. So that doesn't happen. But as long as you follow those procedures are people afraid that they're going to make dry ice in the system? Yes, okay, so it's the same concept of of uh freezing moisture in a vacuum where it's not really going to happen.

It's it's! It's a really difficult thing to do, but everybody's afraid of it so they're constantly blaming it, and so so, with uh with co2 right, the um at 87, i'm sorry, 84 degrees. The pressure of co2 is 1047, or something like that. So you know one one thing that people are afraid of is if they isolate a coil incorrectly, even though there's safeties and all kinds of other stuff, um, basically uh, you know you could potentially, if you close it off the inlet outlet and it expands rapidly. You could blow the blow the coil, the other thing that they have like.

I said, if they're afraid of actually making dry ice and if you make dry ice inside a coil, it's going to rapidly expand and then potentially really damage that coil right bill has a funny comment. Bill says that he thinks that it smells like an old encyclopedia in here now: um, okay, so uh for everybody. That's in here right now, let's uh, because i'm sure there's new people coming in this is brett uh he's from the advanced refrigeration, podcast him and kevin compass see i didn't mix up your name again, see i'm getting it right. Okay, him and kevin compass.

Do a podcast uh: if you go to advancedrefrigerationpodcast.com, you can find all their information they're on probably all the podcast platforms and they also that's their website. They're. Also on social media, youtube channel, just advanced refrigeration, podcast you'll, find it all um. So we're we're talking about a few different things: um, i'm going to go ahead and jump on my list of things to talk about here, real quick.

I wanted to get your take on this one too. So jose asked me um. I get a lot of this people being afraid that they're gon na fractionate refrigerants so jose, asked me if he tries to top off the charge on a 448a system. If he's going to fractionate the refrigerant, if there's gon na be a problem, does he need to dump the whole charge and start over now me personally, um, there's gon na be uh.

You know if, if i found that a system had leaked out 75 percent of the charge on my stuff, i'd probably go ahead and pull the refrigerant out and put it back in, but majority of the time when i'm working on my systems, i top off all Day long, i don't run into problems where's your threshold on that, so in in commercial and industrial i mean you know we're dealing with a larger scale, so it would take a lot longer to really worry about you're talking with systems that have anywhere from you know. 800 to maybe 1500 pounds right, so you have that um. If it's, even if it's a smaller system, i i don't know unless, unless the system's actually starting to have issues where you know, i've checked all the all the pressures and all the temperatures, and you can't figure out what's going on correct at that point, then we Yank, it out i've pretty much been told by honeywell refrigerants that you don't really need to worry about fractionation when it comes to 448a. It's not really that big of a deal i was reading an article before the stream.

Just real quick - and you know it's so nominal - if, if it did it's so nominal, that most of the time you don't really need to worry about it too. Much obviously we're not there with you, so you need to make educated decisions when you're out in the field, but that's one. I think one of the common myths and - and i remember that too, coming out with fortinet when fortinet was still you know evolving and coming out. Everybody was afraid.

Oh my gosh, this is going to be a nightmare. You have to have a separate set of gauges for every refrigerant um you're, going to have moisture contaminant calm down with all that stuff. It's not that i use one set of gauges. Okay, it's not a big deal, i'm just smart! If i, if i use my set of gauges and i'm working on a 22 system - and it's uh got a lot of oil traveling with the refrigerant, it's all, okay, i'm going to purge my hoses, i'm obviously not going to mix gases, okay, but the the fear Of of contaminating that stuff is, i think, a little overblown see i'm a little anal retentive.

So as far as i go, i usually i don't mix so i had basically five set of gauges, so you're gon na call me an idiot right now. No, no! No! No, no i'm just saying i'm mr anal retentive so like you know, because so i've had some some refrigerant hoses that have been 12 years old and then the only reason why they lasted that long is because i you know, basically if it was mineral alka-benzene uh, I used you know those two set of gauges. If it was polyester, it was, you know those two set of gauges and if it was 14 a just because of the pressure, i would use that set of gauges. So it was just me trying to get longevity at you know, out of the out of the gauges and stuff, because then you know, you notice that the more times that you mix from one oil to another, the rubbers on the end, where you're actually hooking up And getting chewed up real bad yeah yeah, so this kind of alleviated that a little bit that makes sense.

That makes sense all right so um real quick before i forget guys, i am going to be at the ihacky trade show in pasadena tomorrow, i'll be there. It starts at like 10 a.m, i'll be there at 10 a.m and probably be hanging out till 2 p.m. Ish. Something like that.

If you see me walking around the show, if you guys happen to make it stop me and say hey, you know something about me and i'm curious about your thought on this too. So people um every once in a while people will recognize me. You know i'll be in a supply house and i can tell someone's kind of looking at me doing a double take and then i'll get an email later hey. I saw you in the supply house, man.

I was a little afraid to come up and say hi. It's like guys: okay, first off, i have tunnel vision when i'm doing something like i'm. If i'm at a supply house and i'm going to get a part, i'm focused okay, a lot of times, i'm not really thinking. Oh man, this guy's, looking at me, you know or whatever i may recognize it, but i don't really say anything.

Stop me say: hey, okay, i don't mind, i'm telling everybody. If you guys see me stop me say: what's up, how do you feel about that stuff? So it the first couple times it happened, it was just it was just odd, like you know, i i'll agree i'll agree, but keep going. But yes, so i was. I was on a job site and we were in the midst of losing.

You know these this certain customer at the time. You know, because you know, customers with with commercial. You know they'll go back and forth to different contractors based off whatever, whatever reason um and i introduced myself - and i i've always been extremely humble. You know what i mean.

I don't try to think that i know everything, because no one wants to talk to that guy. That thinks he's not you know that is being an so like. I basically just was um talking to him. Hey, you know nice to meet.

You, you know, i heard you guys are taking over the stores. My name is brett wetzel and he paused, and he did like like didn't know what to say and he's like podcast facebook and like couldn't get whole sentences out. I was like it was just. It was, it was extremely it was.

It was. The sediment was nice, but it just just got a little weird. It's a little weird. Okay, i'm going to tell you a story so um.

Forgive me if you're watching right now. Okay, i'm sorry, but this was weird. I've never said this live, but i'm gon na say it now. Okay, i don't know if you're watching there's a female that one time i got a phone call one day and uh.

It was right when my my streaming started: okay um! This was probably about three years ago. I got a phone call on my cell phone and it said hi, i'm so-and-so and i watch your videos and i was kind of like again. I didn't have very many subscribers like and i'm like. Oh okay, like it was a little weird and i go um.

I thought she was gon na. Ask me for a job, because i get people calling me right. Not not that, but i thought it was. This girl called - and she says, i'm an hvac technician and i watch your videos and my stomach dropped like what.

How did how did you and then she proceeded to tell me how she got my information and, oh, i heard you one time on a podcast and then i looked up your name. I heard you were part of an organization, so i researched that organization. I found the officers list and then i went through the officers list and i found that your phone number was associated with that and it was just like you went through all that. She basically played took seven degrees of kevin bacon to get your number and and again, i'm sorry if you're watching.

I really am - i you probably didn't mean anything by it, but it just kind of creeped me out at first and um. It was a little awkward, but then, on top of that, i ran into her at the ihacky trade show three years ago. She walked up and she goes hi, i'm so-and-so and then my stomach dropped a little bit more. I was just like okay and then, of course too, i told my wife right away.

I was like hey. I just want you to know this person just randomly called me, and i i just want you to know that there's nothing here. It was a little awkward but anyways, i'm sorry to put you on blast if you're watching right now, i'm not gon na, say your name or anything but um all right. So let's go and get to a couple more things going on um.

It looks like your mic's fixed, so that's cool uh looks like uh. John cruz is saying: 2600 pounds of 134a and a 200 ton chiller yeah. That's a lot of refrigerant, so um all right cool, we're good with that. Hey! That's the cool thing someone posted on here that they said uh just just vent it to atmosphere and yell de minimis and there's kind of a joke that if you, if you vent things to atmosphere and say de minimis, it means to minimize loss like it was An accident right, obviously, don't vent refrigerant to the atmosphere, but the interesting thing is is when you're working with hydrocarbons in r290.

It is a trip to work on something and okay, so i'm supposed to just release this into the atmosphere. That's interesting! It's a little like you feel like you're doing something dirty here. You know when you're doing that same same thing with co2 and it's it's weird because you're just like just blowing the charge, i mean, because you can't use a reclaim machine on it, because the pressure increase would be astronomical. You'd end up blowing up the reclaim machine and or the actual tank, because it's not made for that kind of pressure.

Yeah and so, like you know, you have something. That's vapor that you know you can't pump down anymore. Let it go yeah, that's a trip! It's it's it's very weird and on my my level, i'm working on small amounts of hydrocarbon, but even still i just i feel, like i'm doing something wrong like and again. Okay, i'm gon na preface this with this uh pre-1992 before it was against the law to vent refrigerants.

I can remember taking a rag wrapping it around a hose stepping on it and just venting it: okay, again, pre 1992. All that fancy stuff right but uh to do that now, with r290, like to get the rag out, put it under my foot and vent it. It's like oh yeah. This brings back memories.

This is not right, it's different, but um. So, let's answer a question: uh foster dad david is saying that hit their freezer, so we're talking about a walk-in freezer has ice underneath the threshold and it's rising about a half an inch off the floor and they believe that there's ice formation under the threshold is There anything that can be done for this yeah. There is okay. When you have a walk-in freezer.

First off, you have to find out why water got under the floor. Okay, one of the most common things that i tell people all the time when you're working in walk-in freezers, especially if you have a raised floor, okay. So it's not on concrete. You have a raised floor.

This applies to if it's on concrete, too, because if you get water on a concrete floor in a walk-in freezer, it's going to turn into an ice skating, rink and it's miserable and horrible to clean up, especially the bigger the freezer it gets. But if you're working on a raised floor, walk-in freezer and you get water on the floor eventually that water will seep under the floor and if it gets under the floor, it will freeze and it will lift up the floor. The only solution to that is to completely dry out the floor, find the source of the water majority of the time, replace the floor, because how you can get the floor dry unless you put heaters in there and bring the temperature of the entire box up. You know ridiculously high, but um you, you can fix it.

So you have water under your threshold. You need to find out why? Okay, there should be a door heater around the freezer door. Um, maybe the door heater is working. Maybe it's not, but you really need to dig on those things.

I find people when they fix walk-in freezer doors when they fix heaters when they fix thresholds. Majority of the time i find that people don't do their due diligence to get rid of all the water and the moisture. You need to dig. You need to dry, it up, use torches, use whatever completely dried up.

Then you need to seal it when you repair it. So if it's just a threshold repair dry, it all up fill it with expanding foam, whatever you're going to do, make sure that the heater is still in there and then seal it all off with silicone and everything. But it is repairable. But it's not a quick fix honestly uh foster dad david, it kind of sounds like you're, not an hvacr service technician and that's fine, there's nothing wrong with people asking questions that aren't hvac our techs, but i'm gon na tell you right now.

If you are not a technician, i would not advise trying to fix that yourself, because you're dealing with door heaters, electricity and it's a pretty tedious process. So you want to get a technician involved and if you are a technician, forgive me but same thing applies. Okay, just be careful about that. Um could have a threshold heater too yeah yeah definitely could sometimes you'll have door heaters, uh door frame heaters depending on the size threshold heaters, yeah, good point, um, there's, there's all kinds of different stuff that can happen with that.

Uh. I've done work for i used to do work for a big hospital and uh. They had a giant freezer and whenever we would defrost the coil or do pms and things you know, tiny bits of water would drip on the floor and it was such a miserable nightmare. Because that thing, that's, why? I said, especially if you're in a big freezer, because if you're in a small freezer you shut it off, the temperature is going to rise, pretty quick.

But if you're in a big freezer, it doesn't rise. You're in jackets, beanies gloves and everything, and no matter what you do. If for us, we're trying to melt this ice with a map, gas torch and that wasn't working so then we're getting out our oxy acetylene torch and we're heating up the tile and it's free freezing just as fast as where it's it's a giant nightmare. So anytime we're doing that work, it's all about taking your time, trying not to make a mess um.

I want to get your opinion on this because there's a common thing on social media when you're defrosting a walk-in freezer that is not hot gas, defrost, okay, so electric defrost um, are you getting a torch out? Are you using a hose water? Okay, water is the only thing that i use. Why don't you use a torch, i'm curious, uh, bad experience and what was that um? So so let me let me say first what i what i use. Basically, i have a hose adapter that goes down to about a quarter inch piece of copper, just an adapter that i bought from home depot. So that way, it's it's more controlled, okay, so it's more precise! I can actually stick it in between the coils um bad experience, so the one of the when i started working industrial um.

I was with a technician and he had been in the trade forever, and this evaporator was probably ten foot long, probably about four foot high. Just huge huge evaporator, it was a industrial blast, blast, freezer and uh. I was like well, how are we gon na how we got ta get rid of those ice he's like oh we're, just gon na use a torch, so he pulls out uh. What i can only refer to as a torch down, you told me this story.

This is a good one: keep going a torch down a torch down, uh torch, so basically the big flame thrower, looking thing that hooks up to a propane tank, you guys ever see roofers if you've ever been on a roof and watching roofers lay down asphalt. The the asphalt mastic material, yeah yep, so we're up there and the the freezer is huge and and the the doors you know standard height, but then there's basically another three foot section from the top of the door to the top of the box. Excuse me, and i was uh - i was looking up because they had regular thermostats controlling this thing and i remember looking up - and i was like huh - it's 129 degrees in here, because all the heat was basically getting trapped and just staying up top two seconds later. All of a sudden i hear, and i'm i'm like, i look over the guy, i'm like what did you do.

I thought like he was heating it up so much that he basically penetrated. You know through one of the clothes, because the thing throws off a lot of heat he's like i wasn't even on there that long and the the air sound was followed by a massive stream of water. So if anyone doesn't know um sprinkler systems in freezers, uh their element busts at about 132.. So when i was jokingly, saying huh, it's 129 degrees in here two seconds later uh we're running to find the you know the the 12 or 18 inch main.

That was there for the water - oh wow, not a fun time. No, so for me what i find is using a torch in my experience in a walk-in evaporator in reaching coolers anything like that. What's going to happen and where's that heat going to go, there's a lot of heat there, but you have the potential to melt things you have electrical, especially on the smaller stuff. You have wires.

You have heater wires, literally just ran through the coil through some fake little conduits and things right, and i find that people end up melting things that or they'll melt the aluminum fins right off the coil, especially if you're getting a torch right up into there. Like the little aluminum fins will melt off personally, a hose with hot water seems so much more efficient to me and it works faster. I've tried the torch method, because people try to convince me, i'm like all right i'll, try this and i just find it to be much more time consuming. If you do it right now, me personally, i'm working on smaller stuff.

So if i'm working on a walk-in freezer evaporator, i take out all three for the motors pull out. The blades pull the sides off make sure the drain is clear and then i fill it up and then i'm paying attention too. I'm not just blasting it in there, letting it overflow as the drain starts to fill up. I stop let it drain out start over and even doing that.

For me, it still seems like it's more efficient and goes faster and i can defrost most walk-in freezers, pretty darn quick. As long as you go through the steps you know and follow everything obviously turn everything off a little side. Note years ago we were doing a walking cooler, evaporator replacement, and i had another guy working with me. Don't ever trust someone else when they tell you the power's off? Okay, don't so! This was me too, by the way.

So my technician that was working with me said we were pulling the evaporator out and he goes his power off and i said yeah so on my stuff commonly the condensing unit on the roof controls the power to the evaporators okay. So we typically don't have independent breakers for the evaporator. It's the same, disconnect on the roof so turn off the disconnect. The power is disconnected to the evaporator, but it wasn't for the drain line heater and i told my technician: yeah power's off.

He gets in there with a set of alignments and he made wire strippers out of his lineman's, because stuff went everywhere and it's my fault because i told him power was off but again don't ever trust. When people tell you power's off because now granted, he was dealing with 120 volt circuit or even a 208 volt circuit, but still in the right circumstances. That can still hurt you. Okay, so always double check yourself.

Um, there's nothing wrong with verifying someone else's diagnoses, uh, making sure that it's right, you know to an extent that people make mistakes so and people. Unfortunately they have this uh. You know they do with me all the time where they're you know. Oh, i don't.

I don't need to check it. I don't need to check it. You know, brett checked it, it's fine and one of the i hate doing it, but i love doing it where, basically, you know i'll have the conversation hey if you're working with me. You know you just don't trust anybody and i told the tech to go over and change out a contactor and he goes out over there without his meter starts putting the screwdriver i'm like what the hell.

What are you doing he's like? I'm i'm doing what you told me i was like, and i also told you not to trust me. I was like you, don't know what yeah. No something could have happened. No, you know no always double check.

Um always be careful, don't and you know we're gon na get kind of silly. I'm gon na get kind of silly right here, but always remember uh always make sure you know one of the things i want to point out, even myself, i'm guilty of it. My meter leads meter leads, should be they're like a consumable. You should be changing.

Your meter leads at least once a year, if not sooner, okay, they're, not that much and you'd be surprised, especially depending on how you store your meter. I store mine in my bag and the meter leads get bent in a weird way and the wires get exposed try to be safe. You know always double check your tools. That's me personally.

I like to change them at least once a year. If you have insulated screwdrivers, if they still show any cuts or anything in there, don't be using your insulin first off, i i had to talk with one of my technicians the other day, i'm like that's my insulated screwdriver. We don't use that one to hit on things. You know, because that one is specifically for tightening up lugs without turning the disconnect off, so that one is fragile.

It stays in a nice place, so always be cautious about that stuff. Guys. Now, honestly, i don't think about what i do and maybe maybe for you you can say the same, but i don't think what i do is difficult, but my apprentice, that's working with me, probably thinks it's a super complicated job. Would you agree? It's kind of the same for you yeah, i mean absolutely to an extent right i mean you, you, you have a routine.

You know what you're doing so it's it's a it's easy for us to assume that everybody else knows what we're thinking. It's easy for us, or at least for me to assume sometimes so. Sometimes i have to step back and remember. Okay, i do need to educate people on this kind of stuff, so um speaking of apprentices well, first off.

Let me answer this real quick. So for those that are just coming in here right now, this is my buddy brett wetzel. He is from the advanced refrigeration podcast. So if you guys don't already know, go to advancedrefrigerationpodcast.com, brett and kevin compass, do a advanced refrigeration, podcast right they're, both supermarket technicians and uh.

They they both work different parts of the country but um. They got together because they're like-minded people and they started a podcast similar to what i'm doing but mine's more like commercial. Theirs is much more advanced. Okay, so um they do a great job and they've got all kinds of stuff in the future.

Coming out more videos and different things right now, it's mainly podcasts, but there's a few things going on, but um something i wanted to address right. Now too. I usually don't talk about this stuff, very often, okay, content creators right um. We rely on uh off uh majority of the time like i rely on youtube, adsense, okay, youtube adsense is a way that when you guys watch my video and they play a commercial um, let's let me rephrase this because you have to be careful the way you Talk about this on youtube.

If you watch someone else's content and you skip through their commercials, they don't make money from that video, okay, so there's other ways to support content creators. We take our time. We we give you information. We spend hours a day doing this kind of stuff.

Brett and kevin have set up a website advancedrefrigerationpodcast.com, they just started selling merchandise. If you guys, like their content, if you like what they're doing help them out go to their website, buy a shirt right. It's a cool way of supporting the the platform and you get something in return. I guarantee that they're not making fifty dollars a shirt they're just trying to make a little bit of something and help you guys get something and they're giving you guys their knowledge so help to support their platform.

Go to advancedrefrigerationpodcast.com, buy a shirt. Okay, help to support it and stay tuned, because i'm sure they're gon na have other methods. Uh do you guys have a patreon and stuff like that set up? You know i set one up, but i i well stay tuned. They'll have that stuff set up soon and everything i'm still learning and it's cool.

It's it's fine. I mean i'm still learning every day too, and you know the cool thing is, and i have no problem talking about this um. But the cool thing is: is we have a cool network? You know and i feel like us as content creators. We need to help each other out a little bit more.

So i'm always willing to answer questions and brett's asked me a bunch of questions and - and you know we have similar sponsors and - and you know we we all try to help each other out. So it's really cool to be able to cross, promote and give them. You know uh more people knowing who they are because it's interesting how, even though you guys are getting great view or uh great listens and downloads and stuff. It's still interesting that people in here saying who is this guy right, but in the supermarket side.

Honestly, i'm not trying to make you sound whatever it is, but people kind of know who brett is okay, so i mean so people know who he is on the supermarket side, but not so much like commercial side or whatever and check them out. Okay, it's cool to be able to help promote people um. Let's get to my list of things to talk about real quick. This is always interesting again.

I usually don't talk about this on here, but i have a list of questions coming in via this and then i also have things that i want to talk about too. So we always run out of time doing this, so we're going to try to kind of bounce between two um. Let me see that one's not a very important one. Okay, this is a great question.

Dr kuthbert, i don't know if that's your name or a screen name asked a question about overheat protection in compressors, okay, so he was referring to a recent video that i did where i was saying that and it's the video that i released this last weekend, where Uh the unit had a trip breaker, and i showed you my process of resetting a breaker, so bret. What i do when i reset a breaker. I walk up to a package unit. It's not working.

The unit had no power out it before i went downstairs to reset the main i check for shorts to ground. I checked everything because i have a and i'll tell it right. Now too, i have a horror story way in my infancy of my career. I went to a golf course for an emergency service called nighttime because their kitchen ac wasn't working and i found a blown fuse.

This was a 480 volt system. I went down to my van. I had some fuses, i put fuses in it. I reset the disconnect the fuse blew again.

So i went back down to my van and i got another fuse and i put it back in and i reset the disconnect again. Half the building went black. Oh, what did i do? Okay, so i went downstairs. I had to get the managers, we had to go, find the mains, and this is where it gets worse.

This was a friday night, a very, very popular golf course, and we went to go reset the main and the main fried it was a 480 volt main we're not talking a 100 amp breaker we're talking a 300 amp main for the entire building and uh. Now was it my fault that the main went bad? No, i don't think so, but could i have prevented it? Yes, okay, in my opinion, the main was faulty because yeah i was resetting a direct short, but obviously there was something going on. Maybe the fuses were oversized, but regardless the point that i'm trying to make always check for grounded things before you reset breakers trust. From experience with me, you don't want to do that that poor golf course couldn't the electrician couldn't get the main for the rest of the weekend.

So half of their building, their banquet halls and stuff had no power for the rest of the weekend and it could have been prevented if a dummy, like me, hadn't, just put fuses in the unit and kept turning it on and kept turning it on. It ended up having a grounded compressor and you know it could have been prevented so um dr cuthbert asked a question about overheat protection. In that video i found uh a a tripped uh breaker downstairs for the ac was like 100 amp breaker, but i did not reset the breaker. I actually went down and took it out of the tripped position turned it off then went upstairs checked to see.

If anything was grounded out before i reset that okay now two things, i also had another question, which was a good point from an electrician. The electrician said what i should have done was turned off the unit. Disconnect then gone downstairs actually turned on the breaker to see if i had a direct short in the main feed coming from downstairs before i spent a half an hour checking for grounds in my unit. I kind of agree with him, but at the same time it doesn't take me long to test the load side of every contactor to see if i have direct shorts to ground before so i'm still going to go with, i like to check the unit out.

First verify if there's anything grounded so i did. I found a grounded breaker in that i'm sorry, i found a grounded compressor, so i isolated the compressor was able to get the unit back up and running. So dr kuthbert's question was because i said looking at the compressor first off, i could see a film on the body of the compressor where it looked like it had been getting flooded, back, okay, spoiler alert, there's a video coming about that soon, because i did make That repair, okay, but um also, i noticed that on the head of the compressor. Actually, this is not it, but this is another compressor.

I have a scroll compressor right here and you can clearly see that the sticker and the paint is coming off the top, because we had an overheat condition now. This right here is just paint for someone to indicate that it was 404 404a, but from the outside of this guy, the the stickers wearing off - and you could tell that this compressor head had been overheating. So dr cooper's question is: doesn't the compressor have an overload? Why would overheating happen if we had an overload in that compressor? Okay, the overload is there to protect the motor from an over current okay uh. It's not necessarily there um.

Well, i guess i shouldn't say that, but it's there to protect it from an over current. It's a thermal yeah and um, but even still on a compressor, consistent overheating. Even if the overload is clicking it off is going to lead to catastrophic failure of that compressor. Because you're going to degrade the oil, would you say: that's fair, correct, yeah and once you degrade the oil you lose the lubrication, then you lead to friction happening in issues within the compressor.

So yes, if a compressor does have an overload, it will protect the compressor to an extent. But if it consistently goes off on overload or if the customer consistently doesn't clean their equipment or have it cleaned and we run high condensing temps all the time, you're eventually going to lead to other issues. So, even though there's a thermal overload, you can still uh damage the compressor. Would you agree with that yeah because it might be running borderline for a long period of amount of time? You know a lot of times the thermals when they open it up it's it.

Could be a myriad of things? One thing is basically running outside its operating envelope. So if the compressor is a medium, temp, refrigeration, compressor um, you know it would be stated how low that you should be setting the low pressure switch. A lot of people instantly. Think hey! We want to pump it all the way down to two or five pounds to pump it down, which isn't the case.

Um i've had systems that have been brand new that basically had a peanut uh over or i'm sorry, peanut low pressure switch that wasn't adjustable and this unit consistently every summer would end up going off where someone would have put ice on it to get it to Come back to life for a little bit, have you ever had i've had that situation too, and i've had ones where they've uh, because long story, because i have a lot of customers that don't do routine maintenance and stuff but um. Eventually, this compressor i've changed it.