This was a service call on high carbon monoxide levels in the mechanical room, I found that the building had negative air pressure problem that was pulling the fumes from the water heater into the building.
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Okay guys so I got a service call, I'm exhaust and in a water heater room, not working, and I was told that someone detected carbon monoxide in here just standing in front of the room, always be careful and have your carbon monoxide detectors. So I don't deal with water heaters, that's not my thing, but I'm gon na get this little fart fan going, but obviously being careful here. So what I did so I could safely work in here is I turned off the water heater put in this fan and I'm just waiting until the carbon monoxide levels drop in this room, so I could safely be in here to work. Okay guys.
So let's talk about what's happening here. I came into this restaurant with something in my mind, and I wasn't thinking straight. The service call was that they had an exhaust fan and their water heater room not working properly, and I came right up to the exhaust fan and found that the exhaust fan wasn't working. Okay, no problem, so I started looking at it cleared out the room because it wasn't safe to be in there again.
I really wasn't addressing the problem too much so then. I asked the manager because I pulled out the exhaust fan. I'm gon na have to get a replacement, no big deal and then I asked the manager what was the original complaint and he said that they had the local gas company out because they could smell gas and I said: did the gas company leave any paperwork and He said yeah sure, so I grabbed that paperwork and I started reading it and on the paperwork. It specifically says the building does not have enough make up air and that the exhaust system is pulling the fumes from the mechanical room into the building.
Now I still don't agree with how much carbon monoxide I'm reading in that room, but what I found is that, yes, that is indeed true - the building is extremely negative right now we don't have enough make up air coming into this building. Okay and we are pulling everything from that mechanical room into the building. So what I need to do is increase the make up air to this building now they've had a bigger exhaust fan added to the building that was spec by them, and I know that there's not enough make up air coming into this building now. So what I'm gon na do is I'm gon na make it up with the ACS with the outside air dampers on the ACS I'm gon na go ahead and adjust them and make up for the make of air as best as I can then go from there.
I just wanted to point out. You know. I came in here with a one-track mind that I was gon na look at an exhaust fan and I really didn't address the issue until I was leaving and it just so happened. I asked a manager to see the paperwork and then I read it and it would dawned on me, oh crap, and what the gas company on the paperwork even said.
They opened up the roof hatch to alleviate the building balance problem. Okay, so first I want to say I'm sorry for the dark video. I know I was shooting at nighttime and the camera didn't pick up as much light as there was outside, but it was pretty late. Also so to recap: we had a service call and an exhaust fan that wasn't working in a mechanical room and the customer did say in the work order that someone detected carbon monoxide. So I really didn't know what I was walking into, but I did know that there was potentially carbon monoxide, so I grabbed my carbon monoxide detector. When I got out of my band, it's important to remember to do that. Use your proper PPE. You always want to be safe.
Your life is more important than any job. Okay, always protect yourself. That could have been very bad. I could have passed out the levels in that room were so concentrated, even with the door open.
I very could have easily passed out and not even realized. What happened could have hurt myself. God forbid, the customer didn't find me. You know that could have ended badly.
So it's very important. Now, once I went in there, I found the levels really high. When I was making the video I actually wasn't. Breathing the air in I was actually holding my breath while I was making the video and walking in there to show you the levels.
Okay. So, as you see me walking away, that was so that I could go catch. My breath in a clean area shut off. The water heater aired out the room with a floor fan until the carbon monoxide levels dropped to basically zero to where I could safely be.
In there I confirmed that the fan was bad and then I actually left told the customer. I was gon na order. The exhaust fan and I would be back, went and had dinner and, as I was sitting down eating dinner, I started to think about the job and then I realized, oh, my gosh. I think I know what happened there and the exhaust fan had nothing to deal with what was going on.
So what so? The actual problem was that the building was extremely negative, meaning that the exhaust fans were pulling more air out of the building than we were. Putting back into the building the building was out of balance, or it had a negative air balance. Okay, and that negative air balance was overcoming the combustion motor for the water heater and pulling the fumes from the flue pipe. Instead of letting the combustion motor blow them out of the flue pipe, let's go into building balance a little bit.
Okay, I am NOT a certified air balance person. I'm just gon na give you a really crude explanation. Okay, if you take a paper bag - and you put it up to your mouth and you suck the air out of the bag, the bag is gon na collapse. If you put a tiny hole in the bag, the bag is probably still gon na collapse, but the bigger you cut, the hole but less.
The bag is gon na collapse and eventually you're gon na get to a point that the hole is so big that you're pulling the air right through the bag and nothing is collapsing on the bag anymore. That's a really crude way to explain how we balance a building. We put the exhaust fans to pull the unwanted air out of the building, but then we have to put air back into the building to make up for what we were pulling out. We call that make up air make up. Air can come from all kinds of places. Okay, it can come from your air conditioning units or your rtu unit. It can come from a dedicated mechanical outside air unit. It can come from evaporative cooler, all kinds of places.
Okay, this particular restaurant already has an evaporative cooler, that's its make up air unit, but it's not big enough anymore because they added a bigger exhaust fan. So what I went ahead and did was went around to their air conditioners and it opened up the outside air dampers to make up for the air that we needed. Okay. So now we're pulling outside air that's being conditioned by the air conditioner.
It is actually adding extra load to those air conditioners, though, so you have to be careful about that. The air conditioners are adequately sized, so it's okay right now and we're going through the hottest time of the year and then we're not getting any complaints. The air conditioners are gon na have to work a little bit harder though, but that is something you have to consider. I want to make sure that you understand that it is very important and no job is worth your health or your life.
Okay, always protect yourself. Always use your protective equipment. Carbon monoxide detector very easily saved me from having a problem. Okay, it sounds silly and you know I'm over exaggerating, but I'm serious, okay, the levels of carbon monoxide in that room, even with that door open we're to the point that I would have passed out.
Had I been in that room for too long, I could have passed out and hit my head. Who knows you never know what could have happened? You always want to protect yourself, always remember. Okay, even I was tired and all that I still remember - to grab my carbon monoxide detector to make sure that the levels were safe. Also, I really want to say thank you again for you guys watching my videos.
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If their is to much CO the fire alarms would go off?
Wear a mask now we half to anyhow because of cocid Are you in Barrhaven ?
Damned dangerous – CO builds big bubbles in the air when the air is not moving that you can walk in without knowing. You can breath normally in one point and a few inches further you breath pure CO and are down in seconds. Here in german the fire department and the chimney sweeper wants you to install a CO sensor in the room with the heater when it is a commercial site. Private installations does not need this but the chimney sweeper that tests the security of installations every year recommend a combined sensor for safety. It checks for CO, CO2, propane, butane, methane and heat over 85°C. Additionally it's law that the room with the burner needs an open connection to the outside that is able to deliver enough air for it. No fans are allowed because they could fail. Some heating systems have a pipe for fresh air and have a closed of burner that doesn't pull the air for the burner out of the room. In that case the requirements of the law are fullfilled by the fresh air pipe.
What does it take to get certified to do air balancing? Maybe you should consider doing it? Youknow your stuff and you're on site you could be getting two birds at time…
LOL. I thought I was the only one that called it a "fart fan" 😄 Service area Nepean??
CO is no joke…bus barn required me to have audible CO monitor on if I was in the shop or working inside an engine bay even if outside… (behind the hood of a bus there's almost no ventilation even when it's open due to the shape) it only went off twice… if I had not had it there was noone around to save me
Hi, thanks for your explanation of the negative air balance. my building a print factory in the Netherlands has a huge negative air balance, I notice that every morning when I opened the doors I have pull real hard to open the doors in the wind is really hard at that time. So it's not so bad because we have no combustion units in the building. never the less it's not good so I will take some action. Service area Barrhaven??
I would recommend decoupling the water heater from the building air. Add an intake pipe which sucks air from outside the building for the water heater's flame.
In Germany we usually have an exhaust fan on those units, which's RPM get monitored by the unit.
This is necessary, since the exhaust is too cold after the heat exchangers, to vent out with the chimney effect alone.
Well, a water heater isn't supposed to create any CO at all. It should only create CO2 and water vapour.
Great safety info. Thanks Chris. Service area Orleans??
I have a good question how do you detect your negative are in the building what do you use for equipment for that I'm just curious
omg what a eye opener thank you.
I wish you could show more of the repairs ='[
Sounds like you need to isolate that mechanical room from the effects of the building negative pressure , or you need to cut in large enough combustion air openings to prevent the mechanical room from going negative under ANY condition. That includes someone shutting down the AC units, or changing the minimum air settings on the economizers. That inducer fan on the water heater is not designed to push combustion products out the vent. It is designed to overcome the resistance in the water heater itself, and deliver the products of combustion to the vent connector. I would not have an exhaust fan in the mechanical room. It will rob the water heater of combustion air. The combustion air openings in the mechanical room, one within the upper 12” of the space, and one within the lower 12” of the space are designed to provide ventilation, and make up air for the draft diverters, along with providing the air for combustion, so there is no reason to have an exhaust fan in there. It is against code, at least in our area, to draw air from a space which supplies combustion air to a fuel burning appliance, be it from a return air grille, or an exhaust fan. If all else fails you may even have to install a positive pressure combustion air fan, with a pressure switch, interlocked with the appliance, that would not allow the water heater to fire unless the room was under a positive pressure. Are you in Nepean ?
You are an excellent teacher!! Keep up the great videos and by the way what's carbon monoxide detector are you using?
Chinese kitchens with 6 wok burners and 3 phase extractor hoods over the burners do wonderful things as well, the owners forget you can't take air out without putting some back in.
I saw the same problem at a restaurant that I had worked for when I was in college for this field. They kept having the water heater blow out. I did a quick check with nothing more than my hand near the vent for the water heater after I got it going and I could feel the heat coming out. I told the store that they needed to deal with the makeup air situation and that the easy solution would be is to open a door so that the exhaust hoods (2) could pull the air they needed and not mess with the water heater. Eventually TempRite came out and just put a door on the closet and said that it would be just fine. It did not and eventually the hood over the dishwasher was shut down until the hood over the oven got serviced, at that point the makeup air was corrected with the fact that the oven hood had a pressurized makeup air system with filters inside of the hood that had not been serviced the last round. Dishwasher hood got turned back on and all was fine. Another story for those out there that need to look at everything when it comes to the air balance.
Love the videos Ive been doing service work on residential for about 3 months and ive been wanting to get into commercial roof top. in your opinion should I keep doing residential for a while or go ahead and try to get with a company that does commercial.
You're correct about carbon monoxide. Even if you didn't hit your head the lack of oxygen alone could kill you. You could indeed go in for a few minutes it'd be like holding your breath except for a shorter amount of time due to the monoxide being metabolized into dioxide. Same thing goes for a gas leak like propane, natural gas, or refridgerant. Except those don't get metabolized. I'd actually avoid the area completely, personally I'd go from just taking a peek to attempting to fix something and die from being suffocated.
I follow several good hvacr guys on yt.. You are among the best. Very explanatory…
I keep my 317-3 on my belt…Sad,I know
Great video! You're so thorough with all your videos. Keep up the great work!👍
Love all the videos and how you explain what you did. Glad there’s people that like to the job right. Keep making videos I watched all of them.
Great video!!!👍🏼 Again…looking at the big picture. Awesome job 👍🏼🤙🏼✌
I wonder what the reading was in the flue of the water heater and if it was back drafting. The door to the water heater room had no vents on it for combustion air.
Excellent video – I always check for Carbon Monoxide levels any heating equipment during service calls. Normal level @ 0 PPM, ASHRAE level @ 9 PPM, TWA – OSHA level @ 25 PPM .
thanks,,,just how much is the carbon monoxide meter cost?
Great video, thank you
No food 3 wks, no water 3 days , no o2 3 mins = no life.
That was a smart move man most economizers On RTUs have a minimal out side air damper setting I normally set that 10% in PA it’s code I know CA is a little more Strict on these issues good catch as always I enjoyed the video thinks for sharing !🥇
Excellent vid! Makes me glad I subscribed! ~ Safety first!
@HVACR VIDEOS GREAT STUFF AS ALWAYS THE GAS COMPANY WILL HAVE YOU CHASING YOUR TAIL FROM TIME TO TIME
👍👍
We need to keep the economizers at 5 percent in summer time where I live because humidity is to high,units cannot dehumidify outside air, feels sticky in the space,thanks for posting this
It was a great video man
thank you for continuing to make videos!
Excellent safety video. This will save a lot of lives. Whats the model of your co2 detector?
Thanks , great stuff
So not sure why you would ever have an exhaust fan in a mechanical room with a natural draft water heater. A mechanical room should be slightly positive pressure, never negative by design. But with the whole building being negative, the water heater gas vent becomes a makeup air duct & allows the incoming air to spill out the draft diverter. Unfortunately when the water heater kicks on the gases spill out as well. Now it’s burning clean so it’s spilling CO2, which is heavier than air so it sinks & becomes the primary air for the water heater burner at the floor. Now we get a dirty burn & the CO goes they the roof! Yikes. Well as usual Chris your customers are lucky to have you on their team! That could of got ugly real quick. Nice job!
Heck yes! In fact I have that same Fluke CO sniffer and I am going to bring into 'service' from now on. YES, no job is worth hurrying through (or whatever) and ruining your self and your family. An important and very thoughtful video. God Bless you…
Chris, re 'dark video' apology, for me I wanted to let you know your outside/'night' videos are always very clear and 'seeable.' Service area Kanata??
Yikes! In my area CO with those readings, the gas company doesn’t open the roof hatch, they lock out the gas meter until the situation is resolved…☠️
Why didn't has company shut it down?
Great information better safe then sorry. You can’t be to cautious when it comes to carbon monoxide. The odorless killer.
I walked into a movie theatre remodel one time where they added a kitchen, but relied solely on the kitchen economizer damper for their makeup air. While in the meantime adding about 10,000 cfm worth of exhaust to the kitchen. The electricians had to shut down the power to the AC unit for a while, and the kitchen doors (the double swinging type) sucked right in. Fortunately and not surprisingly, the pilot light on the water heater got snuffed out instantly and the water heater shut down. I spoke with the architects on site and noted this. They all got wide eyed and pulled out their phones and started making calls. The next day the contractor was adding an actual make up air assembly over the kitchen. Which allowed the damper to be backed off on the kitchen AC.
Hey buddy I have a question for you, or others watching….I wanna know can I put 407c in a unit that has r22 in it..thnx Are you in Ottawa ?
Watch your videos every day after work thanks
Your videos are great and very informative… I really appreciate you sharing your knowledge with us… Im way more comfortable with HVAC than with refrigeration and have learned alot by watching your videos… Thanks again!!! Are you in Orleans ?