Evaperator explosion ?????????

Evening all,

Had a nice job yesterday, FFCR evaperator looks like its exploded although hasnt lost any gas. I Should be going back to site tommorow night to change but the bottom half of the coil has 3 golfball size holes, two at the back and one at the front with the finns blown outwards.
All the pipes in the lower half of the coil are crushed (Even the u-bends at the end). Even the metal fan (EBM) has a blade cracked due to it. Put a guage line on the check valve and there is still gas in there so i can only assume heater has caused it although the heaters seem to bell out ok.
Will take photos tommorow and post, just wondered if anyone else come accross it

Regards

Fatboy

heaters wouldn't cause the fan blade to crack or pipes to crush. They cause fires or gas leaks in my experience, but not those things, especially damaged u bends right out of the way of the coil.
Looks to me like it iced up badly, as crushed pipes and broken fan blades are a result of bad icing up.

luv to see a picy mate,had pleanty of split coils but not as bad as that by the sound of it ,

This sounds like long-term melting and re-freezing of water. It may have been caused by an incorrect defrost clock setting or just about anything.

Ice has some strange characteristics and can definately do damage of this type.

Hi All,

Got the evap changed, I did want to bring it home and take some photos but as per usual airport security wouldnt let me go near it so wasnt carrying that thing out through security to the car park. Looks like it may have iced up, on further examination all the pipes crushed. Strange thing on the explosion though. Looks like heaters may have overheated, i cant get them out they wont shift even when bashing hell out of them, strange though they bell out ok. Checked the settings.
Defrost termination +30 :eek: Max termination time 45mins :eek::eek: YEEEEE HAAAA !!!

up and running ok so thats the main thing even though i didnt get home till 4:30am :(

Regards

Fatboy

glad its sorted,why do some people set those controlers all wrong ?can only assume there contractors that think it will stop call backs if they set the defrost to "melt down"was there a drip down time set?,wonder if it was comming off defrost and there was red hot oil in the bottom of the coil being hit with cool refrigerant when the solinoid opens and the heaters were still hot,maybe.:eek: