Detecting Salt in the Refrigerant Circuit

I am working on a boat chiller-type air conditioner and heat pump which had developed a small cavitation leak in the condenser between the sea water coolant and the R-22/mineral oil refrigerant. Although I am replacing the major components, I want to flush the rest of the system with HCFC-141b driven by nitrogen. Does anyone know of a way to detect the presence of salt in the 141b or the mineral oil to determine if the flushing was successful? Any other advice on this mater would be appreciated.

If you are pushing the oil out you could consider getting the oil analyzed. That will tell you the whole story.

hi mayball,
salt? its the water thats the problem , have you vac pump ?= sedgy

Passandscore, I will probably be moving some oil out, especially from the chiller coil, what kind of organization makes such an analysis?

Sedgy, I will remove all water from the system with a vacuum pump and install a suction filter/dryer, but evidently you do not see a problem with salt in the oil. The manufacturer says that once salt water gets into the system, the whole chiller needs to be replaced because it will keep failing. I cannot see why if all of the salt and water is removed and all failed components are replaced.

:rolleyes:HCFC-141b
All the good stuff is no longer available in Europe!!

If you drain the system correctly and flush with a good flushing agent you will be able to clean system.
Then numerous purges.(I would recommend recirculation over single blow pass) Vacuum will not remove salt deposits and actually you will struggle to evaporate all your moisture.

Oil analysis is provided by a lot of suppliers and a search engine for your area will provide an answer.

? what is the chiller by the way? If it has micro bore I could see a problem but do not suspect it on a water cooled unit.

Hookster, Thanks for the recommendations. HCFC-141b is still used here in Mexico. The chiller is an AquaAir Alpha 3. It has a 3 ton capacity, uses a scroll 3 phase compressor and four parallel cap-tubes.