Pulling R410A into a cylinder without a machine

[Acrisoft]

Hi

Suppose I am in a classroom and I want to demonstrate maintenence in the
condenser unit, but I don’t have a recovery machine.

Then I need to recover a small amount of refriregant, as 700g from the AC unit to an empty R410A cylinder with 13Kg capacity.

Although I will tell students this is not the correct method, and it is this for demostration purposes only, I would like opinions about this theory.

The steps are:

1- Recover all refrigerant inside condenser by closing liquid valve and then gas valve.

2-Plug cylinder to the liquid valve and vacuum pump using a T adapter.

3- Vacuum the R410A cylinder

4-Open liquid valve

As gas is under pressure now and cylinder is vaccum, wouldn’t most of refrigerant pass to the cylinder ?



Moises

[install monkey]

buy a reclaim rig and do it properly- dont teach bad practice

[Acrisoft]

In fact you are right because although I tell not to do, they will see it.
Maybe it is better show to unit already empty. Still I need opinions about this theory.

( knowing it maybe dangerous, somehow)

[install monkey]

get 2 reclaim bottles you should be able to get the full charge in, make sure you have a shut off valve at the end of your gauge line(at the bottle)

[monkey spanners]

Can you chill the cylinder in a freezer overnight? (make sure it is rated for low temperatures). The cold temperatures and a vacuum in the cylinder will help, but still better to do it properly.

[Acrisoft]

Could you explain why 2 reclaim bottles ?

get 2 reclaim bottles you should be able to get the full charge in, make sure you have a shut off valve at the end of your gauge line(at the bottle)

[Acrisoft]

Maybe I can chill it . I wonder if immersing the cylinder into ice-cold water could be useful .

Can you chill the cylinder in a freezer overnight? (make sure it is rated for low temperatures). The cold temperatures and a vacuum in the cylinder will help, but still better to do it properly.

[install monkey]

you might not get all the charge into 1 bottle- so you'd need another

Could you explain why 2 reclaim bottles ?

[Acrisoft]

It's a small AC unit, and has only 700g of R410A.

you might not get all the charge into 1 bottle- so you'd need another

[install monkey]

should be ok to get it in 1 bottle- try it first before u demonstrate it to the class

[The Viking]

Why bother?

There will still be some refrigerant left in the system and thus some pressure going psssss as soon as you break in to the circuit making the whole process useless as a demonstration for learning purposes.

Whatever the saturated pressure of your refrigerant is at the temperature of your cylinder is what the pressure will be inside the system. Providing the cylinder is cold enough and you give the process enough time (might be as much as a couple of hours for the refrigerant to fully migrate) there should be little or no liquid refrigerant left in your system but there will still be plenty of refrigerant in it's vapour state in there.

Also, R410A is a blend. The process you are describing is likely to separate that blend so after repeated "reclaims" without a reclaim machine you are unlikely to still have R410A as your charge.

[Acrisoft]

I have a machine. The problem is that I can not take it everywhere. I thought a 13kg cylinder under vaccum was big enough to get 700g of refrigerant , but if fact there is the gas problem. There's no reason for the gas to migrate from the hoses to the cylinder, right ?