Sir, you are the 1st man here on YT that ever vacuumed hoses and equipment. Congratulations! (others just vent random amounts of refrigerant into the atmosphere and even dare giving out that as an advice)
With a regular set of manifold guages recover the refrigerant slowly as a gas and you will get an miniscule amount of oil. Start your recovery from the low side of the system while throttling it, with the blue valve on the recovery machine. After pressure drops below the saturated temperature on the high side, finish up the recovery from both high and low sides and fully open the blue valve on the recovery machine. If possible rotate the vehicle compressor by hand in the normal direction of rotation towards the end. Do not use the engine to rotate the compressor. This method also helps to diagnose the system. If the high side pressure doesn't drop, it indicates a problem with the metering device. In this case you may need to recover liquid from the high side. Be sure to use the throttling method above. The oil is heavier than the refrigerant so slower recovery will generally recover less oil. Letting the system sit for a few hours can help.
@2:30 "R134a is cheap, go virgin every time" may need a revision. Just purchased a 30# cylinder of virgin R134a in FL for over $500... tough times in April 2022.
Tips from a refrigerator guy here : put your recovery hose as far as you can from the bottom of the compressor, (no problem with automotive couplers) heat the compressor with a heat gun (low heat, 10min) to separate oil from the fluid. Never saw this device but mastercool is a pretty solid brand tho
I have the Matco labeled version with an oil separator built in, but never seem to get oil out of the recovered refrigerant. It all seems to go to the recovery tank🫤 I may have to get this just to clean the oil out of my tanks.
that's a super fancy setup. I was just going to solder a couple service valves to a refrigerator compressor and use that. when the pressure drops below zero just rip the extension cord out of the wall.
Thank you for making this video! It was really the best one I could find on RU-vid covering a full setup for a car. I did have one question, it seems that you could get away with a much cheaper system if you're not reusing the refrigerant and you're just reclaiming it. Since I saw you said somewhere that you don't reuse the refrigerant anyway, I was just wondering if you could elaborate on your reasoning for going with this more expensive setup? Trying to decide what setup I want to go with myself and since I won't be doing this very often I'm considering a cheapo VEVOR system.
Thanks. This Mastercool unit was the least expensive option from an _American_ company. And it being a long established American company there are repair parts and service options available. That is something that I consider worth the extra cost, as you can get parts or effect repairs in the future if needed.
Hi Doc, I am new to Diesel and the channel. I found you in my research on the 6.5 diesel. I am thinking of buying a 1996 GMC C3500 ambulance from a small municipality. It's got 115,000 miles and is stated to have been very well maintained. I would need to drive it cross country and I would like your advice on the preparation of the vehicle for the journey. I really enjoy your videos and have learned a lot.
Sounds like a very interesting find, may have dual alternators on top of dual batteries installed then as many ambulances had that option. This is a really difficult question, because it's about predicting what may fail cross country on a 15 year old government used vehicle that we don't know anything about that has never been driven other than short trips it's whole life likely. ;-) But if it were me, I'd start with asking if the maintenance documentation is available, since it was government maintained there may be such records (likely only basic stuff like filters and lubrication services but that's still useful to build confidence). You'll want to see if there have been repairs in the last few years with the transmission, cooling system or engine no matter how minor (some repairs may give you pause on taking such a journey). Ask when the batteries were last replaced. You'll want to see when the PMD was last replaced as that is a common failure component on 96+ 6.5L vehicles (and regardless of when it was replaced you'll want to throw a remote mount on and have a spare one and tools to install before such a trip). Bring a spare serpentine belt, and the tools to swap it, along with extra Dexcool coolant. You'll want to hook up a scan tool and check for any DTC codes before buying too. Lastly, if it were me, after buying I'd spend a day/nite in the area driving around getting a feel for whether the vehicle felt in shape to make such a journey (no hard starting, no stalling, gauges working, good highway transmission response, no major coolant leaks, no major oil leaks, etc). Leave on a weekday, not a weekend so road assistance is available if needed. GL. ;-)
@@DrShock Thanks Doc, you have confirmed my thoughts on what to check. In addition, I plan on an oil and coolant change new fuel filter both thermostats new radiator hoses, and maybe purchase a new lift pump to take along. Oh, one more thing I see that it has a PMD relocation upgrade mounted on top of the intake manifold but I will take a spare.
Super useful!! I’ve been curious about this kind of setup for use on both my 77 c10 and 91 gmc dually. I’d definitely rather a system like this over paying a shop. Will the pieces that connect to the vehicle attach to the old r12 high/low sides or will I need to purchase adapters?
Thanks. I definitely wanted to stop _outsourcing_ these kinds of repairs to shops and handle them myself. The most difficult barrier of getting into DIY automotive air conditioning is having the right tools and training for handling the refrigerants. The high tooling cost, and the regulations and training involved, are why it's typically uncommon to DIY. But as I'm hoping to show in this video series it's definitely within the reach of a prosumer DIYer. It's definitely not for the average shadetree, but if you've done your own engine rebuilding or transmission rebuilding already, then learning how to do AC work is a complementary skillset. The setup I show in this video is capable of handling any automotive, or residential for that matter, refrigerant types so yeah it can do R12. *But* to do R12 you would definitely need the section 609 EPA training and certification to purchase *any* refrigerant (unlike R134a which is only a greenhouse gas, R12 actually destroys the ozone layer of our planet due to its chlorine molecules). The R134a equipment comes in 1/2" ACME thread but R12 is in 1/4" flared thread. Your best bet might be to use an old R12 gauge sets hoses with this kind of equipment for the vehicle side connections, and brass adapters to handle the differences at the equipment side.
Hvacr guy here, i've never seen this kind of oil separator with a recovery unit. If you make sure to recover at slowly rate in the beginning, the oil will stay inside the installation.
It's going to depend on where you buy, but if buying new and limiting your choices to eBay and Amazon, in my experience it saved me about $130 or so. This is definitely one of those your mileage may vary kind of topics. If someone wanted a more compact setup, for about the same cost, I'd suggest the Mastercool 69100. This was my backup choice but I didn't want the cylinder float electronics it required. You'll still have to add the scale and vacuum pump cost either way though. Possibly couplers too.
If you were a professional shop doing a lot of air conditioning I would highly recommend some good quality equipment Like Fieldpiece or NAVAC recovery unit This set up in the video is it good enough for the do it yourself person or backyard mechanic. For anybody who’s going to do multiple vehicles I highly recommend not getting a cheap eBay vacuum hoses they have a short life when use the bit and the seals that come with them are absolute garbage order some good seals from yellow jacket same with the yellow jacket hoses they cost more but worth it And many cars now come with POE oil also known as Esther oil in all your hybrid electric compressors and even now in some compresses that are not electric Do not cross contaminate using the same hoses and gauges and equipment for hybrids and POE oil with vehicles that have PAG oil you have separate equipment and separate gauges.
If the refrigerant is not going to be reused you would take it to an EPA registered refrigerant reclamation center for recycling (they usually pay you for it). If you know the refrigerant is clean and not contaminated, such as if you are doing fleet vehicle maintenance on known systems, you could recharge from the recovery cylinder manually using a gauge set.
The 69000 came with no accessories as you saw in the video, the hose set came out of the 69500 box (and it included the vacuum pump valve). All I had to purchase separately were the two R134a couplers I showed.
I kept a 2.5CFM Harbor Freight vacuum I had, works just fine. My AC work volume is low (maybe 10 vehicles / year tops). The prices change all the time, but when I made the video you can find that at 13:33 index
Yeah, nearly any type of refrigerant can be used. But you will have to have a dedicated recovery cylinder, hoses, and fitting ends for _each_ type of refrigerant. You have to be careful about purging all of one type of refrigerant from the recovery machine before attempting to use it with another type too. The fittings are different sizes for each type, and the refrigerants need to be kept separated from each other so you have to dedicate equipment to one type or the other.
Purging should reference the same thing across all recovery machine brands. It is how to capture the residual refrigerant contained in the internal piping of the recovery machine itself. So once the automotive system has been fully recovered, to the extent it can be, then the residual refrigerant inside the recovery machine itself needs to be captured into the cylinder. Then, and only then, are you done with the recovery procedure. Hope that helps.
No, there is not even a provision for a float switch cable to even be connected with this model. You'll want to look at the 69100 instead for that feature.
Very nice video sir, one question though, is there a part number for the oil separator in that 69500? I tried zooming in on the label but can’t quite make out the words. Im considering making my own setup for recovery, and oil separation is my last hurdle to figure out. Thank you in advance!
Thanks. The Mastercool folks used an Airmender brand oil separator. I don't see any model number info on it. It just lists the compatible refrigerants.
I covered that in an earlier video of this same series here - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Gi0SiJJ6TOQ.html where you need to vacuum out a brand new recovery cylinder. This is because they are filled with dry air when shipped from the manufacturer, typically nitrogen, as both a leak test and corrosion inhibitor. You wouldn't vacuum the recovery cylinder anymore afterwards as that would result in the venting of refrigerant recovered from repair jobs into the atmosphere.
It will handle either of those two refrigerant types, but of course not at the same time. Each refrigerant has different sized couplers/hoses, and should be using a different recovery cylinder.
Umm, I most certainly did pull a vacuum on this cylinder in the previous video of this playlist series. You always evac a new cylinder as part of the commissioning process - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Gi0SiJJ6TOQ.html
You spent $100 on what exactly? An evacuation and a recharge? Most shops charge between an hour and a half, to 2 hours to do those two combined. The general rule of thumb for just about all mechanics in $90 an hour. Not to mention if you need any part replaced, leak dye, etc. Not sure I'd feel so confident in paying someone half of what most shops charge. Not to mention, you can now work on you and your families vehicles after buying this equipment.
