Pulling vacuum with sman 460 micron gage/identifying what is leaking / cause of not holding vacuum 

So glad to see someone on RU-vid telling people NOT to close your gauges after reaching vacuum. I have worked around so many people that pulled vacuum and closed gauges, and frankly didn't know any better. Great video, great teacher, great techniques.

We issued the 460/480 sets to start up techs initially but soon grew tired of figuring out is it our hoses manifolds or systems that kept us from performing the decay tests. So, we issued 1 appion valve core removal tool, 1 svg3 stand alone micron gage, and one 1/4x1/4 appion vacuum hose to each tech. No more tool problems and its blistering fast.

Phenomanl explanation on checking system for leaks. I always say some people are meant to be teachers and some are just meant to be workers. You my friend are both. I have a saying that goes along with being able to teach the knowledge that one attains. "What good is a Lock without a Key", it's useless. So if a Teacher cannot teach but has knowledge on how something works, that makes them useless to students. You my friend, are a Lock With The Key, Very Useful... Keep Making Videos because you do a great job explaining how things work...

I'm one to admit when I make mistakes. After all, if you don't admit them, you're only lying to yourself. (Some of us) learn from our mistakes. I am currently a student in HVACR, and I am so glad that I am passionately scouring the Internet for as much knowledge and wisdom from veteran techs as I possibly can in order to go out in the field with some great information. This video is a prime example of that powerful information. We (my class and I) just finished our first semester, where we learned about the basic refrigeration cycle, along with recovery, pulling a vacuum, etc. (Next semester is Controls and Heating Systems). My instructor never once told us to leave our gauges open after reaching 500 microns. He specifically told us to close everything off! Even when we he taught everyone about electricity - specifically voltage - he never once mentioned the words 'potential difference'. He told them, "0 volts across a closed switch - that's just how the meter reads the electricity flowing through it." When it came to operating service valves, he never mentioned the terms 'backseating' and/or 'frontseating'. Instead, he said, "You have to unscrew them (or tighten them)." 🤦‍♂ Anyway, I instinctively know now (after watching this video) that leaving our gauges open is the proper thing to do. It's logical! Tail Gate Trainer, thank you so much for sharing your knowledge with us by putting together this video. You have my subscription to your channel. I think my instructor needs to get some more schooling, and some wisdom from you - the veteran tech. 😏

You supposed to get millions of likes if all who understand the truth technician is ! Thank you,and god bless you!

Good explanation, just one thing I want to say is that the built in micron haha in all those smart gauges or electronic gauges truly suck and aren’t very accurate. Get a good external micron gauge and stop pulling a vacuum through your gauges all together, get the appion core removal tools and hook those up and run straight to your pump. You’ll hit 250 microns in 10 min

this thing works great. I have used it in a couple of jobs and everything seems to work out fine I love it

Damn that was spot on! I scratched my head big time yesterday, because of my vacuum kept failing. I applied your technic and I found the faulty hose. Thank you for sharing

That's why it's best to not pull a vacuum through a manifold. Too many leak points to worry about , not to mention how much it slows the evac process.

Logically presented and explained! An excellent "hands on" presentation. Great video indeed. Thank you!

I just oder my first! SM480V itll get here on Thursday I can't wait!!

Hello Sir, you are an awesome educator. thank you.

You should not be trying to pull a deep vacuum and test for a vacuum decay using rubber hoses. Especially brand new rubber hoses that have been sitting in a bag for months absorbing moisture and at least takes a overnight vacuum to dry them out. (i’m not kidding). And refrigerant manifolds were never really designed to pull extremely deep vacuum they’re only using rubber O-rings and seals. I made a video on how to pull apart the piston assemblies and remove the O-rings fill the grooves with silicone grease and then reassemble the valve assemblies. This will at least give the seals in the gauge themselves to ability to pull down I have gotten down to 10 µm. If you feel the need to really use a set of refrigerant gages with a micron sensor located in the gauge and not on the system to pull in measure a deep vacuum and perform a vacuum decay test. Toss the hoses away and make lines out of soft copper and flares with brass fittings then you have completely eliminated all possibilities of moisture and leakage. Unless you make a bad flare. Gone through the steps on my videos. But I do also have the advantage of having a vacuum pump that could pull all the way down to 3 µm. And I actually had a set of gauges sitting on my shelf that are still under 800 µm after two months. A vacuum leak down decay test

Just bought the SMAN 480v. Really excited for this. Hope it’s not too hard to learn at first

Wow! That’s really helpful with me just purchased a latest model of fieldpiece digital gauge. Thank you so much,

Same issue with new sman 480v , all new hoses.fieldpie support said when pulling on just the manifold it won't look like it's holding because volume is so small any moisture that boils off will create enough pressure change to show it's not holding ,I'm not smart enough to know if that makes sense or not. Haven't used on system yet but it did hold nitrogen.

Your video was very helpful thank you for sharing. However I always leak test my Line Set and Evaporator coil with nitrogen for 30 min. before I do the evacuation of the system.

very good instructions on how to trouble shoot your hose's . great info.

Nice. Very informative and to the point.

Reply to sman 360 question Add an in line isolation valve to the ref/ vacuum port then reinstall yellow or vacuum line so you can isolate with the 360

How do you calibrate the pressure side of the gauge? Every time I use it, I overcharge the system due to the gauge reading.

Excellent video! Your training material is very informative

What a great lesson.

I’m in schools now for Hvac thanks great video!

Sounds like your directing this to a fellow worker who is struggling.

When pulling a vacuum on an existing system, will remaining refrigerant oil in the tubes affect your vacuum reading? In my mind the oil will evaporate just like water and ruin your vacuum reading?

Hey brother do you have a video on cleaning the micron sensor on the sman460 im curious on how to do it

Do I need the 3/8 vacuum hose for the sman480 to pull a vacuum. Or can I just use the red yellow and blue

You demonstrated proves this what I said

My sman 360 was doing the same thing making it seem all hoses had an issue even new YJ good for vaccum. I called fieldpiece and and was told by the tech that i needed to use a recovery tank not just the manifold. Turns out tech was right. Just throwing it out there

Great explanation - could you actually hold vacuum on any of those hoses? I’ve tried the same procedure on 2 sets of hoses, 1 new and 1 with new gaskets / rebuild and I fail miserably. The SMAN 460 itself hold pretty good (350 from 250 in 10 minutes) but any hose that I test I fail.

How would you recommend doing the vacuum test with a 3 port sman that doesn’t have a vacuum port

That was awesome and helpful thank you very much

Cool class, except this isnt a golden rule. #1, leaking schrader cores arent caught during a decay test. For a couple of reasons, 1, the core should be pulled for an efficient vacuum. 2, youre hooked up to them and if they leak, its into your isolated circuit. #2 factory welds can absolutely pass today and from vibration and harmonics from compressor fail weeks down the road. See it on resi packs enough to know. Finally, smans are great but Id recommend pulling a vacuum without a manifold in refrigerant circuit series. Too many things to leak during deep vacuum. With that said, Ive done it frequently as well. Id recommend if you insist, pull all your valves on the smans and get a light coat of silicone on the seals to protect and get a better seal. Best take-away from this video is frequent testing and maintenance of your manifold and hoses. Better to stay up than have to get up in the field. Thanks for the class!

maybe thats exactly why u shouldnt even use the cages to pull a vaccuum?

I’m in the middle of not being able to pull a vac on a unit.. only getting down to 1300.. I put it under a nitrogen charge overnight. I don’t think I have any leaks but I’m only pulling down to 1300 and hanging there..😡

So only close the vacuum valve?

My SMAN360 leaks in vacuum about 30 microns/sec when under 200, the internal vacuum gauge is a sales gimmick with so many valves, hoses and internal parts that may leak. Save your sanity, get a separate vacuum gauge and a vacuum rated CRT

Watching this cause all my coworkers just pull down to below 500 and take off the pump 🤣

Can you pull a vacuum on a small residential system (~2 ton) with a large vacuum pump like that? Is there such thing as too big?

I'm going to buy the sman 460 anyway but wanted to ask would you recommend using the 460 to vacuum over using a single hose set up with a digital tor guage on the core remover?

great video, isn't the 500/1000 test harder to pass than 250/1000? thanks. i'm learning and your video was really helpful.

Amazing video

WhTs the max pressure the micron gauge can go to without damaging it?

I got my gauges on the vaccum and the micron screen isn't showing up

Do you think it is better to not run your vacuum through your manifold gauge?

You sound like Dr. Phil and I love it.

Excellent video! Where do I sign up for you classes. Thank you!

Great video

Today I pulled to 245 and 1 hour later I was at 445. Is that acceptable? What is an acceptable amount of movement during a 10 minute vacuum hold test ?

When 410a and micron guages etc. came around 12years ago or whatever, it was stated back then that standard charging hoses could not be used for vacuum do to permeability of the hose. They said the same thing about plastic POE oil bottles having permeability and absorbing moisture in the bottle. It was also warned about pulling too fast a vacuum and crystalizing any mosture droplets. This is all common knowledge It is so hard to get people to enter this trade based on working conditions alone. We dont need "teachers" filling them with misinforation. This video is RIPE with misinformation and incorrect procedure.

Can the vacuum be pulled with sman that doesn't have the vacuum port?

Thanks, that was useful 😁

Your vacuum pump is slow as hell, it should have gone down below 200 microns in mere seconds if you only have hoses connected to your manifold gauge.

great video What charging hose do you use?

Prefect.

Is it real vacuum? This fieldpiece is false VAC micrones ?

I want this tools.

If you turn off your pump like that for a longer time, you will end up having oil in your vacuum hose😅

Yep

Sounds just like my fishfinder.

👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾

👍

Makes me don't even want to buy this manifold anymore

You never pull a vacuum thru guages because what you read at the smans isn't counting the hoses which adds about 300ish per hose..At 500 on your smans your not even below 1000 in actually vacuum.

lol This gauge leaks if the valves when open. great all other jobs not vacuum. poor packing setup. 2 o-ring not sealing.

Did you close gas ballast?

I need

My jb micron leaked right out the box

You shouldn’t pull a vacuum though your gauges. You should be pulling a vacuum through vacuum rated hoses and a micron gauge

You train your students to pull vacuum thru gauges ? That’s Not the proper technique.

Why are you using a vacuum to determine if there is a leak? Even if you were able to pull a perfect vacuum, all you would be relying on is atmospheric pressure trying to get into the system. Do you know what atmospheric pressure is? It is only about 14.5 psi. And yet an ac system does not operate under a vacuum does it? It operates under pressure. Pressure testing with nitrogen is far, far, far, far superior. Did I say it was FAR superior? Yes I did. No comparison at all, no contest. Nitrogen pressure testing is superior to testing with 14.5 PSI of atmospheric air trying to get in. Period!

I am going to seriously try to temper my response and educate YOU without calling you a self righteous POS. I recently installed a new system. Pulled my lineset and coil to 139 microns. It rose to 159 microns after 15minutes. I opened the shraders and my lineset pressure only rose to +/-30psi. At that point I realized I had either a low fill or a leak in the condenser from the factory. Visual inspection: there were no marks in the packaging OR oil in the condenser. I charged the unit to the required SC figuring low fill at the factory. Three weeks later I get the call of a freeze up. Because it was a business and couldnt be without ac AND what I had witnessed I came back, cut the condenser loose and brought it back to my shop. The unit has a leak from the factory that only opens at +200psi. Its at the bottom of the fifth connection up from the bottom of the condenser coil distributor. I couldnt find it till i cleared it with nitrogen and then pressurized it to 300psi. It took +/- 60mins or better for an INACTIVE caccoon to form. (I let it sit after giving up on it and checked it again a hour or so later. Was actually surprised to see it) So there u are, how us STUPID installers can have a leak within the first year of operation. What a SIN it is to be so dumb. OH!!!, some more education for you. How about all the Goodman shrader seals that shrunk in the winters releasing the charge only to reseal the next spring? Were you not in the field during that time? Yep, youre a teacher and thats why u come out of the gate within the first minute calling installers stupid that they should have a leak within the first year. Go ahead delete the comment so no one can see YOUR error.

Just get to the point man

You want your micron gage closest to the system as possible it could be a 300 micron difference by you manifold gauges

Most people don’t even use manifolds to pull vacuum anymore

Less fittings less leaks