View Single Post
Old 02-14-12, 12:00 PM   #23
AC_Hacker
Supreme EcoRenovator
 
AC_Hacker's Avatar
 
Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: Portland, OR
Posts: 4,004
Thanks: 303
Thanked 723 Times in 534 Posts
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by BradC View Post
If you are prepared to Vac to 500 Microns or lower, you can use water to do your leak test if you really want. The beauty of using a liquid is a leak becomes apparent _really_ fast as a drop means a massive pressure difference.
The idea of using water to pressure test HVAC equipment gives me a queezy feeling in my stomach. What with all the effort to keep water out of your refrigerant, your compressor oil, your manifold gauge set, your vacuum pump oil, etc... and then to fill your target equipment with water to do a pressure test?

On another track, wouldn't water have a much higher viscosity than (any) gas? Woudn't the gas-&-bubble technique show up problems much, much faster?

I would think that a dry gas purge would be at the very top of the list of preferred purge media.

-AC_Hacker
__________________
I'm not an HVAC technician. In fact, I'm barely even a hacker...
AC_Hacker is offline   Reply With Quote