Over the years, I have heard technicians say that refrigerant can wear out or “lose its blend” by sitting in a tank. Refrigerant does not wear out or “lose its blend”… at least not like that. What can and does happen is called “fractionation.” Refrigerant blends are composed of a mix of refrigerants with different […]

Service valves are so basic, and we see them with such regularity that we can miss them altogether. Before I give the tips, I want to address the tech who tells the customer it was “probably the service valve” or “the caps were loose” as a plausible reason for a leak without actually making a […]

Let's take a deeper dive into the magic that is gas defrost. Most techs who are familiar with heat pumps understand the basics of a gas defrost. When we apply this strategy to a larger system where we're only reversing a small part of the system, we need to add some controls and valves to […]