/diy/ - Do It Yourself

>>2550810
Refrigerant manifold?

>>2550810
old 3 hose vacc gauge manifold typically for HVAC

It's the answer to the three house riddle

In other news:
OP proudly posts, "Stupid questions thread... ? Well, I've never asked one of those."

>>2550810
Question for people here, how bad are the cheaper Amazon manifolds? I’m about to pull the trigger on one of those vac pumps + manifold kits for around $150 and they come with the R134A connectors and shit, but I have had bad luck with chink gauges.

I mean it’s probably going to be once a year use for DIY and handyman stuff. If there’s a chink brand kit with all the fittings and a decent manifold for an extra $50, I’ll definitely get that. But I think just the vac pump would be $80-$100, and then ~$150 on some Yellowjackets, but then I need to piece together the adapters and fittings for $50+ which will piss me off.

Recommendations?

>>2551094
$150 for everything and decent reviews. I just don’t want to be returning the thing 3x before I find hoses that don’t leak horribly and a gauge that is within 25% like I had to do with a $35 fuel pressure tester kit. Also this one is a little bit above the cheapest possible Chinesium options.

>>2551097
It's pretty hard to fuck up the hose fittings to the point where they're unusable. The gaskets are typically universal and cheap. The gauges on every manifold I've seen are 1/4" npt and cheap to replace. If the manifold valves leak they use O rings for a seal on a piston. If you have a leak on anything you can probably get it sealed up well enough using Nylog. For occasional use it's not worth paying a premium for Yellowjacket or JB.

Same with the vacuum pump. Unless you're doing it professionally if that thing will pull below 1000 microns it's good enough. I would wager 7 out of 8 contractors don't bother pulling that low anyways. If you're not picking up a micron gauge then it really doesn't matter.

>>2551094
if you are using it once a year for a cars air conditioning I don't see any reason to have it
I worked as a mechanic for 10 years now but very rarely do anything with air conditioning
I have a Yellow jacket brand manifold but never used it
the only thing I ever used was the small cans of refrigerant
never found a leak or needed to replace anything so simple recharge from the single use cans was always good enough

>>2551128
I was more concerned about the gauges than anything else. The yellowjacket gauges look more like $50/pair if everything else in the kit is good enough. I figure I can teflon tape any of the threads. Looks like there’s 1/4HP, 1/3HP, and some 1/2HP vac pumps and the 1/4HP seem a little weak on the ~$120 kits but the ~$150 1/3HP kits have better ratings so I would go that route.

>>2551136
I need to replace the damn schrader valve on the low pressure side of a car and it’s going to blow out all the refridgerant when it happens, so I sort of want to pull a vacuum before dumping a bunch of cans into there. Also the cheap gauges with the 12” hose are fucking awful.

Also the vacuum pump looks sort of neat to play with for other stuff,

>>2551094
Harbor freight has a set that's cheaper I think, not 100% sure.

>>2550810
its you're moms stinky dookie hole

>>2551160
Harbor Freight comes out to about the same price as the Amazon kits, but without a bunch of the fittings and adapter.

Although I do have a 25% off coupon with no exclusions. They emailed it to me because I haven’t bought shit there in like 6 months. Also I don’t trust HF gauges any more than the Amazon chinesium ones, last thing I got from there with a vacuum gauge was wayyy off with no way to adjust it.

One more question, what’s the deal with these 4 hose manifolds? What‘s the black hose for? Is it worth going this route to cover my ass in the future?

>>2551341
black hose is for vacuum but it has no real purpose if its not 3/8 and you dont need it for diy. for professional use you cant get enough hoses.
also see if you can get hoses with shutoff valves.

>>2550810
This is used to connect 3 houses with gas, water and electricity safely

>>2551367
So if I’m recharging a car R134a system, red and blue are high and low pressure, right? And then is the vacuum on yellow or it doesn’t even go through the manifold? And then the R134A goes into the yellow hose too right?

Too lazy to read the instructions. Digital looks nice but I don’t like buying digital for once a year stuff, same reason I have click torque wrenches.

>>2551367
>>2551384
Also 1 stage vs 2 stage pump… worth the extra $50?

>>2551384
Yes you hook vacuum pump to yellow and then open high and low side valves to pull vacuum on the system. Let it run for quite a while to give it time for the moisture to boil off. Close valves before turning off and unhooking vacuum pump. Then you hook a can of 134a to the yellow line using a can tap to pierce the can. Open the low side valve a.crack to let freon start flowing into the system. Once you get all you can in without the vehicle running then start it and keep adding refrigerant until you put the right amount in by weight or you are satisfied with the pressures.

>>2551393
Shouldnt matter my friend. Just leave it on vacuum for a few hours if the system was open for a long time. heat gun on the dryer to reuse it if you are extra ghetto.

>>2551398
These manifolds only have 2 knobs, as does the $150 yellowjacket?

Please be patient with my ignorance, but will that make a difference? What do the valves do? Are those valves between the yellow and red/blue? So the pressure gauges read the high and low pressure while the valves are closed, then open both valves while vacuum is on, and then close the red/high valve and open the blue/low with the can attached to fill?

I’m reading reviews and I’m thinking I just piece the thing together and buy some $100 manifold instead of getting a cheap one in a kit and having to buy a $100-$200 manifold the 2nd time I use it.

>tfw my dad had so many Yellowjackets but I never asked for one or two when he kicked the bucket
I done fucked up, and the Flukes were all scavenged by coworkers and I ended up with some old Craftsman sockets and fish tape pullers.

>>2550818
yep - 2 way

>>2550810
It's a very old and now pretty useless refrigerant manifold gauge set.

>>2551094
Avoid the cheap manifold sets. The hoses that come with them are garbage, you'll end up blowing the gaskets out after one use. Stick to a decent brand like Yellow Jacket, J/B, or Robinair.

>>2551137
> I figure I can teflon tape any of the threads.
Actually, you can't. That would only work on the actual gauge connections to the bar.
The big problem with manifolds is when the bar starts leaking, but YJ sells rebuild kits if that happens. Vacuum pumps aren't rated by HP, they are rated by CFM. More CFM = quicker vacuum. The standard for residential guys is 6-7 CFM but you'd be fine with a little 1.5 for auto use.

>>2551141
Is the fitting 1/4" flare? If so they make core tools that allow you to change schrader cores under pressure without blowing the charge.

>>2551341
That manifold allows you to have all your shit connected at once - vac pump goes on black hose.

>>2551367
3/8" vac hoses are a meme if you do anything except large commercial.

>>2551393
No

>>2551625
I bought the pump and manifold by themselves. Did pic related because lots of reviews saying it’s not horrible and has the fittings and 2 can taps, the accessories almost worth the money alone, so if they suck I’ll grab the yellowjacket locally and won’t feel like I lost out too bad. I believe that brand is one of the lesser of the evils when it comes to real shitty chinesium.

I actually got the schrader cores already, I saw some funky contraption to swap them under pressure but didn’t get it. I kind of wanted to get the manifold and vac pump anyway to learn how to do AC shit, and I had $200 in Amazon gift cards.

Also for the vacuum pump, they had one stage 1/4 and 1/3 HP, and then 2 stage 1/2 HP, I went with the 1 stage 1/3.

No way you can get into the HVAC/R trade without at least sacrificing your first born to Baal.

>>2551882
Half the techs out there are illegals working with whatever tools they could steal

>>2551423
Basically dont open the red valve when you are filling.

>>2551883
They're from around the way. They're leaving here with something. Maybe next time don't buy the most expensive shit so that when it gets snatched up you don't end up crying to mommy.

>>2551887
Sounds good. We’ll see how it goes when I start gettin dirty. I need to stock up on R-134a. Walmart doubled the price of that shit the past couple years but still cheaper than most other places.

>>2552040
Im eurofig so no r134a for me. This stuff works just as good and only 3 dollars a can. works fine if your car leaks out every 2 weeks. Good luck UwU~

>>2551160
One of my helpers had a harbor freight set and that thing was leaky as fuck. Couldn't even hold inches of mercury for recovery. It was alright to check pressures really quick but useless for anything else.

Fucking australian jewz can't even get R134A, R-12, or any of the newer gasses unless you have a handlers license, abn, and ticket from arctick, mad scammz hot asf country we'll charge ya for it. Thanks for the hole in the ozone, pretty sure 24million people compared to 240 makes a ooge difference :

>>2551094
I use the cheapies and seals are cheap. They're just plumbing and Bourdon tube gauges. One good job pays for everything and I've done several of my vehicles plus helping bros who help me. If you find yourself using yours enough to want Yellow Jackets then buy those later.

The stuff lasts a lifetime of casual use so the vacuum pump was well worth it. I also weld so I bought a nitrogen gauge for pressure testing (beats vacuum for leak tests) and used MIG mix which is even more inert than nitrogen. If you don't weld used nitrogen cylinders are easy to find which I eventually did to add to my rather large cylinder collection (industrial gases are love).

>>2551128
^Wisdom

>>2550810
You want this style not the screw-on pieces of shit.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0009XT7NY/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

>>2553922
I got depressed yesterday looking at the list of shit I could’ve had when my dad died a few years back. He had way more like 5 years before. Should’ve flown to CO and rented a van back, coulda sold a couple specialy things to cover the cost.

In all fairness, they spend $$$$ shipping me like 500lbs worth of hand tools and DeWalt 18V tools, so at least dudes got some free Flukes for dealing with that guy the last couple years.

>>2552097
>>2552040
>>2551638
what is with all these fucking tripfags and pretentious car shit?

>>2551376

>>2554097
>recharging R-134a system
>pretentious car shit
Wut?

Also /o/ is mostly busriders so you’re more likely to find people who own a wrench over here on /diy/

>>2553923
I saw a lot of people recommending these. What’s the issue with the regular can taps? They don’t flow as fast or what? All of the cheap DIY refill systems with the cheap 12” long hose are the tap on top and I haven’t had any issues.

>>2554133
>regular can taps
Leak out in a few days and you cant screw it onto lighter gas cans

>>2551398
Based substitution of canned air refrigerant.

Well anon did you spray cold refrgerant all over your eyes and hands?

>>2554162
I’ve had half cans around multiple times after using the cheap Walmart hose and never had an issue with them leaking. I guess I’ll see when I try to use the ones supplied with the manifold.

>>2555706
Not yet. AC is still blowing cold since I put like 3/4 a can in there a few weeks ago. I want to wait for it to crap out before I drain everything.

I got a little can of oil charge too because the oil is probably going to blow out when I drain it.

>tfw VatoZone has a bottle of vacuum oil to rent with their pump but doesn’t sell it
The thing was like half full. If it was fresh, I probably would’ve put the $10 deposit down to “rent” the vac pump oil and never return it.

Just stick the drain hose into a jar and crack it open a little. then not much oil comes out

>>2555724
The bottles of oil and UV dye, how the hell do you add it to a system when using the 12oz cans and a regular 3 house manifold?

Got a can of R-134a with the dye before and it was super useful, but VatoZone wants like $30.

>>2555728
I just add uv dye and pag oil into an empty can of compressed air with a syringe then refill it with another can of compressed air upside down
Which is very similar to doing this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1k_GusuXsg
or while vacuuming the system through the low side you push the high side shrrader valve in and pour in oil while spilling everywhere
Verification not required.

>>2555728
Inline dye/oil injectors. There are a variety but the principle is simple:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07G37CVCY/ref=sspa_dk_detail_0?psc=1&pd_rd_i=B07G37CVCY&pd_rd_w=2zHeK&content-id=amzn1.sym.3309c9d3-bf37-499a-888c-9ce693c3483f&pf_rd_p=3309c9d3-bf37-499a-888c-9ce693c3483f&pf_rd_r=1D3DZTE7X6K4FKGE7MER&pd_rd_wg=uPtGv&pd_rd_r=bae6abbd-3ff9-4960-8233-dc25ba5b12ba&s=automotive&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9kZXRhaWxfdGhlbWF0aWM&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUEzRU1VRFI2Q1Q0SzY0JmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwNzAyODU3OUpSNVcxRk45SVI0JmVuY3J5cHRlZEFkSWQ9QTA1OTkwODIyTTVQNlVRRzBDNzRaJndpZGdldE5hbWU9c3BfZGV0YWlsX3RoZW1hdGljJmFjdGlvbj1jbGlja1JlZGlyZWN0JmRvTm90TG9nQ2xpY2s9dHJ1ZQ==#customerReviews

>>2555762
>https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07G37CVCY
let me help you with that.
fucking linklets lol

>>2550810
It's a valve designed to deliver water, electricity, and gas to a house without crossing the lines

>>2555769
I expected the link to automatically shorten but seems not. Next time I'll just copy the item name and potential buyers can source the item (Ebay is often cheaper anyway).