Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining Did You
Know, the ESCO HVAC podcast. This episode brought
to you by HeatCraft, the market leader in commercial
refrigeration. Learn more at HeatCraftRPD .com.
Justin Bailey, technical trainer from HeatCraft.
How are you doing today, sir? I'm doing wonderful.
Beautiful day here in Stone Mountain, Georgia,
pouring rain all day, so I'm glad I'm inside.
Exactly. Yeah, I think we're actually, we had
some rain earlier today, and it's going to be
hit and miss all day. You know, spring weather
is part of it. But it's better to be here than...
than out on a roof somewhere today. I agree.
You know, and that's one of the fun things about
regrouping and talking with experienced technicians
like yourself, Justin. Before the podcast, we
were talking about, you know, our experience
in the industry. Both of us were refrigeration
technicians. You know, I spent a majority of
my life in the field. You as well were, you know,
refrigeration technician. We've both seen some
refrigerant transitions early in the industry
when we were going away from things like CFCs
and HCFCs. One of my biggest hiccups back in
the day is when we were going away from R12.
So when I got into the industry, I was still
a young tech and I was working on a lot of mom
and pop grocery stores and restaurants and every
bar in about five counties. So everyone had old
R12 coolers, right? And so we're going through
the refrigerant transition. And some of them
were easy to transition over to. So depending
on what kind of control it had. So, you know,
as a technician, I had to look at a system, determine
what was the existing refrigerant, whether it
had a temperature control or pressure control.
Because if I was using R12 and I was going to
use something like R414B, it might not work well
on pressure control. And so I'd have to convert
the temperature. Sometimes it was a headache.
And a lot of technicians are concerned about
this A2L transition that we're going through
right now for commercial refrigeration. You know,
there's been some hiccups with the R454B availability
in the residential light commercial sector. And
so the refrigeration technicians are going, oh,
is it going to be crazy for us? And not really.
I don't think so. Yeah. You know, when we talk
about the solutions, yeah, we're going through
refrigerant transitions. But when we look at
the big picture of what we're doing, we are just
using refrigerants to move heat. Many of our
new refrigerants, if not most of our refrigerants,
are going to operate in very similar pressures
to what we're used to. And when you have forward
-thinking companies like Heatcraft, it really
makes it an easy transition whether you're working
on a new system or retrofitting an existing.
So let's talk about some of the changes in commercial
refrigeration and solutions that Heatcraft is
offering. Okay, well, the first thing that I
want to say to everyone is... a refrigeration
system is going to work the same way that it
always has. You're dealing with heat transfer.
You're using a refrigerant through it. So from
that standpoint, you're not really looking at
a drastic change. So keep it simple. The biggest
thing that the biggest question that I've gotten
asked is, can I retrofit an existing system to
A2Ls? And the short answer to that is no, because
they're mildly flammable. So you are looking
at. potential equipment replacements. If you're
going to go to an A2L, you know, we're going
to have some transition time with it, you know,
because we're still seeing systems that, you
know, in the air conditioning side, you're still
seeing systems that have R22 in them. Oh, yeah.
You know, so from that standpoint, I don't think
it's going to be a radical change as far as the
way the systems are going to work. You know,
as we move into this, don't let it intimidate
you because it's not going to be, like I said,
it's not going to be a radical change. Exactly.
When we think about, you know, what are we doing?
We're working with a refrigerant that looks much
more similar to an A1 than it does an A3. You
know, the potential for flammability is just
near impossible. I've tried my darndest and was
very disappointed. but we're adding some safety
measures in that. So let's think about on the
commercial refrigeration side and let's think
about what obstacles we might be introducing,
not even obstacles, what new perspectives are
we gonna add with A12 refrigerants that might
look different than we did with say an A1 refrigerant.
Well, the biggest thing is first you've got to
understand the classifications of refrigerant.
We've been using A1s. A is the fact that it's
non -toxic. When you're down in the A1 range,
it's non -flammable. The B refrigerants are toxic,
and the higher you go up on that number, they
become anywhere from A1s, non -flammable, non
-toxic, to the A2Ls are non -toxic, but only
mildly flammable. Anybody that's ever used a
torch on a line with existing R22 and oil in
it or 410 and oil in it, it's not going to be
any worse than that because it's only going to
burn if there is an open ignition source. You
get rid of the ignition source, the flame goes
away. So the biggest thing is, is that when you
service an equipment with A2Ls is use nitrogen.
You should be doing that regularly anyway to
eliminate the oxidation. The other thing is,
if we move into the replacement and change out
market, you're going to have to look at a couple
of differences in piping. That's probably going
to be, I think, the biggest changes. Because
first of all, as I tell everyone, each refrigerant's
got its own amount that it'll boil away into
vapor. So I tell everybody, do yourself a favor.
Run your pipe sizing charts. Make sure, first
of all, that the piping is the correct size because
oil return is a big issue. The oil is not going
to be any different with the A2Ls than the POE
we've already been using. Exactly. That's not
going to be a big, in my mind, that's not going
to be a big concern. The biggest concern is probably
going to have to be that we're going to have
to go to a refrigerant detection system to shut
it down. and stop the refrigerant loss in the
event that you have a leak. Because the difference
with refrigeration is the fact that your walk
-in coolers, walk -in freezers, you're in a contained
area. So you're going to have to do some calculations.
Fortunately, there's the ASHRAE information,
ASHRAE 15 and ASHRAE 34 out there to help you
calculate that. There's four or five different
mitigation zones. so you just have to figure
out which one you're in but i think it's going
to be the piping that's going to be the biggest
difference in what you've been doing because
we're going to have to have shut off valves and
check valves outside of the box in other words
if you have a leak in the evaporator and that
refrigerant leaks in that enclosed space you
want to be able to stop that and not lose any
more refrigerant and if you have multiple evaporators
you're going to have to have a piping is going
to have to change to move the check valves outside
of the box to each individual evaporator. That
way you minimize your refrigerant leaks. So I
think that's probably going to be the biggest
challenge that we're going to face with this.
Yeah, if we think about what are we doing with
mitigation, we've been using mitigation strategy
in gas -fired appliances since we came out with
electronic ignition modules. A mitigation strategy
is if there is the potential for leaks, say I
had a rollout limit or a pressure switch not
functioning on a gas appliance, what's it going
to do? It's going to shut down the potential
for fuel. And then it's going to run the fans
to dissipate and mitigate that so that there's
no potential for ignition. So if we think about
a box, right, think about a walk -in cooler or
walk -in freezer, you know, we have a fairly
small space. So if we were to have a release
of refrigerant, we just need to make sure that
we reduce that refrigerant. as quick as possible.
And so I go back to thinking about pump down
systems or anyone that's familiar with a pump
down system is already familiar with what we're
going to be doing with mitigation. It's just
a different type of control that's going to operate
that solenoid. So kind of walk us through what
a mitigation would look like and say a walk -in
cooler. Well, as I said, there's several different
mitigation zones. The first one is if you have
under the acceptable amount of releasable charge,
which is usually about six to eight pounds, depending
on the refrigerant. And you've got a certain
amount of square footage in the box, then you
don't really have to do anything because the
refrigerator is heavier than air. It's all to
the floor and it's only going to build up so
much. Then of course you have the next mitigation
zone, which is circulation. If you have Either
the refrigerant detection system fails, the sensors
don't work, and it says, hey, you don't have
a leak, but I can't tell. Then the circulation,
the evaporator fans that are already there simply
have to run to keep it from pulling. Just forced
on. Forced on. And then in the next mitigation
zone, that would be exactly what would happen.
I've got enough in here. I don't have to do anything
other than turn the fans on. from there you move
to the next mitigation zone which is you're going
to have to do some shutdown and you're going
to have to stop the refrigerant flow that's where
the solenoid valve and the check valve come in
come into play now they have to be separate valves
from what you're already using they have to be
rated to do that check valve goes in the suction
line prevents anything from the condenser coming
back the refrigerant detection system would simply
shut off the that solenoid valve to stop the
refrigerant flow and the unit would pull the
refrigerant out of the evaporator and shut down
and your refrigerant detection system would go
off and say hey you've got a leak yeah so then
from there you move into you've also got a volume
in between so there's an area where the volume
is sufficient to take care of it the Worst one
is going to be if you move into the ventilation
zone. At that point, you're going to have to
introduce exhaust fans and fresh air coming in.
But for the most part, that's where if you size
your walk -ins and the evaporators correctly,
it becomes a one -to -one, one evaporator to
the cooler. If you have multiple evaporators,
you have an individual check valve and shutdown
outside the box for each evaporator. Because
the odds of having multiple evaporators leak
are not very likely. So then you would keep it
out of that mitigation zone where you need the
exhaust and the fresh air coming in. So understanding
the mitigation zones and how they apply to the
square footage of the box you're in is probably
the biggest challenge. Yeah, and it's just a
little bit of a learning curve. And, you know,
we're going to use calculations to quickly look
at the capacity of the charge. We're going to
look at the space that we're in, and then we're
going to be able to determine what needs to be
done. I myself love the idea of installing, you
know, the solenoid per coil plus a check valve.
And if we look at some of the residential strategies,
some of the manufacturers are recommending doing
that even if it is below the required charge,
just as a good practice. So there's ways that
we can look at that, but there'll be calculations
to use to determine which is required. And anytime
the manufacturer, you know, we at Heatcraft,
we put a lot of emphasis on the A2Ls and training
for A2Ls because we don't want anybody to say,
well, I'm afraid to use it or I don't want to
use it because we're going to move that direction.
The industry has already geared towards that.
Everyone is going to be doing that. So, you know,
we... I remember in the early 90s when we moved
to recovery and moved to 410 and everything else,
there was an intimidation factor out there because
it was unknown. So the biggest thing with this
is I think the more we learn about it, the more
we understand it and what we have to do, we're
hoping to take that intimidation factor away
because knowledge is key. It sure is. One of
the things that you had mentioned is we're actually...
at Heatcraft going above and beyond the required
detection. Whereas, you know, there's a required
that if we hit that 25 % LFL that we're required
to go into mitigation. But you're actually going
into like a pre -mitigation, like a warning stage
beforehand, before you would ever get to that
point. Knowing that we've got perishable products,
we're actually going to have some indicator beforehand.
Can you talk about that a little bit? Yeah, that's
correct. Because first of all, I think at 25%,
you have to go into the mitigation. You've got
a leak. If you've hit 25 % of the LFL, okay,
we have to go into mitigation. Of course, you
know, you have sensors in the coil to tell you
that it's leaking. You've got an RDS system.
One of the things that we're doing is we're giving
you a warning at about 6 % to 7 % that it goes
off and says, hey, there's a leak. You're going
to have to address this, but now you've got some
time. Exactly. Between when you initiate that
leak response, which is nothing but a warning
to say the equipment's still working. You've
got a refrigerant leak. Hey, go ahead and deal
with this before you reach the shutdown. Because
anybody that has dealt with critical refrigeration
installation knows that anyone stands to lose
a lot of product. or a lot of whatever it is
that they've got in that walk -in that's critical
you know it's nice to know that you're going
to have a problem that you can deal with now
before you lose that refrigeration so that the
customer's got time to deal with it you know
working in a lot of Grocery refrigeration. We've
had refrigerant detection sensors in the compressor
rack rooms for decades. And I've always thought,
boy, it'd sure be nice if we had these in our
evaporators as well to be able to look for refrigerant
leaks before they become an emergency or a high
priority. And so by doing that at that very low
LFL, if there is a small leak, I mean, 6%, 7%,
that's a very small leak in a contained space.
So it's going to give us a lot of indication
beforehand so we have time to call, get on that
schedule, get a technician out and determine
where that issue is. In many cases, we find flares
or things that are repairable with minimal downtime
versus waiting until it's hit that 25 % LFL and
it shuts down our refrigerant flow and goes into
mitigation. Right. And of course, like you said,
we've been using refrigerant detection systems
for years. If you've ever worked in any enclosed
environment, the basement of buildings, anything
where there's been the possibility of accumulating
refrigerant, they're already out there. We're
just simply adapting them to go into our unit
coolers, into the evaporators. So it's not going
to be any great leap in technology. It's just...
a few little things that we're going to have
to do differently. Because one of the things
that we're doing is dual compatibility with our
girls. As we call it here, what we're doing is
that we're making the evaporators where they're
dual rated. You can buy an evaporator, do a change
out, use it for your existing A1 refrigerants,
or you can buy that evaporator. set up for the
A2Ls. So with our intelligent control system,
we simply, you can get it either already installed
for the A2Ls with an A2L evaporator, or you can
then add the refrigerant detection kit, simply
plug it into the intelligent control. If you
fail to put the RDS on and you try to select
an A2L refrigerant, it's going to say, hey, I
need the RDS kit. So it's going to tell you that
you have to have it. So that's going to make
it nice because Rather than buying a piece of
equipment and say, well, it's already outdated.
You know, we're going to be able to have that
dual refrigerant capability with what we're making.
I was fortunate enough to get a chance to take
a look at that at AHR this year. And from a service
technician, that is like, that's a dream come
true for a product. You know, because if we look
at, you know, previous refrigerant generations,
you know, when we were making these refrigerant
transitions. you know it was a significant change
in on operating pressures so we would have one
evaporator coil for the existing refrigerants
that we were using and one evaporator coil for
the new refrigerants and new metering devices
and so like you'd mentioned this isn't as significant
as a change as we've seen in the past it's just
a little bit different because of operating on
very similar pressures we can utilize a coil
that would operate on either so whether i'm doing
a new installation Or whether I'm doing a coil
replacement on an A1 refrigerant or a coil replacement
on an A2L, I have one product that will fit all
three categories. Correct. Now, you know, one
of the things that I tell a lot of the classes
that I teach and technicians that I run into
is do your homework. Because the contractors
that do learn about this ahead of time. They
educate their customers because it's the end
user that's going to be turning to them to say,
hey, I need help here. What do I do? And let's
face it, that our technicians that are out there
in the field are usually the first point of contact
with the customer. They're the one telling them,
you've got a problem. Here's what's wrong. And
the sooner you offer them a solution. Because
what we used to, one of the things that we did
when I was in the field is we had what we called
planned obsolescence. We knew how old the equipment
was. We kept a list of it with the customers.
As we would make recommendations, you do your
maintenance, you say, here's the list of things
that could possibly go wrong with this. Here's
what we're recommending doing. Because if they
can budget for this ahead of time, it's going
to make it a lot easier. And when you become
the expert that your customer can count on, it's
going to make your life and theirs a lot easier.
So we try to provide as much information as we
can. And that's kind of my job here is to present
the service tech's point of view, you know, to
us as a manufacturer. Because I know what makes
my life easier in the field and what I prefer
to do and use. I love that. That's the whole
reason I've chose to be in this role is from
a technician perspective. How does these things
look? How do these changes look? What do you
need to know? So when we pair with equipment
manufacturers like Heatcraft, who's trying to
get the information out to the industry, all
you need to do to be a successful contractor
is to be educated. to understand the difference
and present it to your customer. That's all we've
ever really done. So I worry about the contractors
that are going to struggle with this transition
when they go to buy that first new piece of equipment
and go, wait a minute, this looks different.
What's going on here? Versus the one that goes,
I've been waiting for you and I know that you're
not that different. So come on, let's go do this
installation. One of the things that we're doing
is creating a series of almost did you know videos
that you will be able to access on our website
to get this information out there. They're going
to be in quick, easy to see modules. That's something
that we're building. We're putting this out there
to make the technician's life easier because
information is golden. When you know going in
what I'm facing, what I have to do, the intimidation
factor goes away because there's always, I've
always heard, oh, I'll retire before I have to.
to face that change or do that. And technology
is changing at such a rapid pace right now. We
have to keep up. And education is, you know,
it's important to me. I've always been that guy
that the technicians have come to that says,
hey, what are we going to do? And it was my job
to get the information and find it. So that fits
in nicely with my role here at HeatCraft. Yeah,
absolutely. I really look forward to those videos.
I'll be sharing them like crazy when we get to
that point. So, Justin, tell us a little bit
about the training that HeatCraft offers and
how people can learn more about the training
opportunities. Well, first of all, you can visit
our website and you can look at our training
schedule. We do several things. First of all,
we have training that... Well, let me say this
first. We're putting a big emphasis on training.
Over the course of the next year, we're going
to be building a new training facility here to
greatly expand what we do. So we offer classes
here at Stone Mountain, classes on our intelligent
controls, our electronic defrost controls. We
also offer basic education. After being in the
field, I realized that even students coming out
of a tech school that are getting ready to break
into the industry, they haven't really learned
how to read diagrams and troubleshoot to the
point that's really going to benefit them. So
we offer everything from a basic refrigeration
and installation to a troubleshooting course
to specifics. all the way up to CO2 and we're
going to be developing classes for racks and
as time moves forward I think we'll really be
able to offer some some nice in -house training
but we also take it remotely. I'll be traveling
to Texas next week to do a two -day training
for some technicians. through one of our distributors
there we've been traveling all over the country
to put these classes on as we've had the request
and now what we're doing is we've got a new development
coordinator that's taking our courses breaking
them down into smaller sections putting them
on our website so that people can go in and say
well i got 20 or 30 minutes i want to find out
about this and so That's really the direction
that we're heading is trying to get that information
out there, make it easier for people to take
it in small chunks and just not get overwhelmed
with it. Yeah, you're right. That's it. A little
modular training. Take it in small chunks and
take it as often as you need and as comfortable
as you need when you have that time available.
No, it's absolutely what we need in the industry.
Well, Justin Bailey, technical trainer for HeatCraft,
I sure appreciate you joining us. And for those
that want to learn more, I encourage you to go
over to the website, HeatCraftRPD .com. Thank
you, sir, for your time. You're absolutely welcome.
It's been a pleasure.