The real reason as I've heard is 134a went off patent and DuPont is kinda greedy.
A/C Compressor Out- Real Surprise
- Thread starter Tex1001
- Start date
The real reason as I've heard is 134a went off patent and DuPont is kinda greedy.
That's been the supply house counter talk since they phased out R12 in the '90s. Not sure I buy it any longer.
OP
Tex1001
Member
Typical Texas price. Hope that you're keeping cool.
Thinking about it now, all our newer chillers in the schools were 134A. There aren't any R11 units left for sure. All our newer coolers & freezers and the Central Food Service coolers & freezers are 404A. I have no idea what they did with the computer room. It had 7 dual circuit Liebert units all running on R22. And I don't care anymore!!
Alton
Member
I am on my third heat pump. The first was a Trane that worked great once it was wired correctly by a second repair company but it always froze up when temps got below 35. The second was a Trane with the new freon and a POC. It broke down twice a year. Replaced inside coil three times, inside motor three times, outside motor twice. Fittings made in china kept exploding due to the new pressures. Finally replaced it with a new unit not a Trane. It doesn't freeze up even at 25 degrees, blows 90 degree heat at 15 amps. The heat pump is finally perfected.
All heat pumps will freeze up. That's why they go through a defrost cycle. Also they're not designed to work below about 45 degrees. That's when an ambient thermostat is supposed to shut it off and switch to gas/oil/electric strips.
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Tex1001
Member
I've made quite a bit of money over the years following up
on atrocious heat pump installations. It seems that almost no
one knows how to install/maintain heat pumps.
No one knows how to install second stage heat.
No one knows how to correctly program a heat pump
thermostat.
What's a heat pump? 
OP
Tex1001
Member
Any coil running below 30F will freeze up if outside humidity is
high enough.
Not working below 40-45F ambient is a function of refrigerant
characteristics. We can make units that will heat down to -10F
but they will lose serious efficiency when trying to cool at 95F.
That's why heat pumps are a bad investment at northern
latitudes.
OP
Tex1001
Member
I've heard this quite a lot. The old adage "it's hard to get good help these days" applies with these (supposedly) new-fangled technologies, esp. as there is so much pressure/hype to install them. They're eager to sell, but less able to service and install.
I had that problem with the high-eff. boiler when I built my current house 15 years ago. The installers hadn't a clue what they were doing. It worked, but not properly.
If I were to move and updated building codes mandated a heat pump, I'd be asking some rather pointed questions about the qualifications of the installers, like, "I want to see your factory qualification certificate." I'd probably go with Mitsubishi, Fujitsu or Daikin as these seem to be the best residential products. And I probably wouldn't use it for cooling in summer, but put in an earth tube as I did here. I've even heard of integrating an earth tube with a heat pump for winter use to temper (warm) the air around the pump amd keep it above 40º or so.
