Geofence, what type of a fence is it?

Smartphones, smart-TV’s, smart cars and now even thermostats are all smart technologies. The days of thermostats only maintaining one temperature are long gone. We want thermostats to not only help us maintain our room humidity and temperature, we also want them to maintain different temperatures when we are home and away.  I started reading about all the new Wi-Fi thermostats available to the homeowner and realized that the choice isn’t just Honeywell or White Rogers anymore, it’s ecobee, Nest, Venstar,  or Sensi. There are many more but these are the big names currently in the market.

Two of the brands, Nest and Ecobee use sensors on the thermostat which can override the temperature settings when they sense movement. The thermostats adapt and learn your schedule and in theory will adjust your temperature up or down based on whether you are home or not.

Honeywell chose to not use sensors on their new models. They have added geofencing abilities to their thermostats.Geofence Instead of using sensors on the thermostat to determine if you are in the home or not, they use your cell phone to determine where you are. You can set a geofence distance away from your home in which you want the thermostat to change its settings. The thermostat knows that if I set my fence to 500′ and I’m 3 kms away, it will be in Away mode. It’s a brilliant idea since most of us carry our phones with us everywhere we go.

 

Polyethylene Refrigerant Piping

Say it isn’t so, plastic piping for refrigeration and air conditioning. Well I guess copper has officially become too expensive when refrigeration piping starts to switch to plastic. The company called Multi-flex has designed refrigerant piping up to 1  1/8″ that is light and almost zero coefficient of thermal expansion. The piping can be bent and is good from temperatures of -40ºF to 200ºF or ( -40ºC to 93.33ºC). Multi-flex pipe has a working pressure of 650 psig and a life span of 50 years. That shouldn’t be a problem since most equipment have a lifespan half of that. The company even offers a 25 year warranty. Multi-flex Pipe.

The pros seem to outweigh any negatives that I can come up with. The product is light, easy to handle, strong and has next to zero expansion issues. So is it the future of the HVAC/R industry? I’m not so sure. It’s going to be an easy sell to a contractor because it’s easy to use and quick to install.

Change isn’t easy to most, and this one will be even harder. As an HVAC/R mechanic, all I’ve ever worked with is copper. I trust it, I’m familiar with it and know it’s limitations. There’s something about lighting that acetylene torch that makes me feel like a refrigeration mechanic. Taking that away will help my hearing, but will likely take something away from that feeling of accomplishment, that feeling that I built that. Oh well, change will happen whether I like it or not, and this product from the outside looks to good to fail.

 

 

Yellow Jacket BlueTooth P/T Gauge

Bluetooth P/T Gauge. Gone are the days of mechanics carrying around 6′ hoses full of refrigerant, not knowing if the refrigerant in them was good quality or contaminated. Worrying about hooking up your hoses to someone else’s machine and possibly contaminating their refrigerant with the stuff in your hoses. Yellow Jacket has come up with a wireless Bluetooth P/T gauge that connects with your smartphone or your tablet. This technology allows the technician doing a service to create a file on their smart device that can track pressure and temperature conditions as well as superheat and sub-cooling. One device capable of multiple refrigerants without worrying about hoses leaking or gauges leaking. Gauge sets will still be necessary for pulling a vacuum or to charge a system but for maintenance or service, they are the answer.

Google Glasses for HVAC

Google Glasses.When I think wearing glasses for work the first thing that comes to mind are my safety glasses or PPE. I recently read a story on an HVAC company in the United States that are using the glasses for the customer to be able to see what is wrong with their machine and what you intend to do as a service person to rectify their problem.  We as service people already use cell phones to take pictures or short videos for the customer but this allows us to do it hands free. The customer sees the issue immediately and can give you approvals right away. The other benefit as a service person is the technical help from a supervisor while you are working alone. It’s like having a journeyperson with you at all times. This technology may become the new PPE of the future.

Fridge cops in the U.S are actual cops!

You know the economy is bad when recently an Ohio man was arrested for stealing air conditioning units to be parted out for their copper. The man was charged with theft of the 49 units he stole and for cutting the copper lines and releasing refrigerant into the air. He violated the United States Clean Air Act which breaks both state and federal laws and has landed him a jail sentence for both acts as well as community service once he is released. R-22 Venting.

While we as Canadians may laugh at how silly this sounds, we are not immune to this type of theft. I used to work for a large manufacturer and we kept all of our roof top units(RTU) stored behind our warehouse in a fenced in storage compound. We were open Monday to Friday and continually had picker trucks coming and going picking up and dropping off RTU shipments. One Monday we showed up for work and our warehouse manager told me we had been robbed over the weekend. It turns out that one of the delivery drivers with a picker truck decided to lift the RTU units sitting inside of the compound fence up and out area with his crane. He knew how often we had security drive through the area and that our cameras at the time were in a bad area to be able to identify the truck or the licence plates properly.

Kawasaki’s Water Chiller

Global warming and ozone depletion have become synonymous with our trade. I think most people in the trade want to defend the trade and are excited for new technologies that make our industry look more appealing to the general public. Kawasaki, yes the same company that make motorcycles and jet-ski’s also make chillers. Their newest chiller will revolutionize the industry as we know it. Gone are the days of machines that run on HFC refrigerants. Kawasaki has come up with a completely green machine that utilizes the natural refrigerant, R-718, or as most people know it as, water.

The company has eliminated the need for HFC refrigerants by completely redesigning the centrifugal chiller and designing a unique compressor and some special components to operate with water. Kawasaki Water Chiller

Refrigerant loss to a roof top unit or (RTU) will usually be 5-10 lbs or an HFC, refrigerant losses to a centrifugal chiller can be 1000-2000 lbs. This technology reduces manufacture of HFC refrigerants and will reduce the loss of those same refrigerants. This is the type of technology that the industry had been waiting for since Willis Carrier first invented air conditioning in 1902.

Embraco Oil-Free Compressors

The HVAC industry has once again taken a giant step forward in developing technology that not only benefits the consumer for efficiency but also benefits our environment. Traditional compressors used in refrigeration and air conditioning require both refrigerant and oil for the system to operate properly. The compressor much like your car’s engine requires oil for lubrication of the pistons, crankshaft and other compressor components. The oil that was a requirement in all compressors is no longer required with Embraco’s new compressor.Embraco’s Oil-Free Compressor.

This new compressor is known as the Wisemotion compressor. This compressor not only saves the consumer on electricity consumption but is also considerably quieter than a traditional compressor and the harmful oil used in compressors is avoided. The internal components are coated in a material that enables a lubricity without the need for oils.

General Electric’s Magnetic Refrigeration

For years refrigeration and more specifically refrigerants have been a major contributor to the global warming and ozone depletion problems we are facing. Manufacturer’s have been experimenting with different refrigerants, use of less refrigerants, refrigerants that don’t contribute to the ozone depletion potential (ODP) but do contribute to the global warming potential (GWP). The new push is for environmentally friendly refrigerants or as they are called, natural refrigerants such as water or carbon dioxide.

General Electric has possibly revolutionized the refrigeration and air conditioning industry as we currently know it but designing a refrigerant free means of mechanical cooling. They have found that they can make a fluid, such as glycol, heat or cool using magnets and magnetic fields. This technology removes the need for refrigerants, compressors and is significantly more energy efficient than the traditional form of refrigeration. Magnetic Refrigeration