Arkansas HVACR NewsMagazine May 2022

HVACR NewsMagazine May 2022

Tech News

Refrigerant leak detection: using an electronic leak detector

Electronic leak detectors are portable devices that you can use to “sniff” for leaks in the refrigerant piping or coils, or some types of leak detectors can even “hear” vapor passing through a leak. You will typically see electronic leak detectors come in three main varieties heated diode, infrared, and ultrasonic. Heated diode and infrared leak detectors are designed to pick up a trace amount of

system will be caught in the leak reactant first and show up as bubbles.

As you can see in the image above, smaller leaks show up as little “cocoons” of tiny microbubbles. Larger leaks, like the one on the underside of the line’s center point above, will have bigger, more visible bubbles. If you apply leak reactant to fittings and connections, make sure to apply it to all surfaces and use a mirror to inspect all surfaces for bubbles. When you’ve finished confirming leaks with your leak reactant, you can simply wipe it off all surfaces. We like to use Refrigeration Technologies Big Blu, which can detect leaks with rates as low as 0.5 ounces per year.

refrigerant; those leak detectors can’t detect nitrogen in the lines because nitrogen makes up over 70% of the air in the atmosphere! You can add a tiny amount of refrigerant to the lines if you’ve already recovered the charge or have yet to release the charge in a new system. Ultrasonic leak detection works a bit differently, and you can even use it without adding refrigerant because it doesn’t “sniff” refrigerant.

Heated diode leak detectors