Skip, Unfortunately all manufacturers of boat icebox conversion units
have some items in their designs that cause unwanted problems. Pre-
charged refrigerant lines have always come with O rings to prevent
refrigerant loss during assembly. Ounce torque down a metal seal
permanently prevents line connector leakage but Frigoboat relies on O
ring seals only to retain refrigerant. There are many applications
where O rings are used to prevent leaks. Now you are finding out why
spare O rings come with new Frigoboat units and also why at boat shows
they demonstrate how to change Orings. What you must find out for
yourself is the difficulty in re-commissioning systems after replacing
a refrigerant line O ring. When reliability and safety is demanded
from O rings shelf life of new rings is limited to one year. I read on
another forum where there was a discussion about replacing these
Frigoboat O rings every five years. My guess is that only one out of
ten refrigeration service technicians could add the correct amount of
refrigerant to your system.

Frigoboat’s refrigerant flow lines on keel cooler systems are simple.
There are three lines connected to compressor two on dome top and one
coming out of side. Line coming out of compressor’s side below welded
dome goes to keel cooler. Line out of other side of keel cooler runs
to evaporator. Return line from evaporator connects to one of the
lines coming out of compressor dome. Other line out of compressor dome
is short with the only refrigerant servicing connection on this system
There are three line connectors with O rings and no high pressure
servicing connection on a standard Frigoboat unit. Some installations
have optional line extensions that add more line connectors.

Yes there is a trouble shooting LED on the Smart Speed Control and it
will only flash when electronic control module senses an electrical
problem. Low cooling do to refrigerant loss will NOT trigger a signal
from troubleshooting LED.

Hi, Richard,

Thanks for the erudition and education!

So, if I read your stuff (clipped for brevity) correctly, the left side
nipple on the top of the dome is where I'd put new gas after evacuation. Is
that also where I'd evacuate it?

The one out of the side under the dome connects to the point which leaks,
and has a T'd connection point on it. That's the one I was instructed early
on to vent the slight overcharge from.

I (think I) understand from your tutorial that there is no real means of the
typical testing setup on my unit - no place to connect to high and low
side - just for evacuation and gassinng?

Thanks again for your assistance.

L8R

Skip

--
Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig KI4MPC
See our galleries at www.justpickone.org/skip/gallery !
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"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you
didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail
away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore.
Dream. Discover." - Mark Twain

"Richard Kollmann" wrote in message
...

Skip, Unfortunately all manufacturers of boat icebox conversion units
have some items in their designs that cause unwanted problems. Pre-
charged refrigerant lines have always come with O rings to prevent
refrigerant loss during assembly. Ounce torque down a metal seal
permanently prevents line connector leakage but Frigoboat relies on O
ring seals only to retain refrigerant. There are many applications
where O rings are used to prevent leaks. Now you are finding out why
spare O rings come with new Frigoboat units and also why at boat shows
they demonstrate how to change Orings. What you must find out for
yourself is the difficulty in re-commissioning systems after replacing
a refrigerant line O ring. When reliability and safety is demanded
from O rings shelf life of new rings is limited to one year. I read on
another forum where there was a discussion about replacing these
Frigoboat O rings every five years. My guess is that only one out of
ten refrigeration service technicians could add the correct amount of
refrigerant to your system.

************
Hi, again, Richard, and list,

Apparently, despite my not being a technician, let alone one in ten, I
managed...

The O-ring replacement was a non-event. Once the system was closed up
again, I evacuated the system. From Frigoboat's "manual" online, " The
suction side service valve normally will be on a stub of tubing that is
connected directly to the top of the compressor. "

That jibes with what you said, but everyone I spoke with in vendor or
distributor level phone calls wanted me to have a tap on the low side line -
there wasn't one, but the stub is apparently where Veco (the US distributor
for Frigoboat) wants you to put the line connection - after repeated
assurances in each call that there was no stub on the blue line, all agreed
that the stub "would do" - you'd think the Veco folks would have been
familiar with their own manual :{))

I ran a 6cfm pump for over 12 hours and removed it. Connected up my can
(with the adapter which is scarcer than hen's teeth locally), to the R12
line I bought, purged it with a nice blast, and left a trickle coming out as
I connected to the stub (to assure fully purged line, no possible moisture
intrusion) and put in an initial charge, with the compressor off.

Ran it for a couple of hours, and found the plates merely cool. Shut it
down, waited for equalization, and added more. Based on the "cool line" on
the can, I'd not put in nearly 6oz initially, the expected charge required.

Run, check, it wasn't making full cold, yet, so I added a third shot, ditto
on shutdown/equalization/restart.

That showed promise, bringing the previously 85° boxes (6" extruded
polystyrene covered in epoxy and gelcoat) down. Checking the exit line,
there was a very small bit of ice, but the box wasn't down to temps yet, so
I left it alone.

Overnight, the boxes came to 8° (the freezer set point), and, just by
spillover, as I'd unhooked the fan, 27° in the reefer. I had to stick my
finger into the bulkhead hole to feel any ice, but it was there, right at
the edge. I'll assume, until I load the boxes and get them down to temps,
that my charge level is correct.

Despite those temps, last night when it was still a few degrees over the set
point, there wasn't frost on all the plate surface. However, an infrared
thermometer showed the highest temp to be zero, and the rest ranged down
to -21° with most of it in the -15 to -18 range. I concluded that to mean
that it was adequately charged :{)) - but didn't know for sure that it
wasn't slightly overcharged. This morning's feel for the ice on the return
line suggests it's right on. The lack of frost everywhere, despite my small
circulating fan in the freezer running, suggests I have the reefer door
gasket difficulties resolved, as (I presume) there was very little moisture
in the two spaces, starting from hot and wet air.

And, despite my bragging on the keel cooler's amazing ability to dissipate
heat in the air, I wrapped it in a wash rag, propped it on all 4 sides, and
ran a trickle of water into it (enough that it dripped continuously).
Initially, that water was VERY (not to burn, but notable) hot. As the box
came down, it became less so.

So, I'll leave that in place, as we're routinely over 90° here during the
day, and only low 80s at night.

All is well here. Thanks for your help!

L8R

Skip, off to fix dings in both doors

--
Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig KI4MPC
See our galleries at www.justpickone.org/skip/gallery !
Follow us at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheFlyingPigLog
and/or http://groups.google.com/group/flyingpiglog


"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you
didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail
away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore.
Dream. Discover." - Mark Twain

Refrigerator:
Skip, Line coming out of BD50 compressor’s side is high pressure
line, in warm seawater it would be the one that gets the hottest and
may be why O ring failed in it. Hopefully compressor was not
overheated as well. When failed O ring was removed I hope all pieces
were accounted for. As you know your system has no filter or screen
protecting expansion capillary tube inlet orifice in high pressure
liquid side of system.
Yes, the single service connection on top of compressor is where
vacuum dehydration pump and recharge with 134a is accomplished. Rube
Goldberg would give you an A+ for trying to complicate a simple
process. Only time will tell if you dehydrated deep and long enough to
be successful. On your system successful performance can only be when
refrigerant volume and keel cooler condenser cooling are in balance as
seawater temperatures and compressor speeds change.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Richard Kollmann"
Newsgroups: rec.boats.cruising
Sent: Wednesday, August 10, 2011 9:28 AM
Subject: Skip, this may help with refrigerator problem.


Refrigerator:
Skip, Line coming out of BD50 compressor’s side is high pressure
line, in warm seawater it would be the one that gets the hottest and
may be why O ring failed in it. Hopefully compressor was not
overheated as well. When failed O ring was removed I hope all pieces
were accounted for. As you know your system has no filter or screen
protecting expansion capillary tube inlet orifice in high pressure
liquid side of system.

The O-ring came out nicely - just flat! (well, actually, on close review, a
truncated right-angle cone ring) - no scars, and a brilliant metal where the
new one landed immediately and was immediately inserted and tightened.

Yes, the single service connection on top of compressor is where
vacuum dehydration pump and recharge with 134a is accomplished. Rube
Goldberg would give you an A+ for trying to complicate a simple
process.

:{)) When my vendor and Veco kept telling me that I should have a low-side
tap, foolishly, I believed them. Reviewing the manual, and, of course
referring to your earlier helpful comments, I stopped worrying about that.

As to Rube Goldberg, if I'd known that the vacuum was an R12 fitting, I
could have been sucking away much earlier. Getting the gas to the system
would still have taken a bit longer due to the hens-teeth nature of the
134aF/12M fitting (everyone has the reverse).

However, I'll acquire my own vacuum pump shortly, which will eliminate that
problem, and we'll be good to go with my 134-only gauge set and can
adapter/R12 hose.

Only time will tell if you dehydrated deep and long enough to
be successful. On your system successful performance can only be when
refrigerant volume and keel cooler condenser cooling are in balance as
seawater temperatures and compressor speeds change.


Agreed. However, I suspect that a previously closed (and remaining closed
due to the quick-connects) system, evacuated at 6cfm for 14 or whatever
larger number of hours it was, likely pulled it about as far and dry as it
could get absent some industrial-grade sucker.

As I write, all the door repairs/improvements are finished, and, 12 hours
into an 83° 10CF (total) box' cooling, I'm at 10.9 and 32.3 in the freezer
and reefer, respectively, and no ice on the return line. I've left the
charge line/can attached just in case I'm not absolutely perfectly charged,
but the trial run suggests it's right on. I'll make that determination
after a while of running at normal cycling vs full-time pull-down.

My vendor, who'd been watching from the sidelines (the Boy Scout program in
the Keys, where he's a charter captain in those months the program
operates), including some emailed pix of what was going on, wrote after my
last to say:

"Congrats,
You need to fill out a job app. for service technician now when you're
ready to come out of retirement."

He'd offered me a job when he came to look at the boat in Keys Boat Works
just after the wreck, too; apparently, following your suggestions about
box-building, including the doors (with carefully calculated swing radii to
make sure of the angle I'd have to cut into them to allow opening, with all
that depth) impressed him :{))

And, to my previous, my presumption had been that the circulating fan had
been running. Turns out not so, as my reed switch had failed somewhere
along the line, discovered during the redo of the power line to the LED
cluster which comes on when the door's opened at the same time the fan
switches off, and the reverse when closed. So, yesterday, before
reassembly, I ordered new (one for spare) NO/NC switches, and put in a new
fan, along with repairing the broken line on the LED cluster for the
lighting. Once the switch arrives, it will be a 10-minute job to install
it.

Due to the now-constant 90+ temps here, I've also rigged something similar
to, but much improved over, the setup to keep the keel cooler wet which I
did in St. Pete during our wreck rehab. In our prior trial, the water
running off it got cooler as it stabilized; I assume that will assist in my
overall efforts at having cold beer for Lydia and coke for me, along with
the first-in-many-days, cold eggs to break for our breakfast that I enjoyed
feeling as I picked them up over the bowl this morning :{))

I believe this concludes all but chatter on this thread :{))

L8R

Skip and crew, back to the old grind (first step to polish up the new
weld/SS installation on the bow roller/cage system)


--
Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig KI4MPC
See our galleries at www.justpickone.org/skip/gallery !
Follow us at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheFlyingPigLog
and/or http://groups.google.com/group/flyingpiglog

"Believe me, my young friend, there is *nothing*-absolutely nothing-half so
much worth doing as simply messing, messing-about-in-boats; messing about in
boats-or *with* boats.

In or out of 'em, it doesn't matter. Nothing seems really to matter, that's
the charm of it.

Whether you get away, or whether you don't; whether you arrive at your
destination or whether you reach somewhere else, or whether you never get
anywhere at all, you're always busy, and you never do anything in
particular; and when you've done it there's always something else to do, and
you can do it if you like, but you'd much better not."

"Flying Pig" wrote in message
...

big trim

Due to the now-constant 90+ temps here, I've also rigged something similar
to, but much improved over, the setup to keep the keel cooler wet which I
did in St. Pete during our wreck rehab. In our prior trial, the water
running off it got cooler as it stabilized; I assume that will assist in
my overall efforts at having cold beer for Lydia and coke for me, along
with the first-in-many-days, cold eggs to break for our breakfast that I
enjoyed feeling as I picked them up over the bowl this morning :{))


That was a smart move, Skippy. Keeping the condenser water-cooled is how it
is intended to operate. Having no such method of cooling and relying on air
temperatures alone causes they system to operate harder, longer and with
more stress on all components. The excess heat was probably responsible for
the failed o-ring.

"Cold beer for Lydia and a coke for me"????? C'mon, Skippy, man up and have
a beer.

Wilbur Hubbard