Blue Orifice Tube or White? Which is best? R134A

[pauljleblanc]

Charlie will this oriface tube work in say Chevy trucks / Suv's. TIA

 

[charlief1]

Charlie will this oriface tube work in say Chevy trucks / Suv's. TIA

Where you located Paul? It should work fine in most locations if everything is taken into account.:smile:

 

[pauljleblanc]

I'm in Dayton, 10 miles North of Baytown or 20 miles East of Houston.

 

[charlief1]

You should be happy with it then. I'm in Hillsboro, about 40 miles North of Waco.

 

[TexasT]

Bringing this back from the DEAD and hoping it pings Charlie or anyone else who has input.

I have been studying up and i am guessing the ford 38635 is the blue orifice tube.
I think the 38639 is the red orifice tube and the ACDelco 15-50120 Orifice Assembly is the white orifice tube

Just some background. I am going to go with the 152a(as seen here http://www.ihadav8.com/forum/index.php?topic=4082.0). I have procured a vac pump and some gauges(happy birthday to me). Now, as my car is stock and might even have some r12 in it(I bought it new and the a/c has never been worked on) I will probably need a new drier, orifice tube and possibly a compressor(Thanks to Jason Good2win22).

I will get the drier as mentioned on the link(ACDelco 15-1681 Accumulator Dryer (This is the correct TR part #, despite what Amazon and RockAuto say). I am probably going to order several orifice tubes. The delco one might not get the green light as it is over $20 and the two ford ones are $.80 ea on rock auto in the four seasons brand.

I guess I need some flush and some kind of oil. pag150, ester, mineral? So confusing. One of the sites I read about using brake cleaner to flush out the lines.

Is this the way to go about it?
http://www.s10forum.com/forum/f135/how-to-r152a-conversion-493953/

I notice he is using a white orifice tube. But I am in Texas, where it is HOT. I need max cooling at all rpm.

Thanks for you thoughts and sharing your experience with us novice wrench benders.

 

[charlief1]

Brake cleaner will work and the best price is through wally world, but, you may need a lot more than you think. I like the quarts of cleaner because you can pour it in the condenser, plug both pipes, and shake the heck out of it to clean it. Then use air to blow all of it out. The brake cleaner works best for lines though.

 

[bison]

I used a blue orifice tube on the last one. It was cold. .067" orifice iirc


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[John Larkin]

I used the red Ford one. I ordered for a 1995 Ford F150 with V8. It worked well. Also used mineral spirits to flush with. That citrus stuff is way expensive. I just measured how much oil I was able to drain out of the system and then let the shop replace that much oil and recharge.

 

[TexasT]

I'm probably going to pick up a red one. What oil should I be using with the 134a/152a? I will disassemble the whole thing and clean it out/replace the o rings, and probably get the pag 150. What is ice32? Oriellys has that in their oil.

Thanks for the input it is all valuable.

Sent from my HTC PH39100 using Tapatalk

 

[charlief1]

The "ice" stuff is an additive that's supposed to promote a better heat transfer. Haven't heard much about it though.

 

[dragrazor]

Lots of good information here. living in south florida, what orifice tube should I go with. Also, I need decent cooling at idle. I also read that a variable orifice is the best. I will be evacuating the system and refilling it with r134. It has a new r134 compatible dryer. I don't know what orifice tube it currently has. Thank you in advance.

 

[aminga]

Flush it completly with AC flush, it's more than brake clean but not much. I used a white orfice tube and it will blow 42 degrees out the vents. The key is to charge it by the PT tables. which on a 90 degree day will produce high site pressures that look scary compared to R-12

 

[TexasT]

Flush it completly with AC flush, it's more than brake clean but not much. I used a white orfice tube and it will blow 42 degrees out the vents. The key is to charge it by the PT tables. which on a 90 degree day will produce high site pressures that look scary compared to R-12

What are pt tables? Can I get a link?

While I have yall. I have been studying up on oils. Gotta get mineral out, that is pretty clear when going away from r12. Pag150 or ester oil? I bought the pag150 but upon further study it appears the ester is better when reusing the compressor that had mineral oil in it. Is this ester a better choice for me since I will be using a compressor that had mineral oil in it?

I will get as much mineral oil out as I can and flush with one of the other two choices.
The gnttype.org sez ester oil. Others have used the pag150 but these appear to be using a new or rebuilt compressor.

Anyone have thoughts? TIA

Sent from my HTC PH39100 using Tapatalk

 

[charlief1]

Ester needs to be changed once in a while since it collects and holds trash more than PAG does. PAG does remove paint though, but since it lasts longer the system shouldn't have to be opened up unless there's a problem.

 

[aminga]

In short if it's 90 degrees when you charget the system the high side pressure needs to be 250-270PSI

 

[TexasT]

Sounds like pag150 with as thorough a clean out as I can do. I have a quart of flush and keep brake cleaner for general squirting on stuff to clean it. Still working on the head gasket over heating fiasco on my daughter's Malibu. Gonna do a vacuum and fill on that one too when we get it running but it already has 134a from the factory.

 

[aminga]

I wouldn't use the brake clean at all.

 

[ijames]

Sounds like pag150 with as thorough a clean out as I can do. I have a quart of flush and keep brake cleaner for general squirting on stuff to clean it. Still working on the head gasket over heating fiasco on my daughter's Malibu. Gonna do a vacuum and fill on that one too when we get it running but it already has 134a from the factory.

First, check out JDEstill's recent thread in this forum on upgrading his system; he used brake clean and was amazed how hard it was to get rid of even with extended pumping with a vacuum pump. If you do use it, I would really want to follow it with real AC flush anyway, so why use it?

Second, back in the dark ages of the 1990's when I last did a lot of reading up on all of this and conversions from R12 to R134a were in their infancy, ac tech magazines had lots of reports of compressor failure when pag oil was used in retrofits. The explanation then was that any system that had had a chlorinated refrigerant like R12 or R22 would have traces of acids and chlorides from tiny amounts of refrigerant decomposition that could not be flushed out and which would attack the pag oil and lead to failure, so you had to use ester oil unless it was a completely virgin installation with all new components (lines, hoses, compressor, evaporator, condenser, etc.). I converted my system to R134a with ester oil in about 1995 and it was still blowing nice cold air when I pulled the motor in 2008 or so. That was about 13 years of reliable service. I never "changed" the ester oil, and sadly haven't put it back together since but I expect the ac to still work if I ever do. I haven't read up on this stuff in a while so I don't know if pag oil is still considered incompatible with residues from chlorinated refrigerants or not, but I would still go with ester oil just in case.

 

[TexasT]

Goodness this goes back n forth. I guess for $9 I can get some ester oil. or take my pag 150 and trade it for ester oil. I just don't want to crater the compressor Good2win22 hooked me up with by using the wrong oil.

 

[charlief1]

The acid in the system is natural from the refrigerant. It happens with R-134 as well. Just make sure to flush it all out and use compressed air to blow through it when you're done Rich.