Common sense...doesn't exist. It is what you believe others shouldknow, based on your years of experience. Its a myth. Nobody learnsanything without asking questions and doing stuff, and that includeseverybody here.What is an EE?I cant help but feel sorry for people who are territorial about theirprofession. There is nothing an HVAC tech can do that I couldn't dowithout the proper knowledge and equipment. You've admitted ityourself: it's a series of calculations and some book knowledge. It'sbasic mechanical engineering with maybe a touch of fluid dynamics. Andthere are those who insult people who haven't learned it yet and arestupid enough to wonder about it.The only difference between home electrical and home HVAC, is thatthere aren't a bunch of DIY books on the subject. And someday thatwill change. Just like with all the other trades, people will hire apro only when the job is too much to bite off. And they'll have theknowledge to properly tackle the jobs safely. No longer will we haveto suffer $75 service calls just to get browbeaten.For those who helped me, thanks! You've confirmed that my project isbest left untackled. And I will get a pro to help balance the systembefore I finish the basement.For those with disdain for the DIY'er... You might be better served byspecializing in fixing amateur jobs. Because all your secret knowledgeis being gradually pried open. There will be a day when people won'thave to take abuse from guys because they happen to bend sheet metaland run calculations for a living.

Common sense tells you that if you hit your hand with a hammer, its going to hurt, or if you stick a fork in an electrical outlet, its going to knock the crap out of them. We have a lot of Darwin Award nominees that come in here that haven't figured that out yet.Electrical EngineerThe ones who get insulted are the ones who won't listen to good advice and council, and get nasty because they get told what they don't want to hear. We get a lot of that in here because the folks asking the questions are trying to do things that are inherently dangerous, without the proper tools, and will put themselves, their familys, as well as their home at risk.They can't print the books fast enough to keep up with new technologies. $75 only gets a tech there, and basic diagnosis. Repairs are extra. Unfortunately, you can bring your broken air conditioner to our shop, so we have to bring our shop to you in the form of a service truck.Its more than the calculations, the technologies are changing very...

Re: Turns out my BIG furnace filters are unnecessary?

Sep 02, 2010 23 Replies

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Steve 15 years ago

I have never worked in FL, but here localy, I have had to show some of the inspectors in the code books where they were wrong.

I gave up on surface mount stuff cause my eyes just are not that good anymore. I still piddle from time to time with conventional parts and breadboards. Been thinking about getting back into some of the older digital modes on the HAM radio again. Sux that Radio Shack no longer carrys anything to do with radios or electronic parts. I remember building a packet modem for around $5 for my C-64 back in 1984.

Funny thing, that, I will be re-configuring and re-piping some chillers at a Jackson, MS TV station in a couple of weeks, to complete the change-over from the analog to digital transmitters, as well as to build in redundancy in the cooling systems. They still have an empty spot to add a 3rd digital transmitter, and cooling provisions are being made for that also.

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Michael A. Terrell 15 years ago

I was hand soldering Motorola MC68340, 288 pin CPUs under a stereo microscope. QA couldn't tell my work from that done by the new Heller reflow oven. At first they tried to claim I didn't use enough solder because the rework department used more, till I picked up their IPCC handbook to show them that my work matched the photos, and it was rework who was using too much solder.

The fun thing is flushing them out to maintain water purity. The

1952 RCA used 25 pounds of Citric acid to remove the scaling once year, while the '80s 195 KW UHF Comark uses Tyglos which only works at full operating temperature and can not be used in the Klystrons. I needed some fiberglass duct board to enclose the sides of the chillers to use a salamander to heat the water, but no one wanted to sell it to me. The last place I asked was the local wholesaler. He told me to go to hell, so I told him I would make sure to mention their name on the TV station when we asked our members for help. Suddenly he thought it was a good idea to sell to a Christian TV station, gave me the best price break and loaded it into my truck. :)

BTW, I wrote software for a heating & air conditioning company in Ohio the mid '80s to calculate heat loss/loading for both new and upgrade jobs. It calculated each ceiling, door, window, wall and floor and printed a BOM, and estimated cost of operation in less than 15 minutes per job. I had three printers on the system, so you didn't load and unload forms all days.

Politicians should only get paid if the budget is balanced, and there is enough left over to pay them.

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Steve 15 years ago

Not too worried about "water" purity here... the coolant is glycol, and I will be purging with N2 when doing the 1/2 dozen braze joints, the rest of the connections will use soft solder. This stuff is a little bit bigger than I normally work with.... 2" and 2 1/2" copper.

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Michael A. Terrell 15 years ago

The RCA transmitter had 7 kV across the water. If purity wasn't maintained, it broke the water into hydrogen & oxygen which would over pressure the system.

That is small pipe, compared to the 4" and larger used in a TTU-25B

Politicians should only get paid if the budget is balanced, and there is enough left over to pay them.

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