Recovery Machines - 3 Types Of Air Conditioning Refrigerant Recovery

When your job is to repair air conditioning systems, and you are paid by the job or by the hour, then efficiency of your work must be important to you. In this short article, three types of air conditioning refrigerant recovery are introduced. These are liquid phase recovery, vapor phase recovery, and push-pull recovery. Knowing about all three, and using them when appropriate will speed up your work with refrigerant recovery machines, be it for air conditioning repair, air conditioning service, RV refrigerator repair, or similar jobs. Ultimately knowing about these three types of air conditioning service will make you more money in the shorter amount of time in your job.

Liquid phase refrigerant recovery

This is the fastest possible way to recover most if not all the refrigerant in the AC unit. Since the liquid is always denser than the vapor, liquid phase recovery is fastest regardless of what refrigerant you are working with. Liquid phase refrigerant reclaim is very suitable for container-to-container transfers, however, it is not suitable for all AC or HVAC systems.

Vapor phase refrigerant recovery

Vapor phase refrigerant recovery will transfer the refrigerant in its vapor phase. This is the most common and most frequently used refrigerant reclaim done to date. However, it is also the slowest as the vapor always has lower density than the liquid phase, and by a large margin. This type of refrigerant reclaim is suitable for all air conditioning systems.

Push-pull recovery

This is a combination of liquid phase and vapor phase refrigerant recovery with a twist. In the first phase, the compressor pressure is used to push the refrigerant liquid out of the air conditioning unit into the recovery tank. In the second phase, which may require a quick exchange of hose attachments, the remaining refrigerant is "pulled" out of the air conditioning unit in gas phase, as with the vapor phase refrigerant reclaim above. A combination of push-pull provides the speed that is superior to that of the vapor phase refrigerant reclaim and the completeness and the lack of residual refrigerant leaks as characteristic to the vapor phase refrigerant reclaim. So when you get a hold of the recovery machine that can do push pull, you will be able to benefit from it the most.