absorber a** kicking

[bullgear420]

I have a York M/N YIASTIA2. Its a little machine, however I cannot get it to make range, stop crystallizing, and I never see any evap overflow. It takes FOREVER to load up. Once it loads and makes temp, it backs off and goes into ADC mode. My refrigerant is trashy. I feel overflow as soon as my steam valve opens. I have a clean bill of health from the chemist, I added a half gallon of alcohol, and I have a great vacuum. My flows are in range, and the "engineers" punched the tubes. Here are the numbers:

Steam: 14.39psia after the valve, 21psia feeding the valve, 230F outlet. Valve at 82% (machine loading)

Refrigerant: 62F, S.G. 1.12,

Chilled Water: 64F on, 58 off.

Condenser: ABS in 81, 87 out, 93 cond out.

Weak Solution: 97F, S.G. 1.56, 121F to generator.

Strong Solution: 178F into the HX, 120F out. 1.64 S.G

The rate limit is set to .5, and the valve pulse is set to 1 minute.

My main concern is a huge (80f) TD between the strong solution into the HX and the strong solution leaving the HX, I have de-crystallized the machine, but nothing changes.
I need help!

[DFZ]

what is the pressure of the absorber section,

what is the chilled water setpoint.

and what is the purge bubble rate?

[york56]

I ain't no expert but mabey these IOM's could help you out to figure out your problem they have helped me out tremendously in the past good luck.

[bullgear420]

York56, thank you very much for the books!

DFZ, the absorber pressure is 7-8 mils, the bubble rate is imperceptible, and the chilled water set point is 45.

[absrbrtek]

Clean your refrigerant up. At 62F with 1.12sg you have about a 15% concentration of solution in your refrigerant. Should be close to 0% solution in your refrigerant. Cut your steam regulater back. Should be around 10PSI at the generater inlet at full load. Relog and post.

[DFZ]

absorber section should be about 6mm

as you clean up the refrigerant the pressure may drop on its own

it does look to be fouled refrigerant.

hope all of this is helpfull.

[bullgear420]

Thanks for the help. How do I clean up my refrigerant? My steam is already 3-4 psig below design.

If I increase the pressure, will I increase the rate of distillation, or will I over concentrate the machine?

[absrbrtek]

Should be a (hand) dump valve on the discharge line of the refrigerant pump that goes into the solution side. Just open it up. It may be 2sol on your machine on page 26 and you may not have a hand valve. Ooops, I see your steam is in PSIA not PSIG. Probably have to log into service mode and go in with 1380 to manually open the dump valve.

"These solenoid Valves can
be manually controlled only when “Manual Solenoid
Control” is selected. Instructions for selecting the desired
control mode are contained in the IsoFlow Control Center
“Service” manual, Form 155.16-M3 in “Special Programming
Procedures” section."

[bullgear420]

thank you much, absrb! I wired a bypass switch in for 2sol on friday when i tried to decystalize the machine. I guess i didn't leave it on long enough, I was afraid to starve the refrigerant pump. I give it another go on monday, and let you all know how it goes.

thanks again!

[absrbrtek]

Well???????
thank you much, absrb! I wired a bypass switch in for 2sol on friday when i tried to decystalize the machine. I guess i didn't leave it on long enough, I was afraid to starve the refrigerant pump. I give it another go on monday, and let you all know how it goes.
thanks again!

[bullgear420]

It has been cool here on the east coast the week, and the customer has been relying on other means to cool this building. I hope to get out there Friday as we should be having a nice warm day. I will be sure to give a proper update.

Thank you all again for your help!

[Randy S.]

If the machine has a history of leaks, you've got a tiger by the tail.
I inherited a sick Trane unishell and fought with it for a while, a few years back.
It had a history of leaks, and you couldn't even see through the sight glass.
When we scrapped it the solution heat exchanger was so full of crud that it was a wonder it worked at all. Stack up city.


Abs. is probably the best guy around here on absorbers.
Listen and learn. He da man.

[zsmillie]

I'm currently fighting a crystallization on a single effect, steam fired 450 ton Carrier 16JB. I'm almost positive it's crystallizing in the lower solution heat exchanger, but I'm running out of ideas and can't get my water below 54 degrees. Any ideas, tricks or suggestions would be much appreciated.

[LiBrman]

My first post. To zsmillie, the most likely problem is some air or non-condenseables in the machine, start there. To prove this perform an absorber loss test. Pull a dilute sample and plot its specific gravity and temperature on an equilibrium diagram. That point on the diagram will give you its concentration but more importantly it will give you the temperature of the refrigerant water that the solution should be maintaining. Compare the temp. on the diagram with the actual refrigerant water temperature, in an air free machine they should be within 0-2 degrees F. If the difference is greater than that then there is air in the machine. If there is air hook up a known good vac pump and get it out, do not try and use the auto purge on the machine to accomplish this. Start with the simple first and know this is not the problem before moving on to something else.

[bullgear420]

Thank you all again for your help. I got sidetracked on some other jobs, and another mechanic ended up looking at this machine. He found the 2sol (ref pump discharge to strong solution heat exchanger) passing. He feels that this may be what was bogging down the machine and keeping my refrigerant polluted. I think he is going to dump the machine and we will know soon if this was the case. I'm glad someone figured it out!

[LiBrman]

bullgear420 - the 2SOL may be leaking by, but it would be cleaning up the refrigerant as the machine ran. The discharge pressure of the refrigerant pump would force refrigerant into the strong solution line and as the machine ran it would become cleaner. The only time it would contaminate the refrigerant is while off. If your refrigerant is staying contaminated while running the more likely culprit is the 3SOL located near the vac pump. If this one is leaking by it would put a continuos supply of LiBr into the refrigerant. I have removed this solenoid on some of my machines because I see no need for it and otherwise it can cause this problem.

[zsmillie]

Well, it was a rough week, but that 450 ton is holding 42 degree water now. I appreciate the suggestions, help and ideas. Turns out my Cycleguard valve was stuck, so I was over concentrated and it took about 4 hours to heat the machine up enough to flow correctly. Thanks again LiBrman!!!