Refrigeration is not my thing, now I need help with a project

[Green Mountain]

Originally posted by star882
Isn't SO2 sulfur dioxide?

You are correct. My mistake. My doctor has me on a salt free diet so I have sodium on the brain. .

I think methal cloride was before SO2. We have an old Frigidaire in the shop that had methal cloride in it. That stuff is nasty. Even worse than SO2

[icemeister]

Originally posted by benncool
I think methal cloride was before SO2. We have an old Frigidaire in the shop that had methal cloride in it. That stuff is nasty. Even worse than SO2

Methyl Chloride has a sort of sweet odor. I remember the old 8 hole ice cream cabinet we had in the cellar that ran on methyl. We also had a Frigidaire 2-door cooler that had SO2. The SO2 was a much nastier smell......like rotten eggs mixed in sulphuric acid.

The biggest difference was that methyl chloride is highly flammable. Nice stuff to have around open drive motors and those hot wire relays!

SO2 preceded Methyl as a refrigerant by only a couple of years, 1875 vs. 1878. Both were pretty common up through the forties and into the fifties.

Willis carrier used methyl chloride in his first centrifugal in 1926, the same year Thomas Midgley came up with R12.

Interestingly, CO2 was one of the first, being introduced as a refrigerant in 1866. Now 140 years later it's seeing a comeback.

Reference:Refrigerant History