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Well guys we are trying to see if we're going live. Hey guys today's just a day where I'm trying to go live and talk to you maybe answer a few questions. Hopefully we can get to where I can see some comments at least that's what I'm trying to do. And yeah if y'all can find a way to let me know y'all can hear me. Oh here we go finally we're getting some comments. Hey guys I'm having to do this on my iPad because I've tried to do it multiple times and things just weren't working out. I hadn't had a lot to video. Y'all see me put out shorts and shorts. Yes, y'all can hear me. I tried to go live yesterday, twice today using the MacBook and for some reason that just that was not working. It's working now. Thank you, Adrian. It's nice to know. I don't know what the deal is. I tried multiple times using the Mac And it just wasn't working, so y'all are on my iPad today. Stephen, I work in South Georgia, Venice, Florida. I don't know if y'all have had the same weather we've had, but it's been rainy and overcast. It's hard to film anything when it's raining all the time. Yeah, so actually it's a slow time of year and it's been overcast and raining really mild. No need to run the air conditioning whatsoever. So, hey, Rick, watching from Arizona. Just came from Valdosta. That's just right down the road from me. Hey guys, it's good to finally make a connection. I've been trying to get a video out for y'all today on things just were not cooperating. I'm not in Texas. I have family in Texas, but I'm not in Texas. There is very little oil fired equipment down here. We don't have a need for it because it doesn't get very cold. Most places that use oil fired equipment, they have a problem with propane getting too cold and it doesn't get that cold down here. Looking for a Klein utility knife. I don't know. I've got their, at least I had it earlier, their Klein box cutter, which I like. Yeah, we're sort of a heat pump state. When all the push was trying to get away from fossil fuels or natural gas, propane, or anything like that, the push here was to go towards heat pumps. What did I do today? I worked on videos and had a couple couple meetings, some of these Zoom meetings that we have to have sometimes. had a couple of those and some of those were interesting. Milwaukee has a cordless recovery unit but we can't get our hands on it until like January of next year. Any advice for fresh trade school student? Be hungry to learn everything you can and don't give up. You might get some crap jobs. I don't know, we haven't worked on much of the 454B. Yes, a live stream. The R438A refrigerant R22. Yes, I use the R438A is also known as MO99. I think that's right. And that's what I've been using to retrofit R22 systems. Some of the guys around here just dump it right on top. I don't do that. But Ted does not like the R454. I haven't had much experience with it. I've only worked on one of them. I have a drum of it on my van. They aren't very common yet. Yeah, we've only been doing R410 for what, 15 years now? So everything out there is either old R22 or R410. Well, hello, here in Panama City. I hope y'all didn't get this bad weather. Understood some of it went through Tennessee, and we sure got a load of it today. 454 is all he has available from Trane. Well, I'm still able to get a little bit of the R410 stuff, but they aren't receiving anymore. They just had a whole big stockpile of it. Forgive me, guys. I'm reading some of the comments as fast as I can. Do you think mini-split system will be the new normal standard? Mini-split systems, it's going to take a while before those become a standard install, unless you're talking about like a mini-split style condenser on a regular air handler. Many of the houses around here are built for nothing but a unitary system or something with dot work. But to say that, I'm replacing one in an office right now with a three-head mini-split. So I guess it's going there. You can't top off leakers. I haven't worked on the R32 Goodmans. I don't know about their expansion valves. I wouldn't think they would be much different. I'm just not imagining working on these systems is gonna be much different for me or really for anybody else. Just monitors on them. Oh, is that on the trains, Ted, you're talking about? They got monitors in the air handlers? I've heard about some of those. Most of the reams that I have been installing, Have been still 410 systems. Well, I don't know what they're using for a monitor, but I wish they'd put something like that in my leak detectors because half of them don't work. Goodman has monitors also. Lovely. Is there a way to bypass those? You bought the Detex Stratus last week, so that means you're not eating this week? Yeah, as soon as I said about bypassing one of those sensors, I thought maybe we shouldn't do that because it's a semi-flammable substance. Even though it's not really that flammable, It won't sustain a flame on its own. I feel like a lot of this A2L reaction and stuff is a little bit of an overreaction. Mildly flammable. It means if you hold a torch to it, it might burn. Any other instance, it's not going to burn. How's Riley? Riley is being capricious and seems to do what he wants to do half the time. Well, congratulations on getting out of tech school. Hello from the UK. In fact, some of my day, I was corresponding from somebody over in the UK. Hello from Perry, um, somebody who works for Richie Yellowjacket, part of their advertising people over there in the UK, hoping they can hook me up with somebody here in the U.S. And I've been, hey Mike, um, Mike at AHR. Ted don't know it, but he, um, he's one of the people that helped inspire me to start my channel a long time ago. That's, why has it been like four or five years now? Oh, the new fans are great. It's still not hot enough to drag them up into an attic yet. That was preparatory for what's coming. Well, guys, I don't know what was going on with the other live streams I've started. They just... It's like Google would start them. I used Google Chrome on my computer, and then nothing would happen. And then people would tell me they couldn't click on the link. So I'm glad I was able to make this one happen. So, y'all tell me, what else has these sensors in them that will turn them off when they sense a leak? That sounds like commercial work. Here, the last couple of days, I guess that tells you I haven't installed any. Yeah. The reams, I think they do have the 454, so I'll be installing those. So, I'm going to have to get used to those. Lovely. Just something else. yeah i think i showed with the R454 it's barely flammable at all i mean the only way it's going to burn in somebody's house is if the house is burning down um it ain't gonna burn by itself i can't always see your comments even this um i think the mini split that i'm installing in this office i think it's 410. no i don't use a jumper king but i will use a um what i call a little A little popper, I think that's what they're called, a three-amp little popper to... Troubleshoot low voltage? Yeah, so the 410 TXB worked. Hardest thing to troubleshoot for me right now, and I'm still learning some of this, is some of the inverter technology. If you have more than one board that's controlling the inverter, or like one board that cleans the power, and another board that turns it into DC, and another board that makes it into an alternating DC current, Troubleshooting between the three different boards is difficult because they just communicate with each other. It's hard to tell what's going on. So I kind of like the idea of one big board that does it all, but they're very expensive if they go out of. Yeah, if you can get tech support around here, it's hard for us to get it. Our tech support is very demanding of you. They want you to stay there, be there on site when they call two hours later and have. Every probe in your bag hooked up and it's almost an impossible case you have to document everything and then wait for them to call you back two hours later and you go back the next day and For most of us that ain't that ain't gonna work. I have done that with Inverter system on a mini split I replaced the board because I didn't find a fault with the compressor and I was wrong It happened to be the compressor. So they got a new board and a new compressor. I owned it out like we do regular PSC compressors and everything seemed fine but it wasn't that that was a learning experience for me those things have to be perfect for those inverter boards i didn't show anything to ground on any of the legs i ohmed out the windings like a three-phase motor and i thought it was good but it wasn't yes i think that's a good idea even if it's out of warranty or something if you're If you're changing the compressor, change the board too. It's kind of like changing an X13 motor and not changing the module. You just change the whole thing. Yes, all of these inverter systems, yes, I can maybe help with some advice and start a new company, but this ain't a real good spot for it. If you go to my YouTube page in the About section, there's an email. You can try to send me an email, and maybe we could talk a little bit better. Well, I do deal with a lot of rental property, so you're going to see more properties where people don't care for their air conditioners. If they do anything, they just pull the filter out because it's plugged and they won't air. A lot of those people just, it's not their property, so they don't care. I don't work on the VAVs very much. Sales scripts, I don't use a sales script. My number one thing is repairs. I want to fix it first, and then we'll talk about sales. No, I haven't heard of Lula Property Management. Am I getting that new Fieldpiece leak detector? I don't know. I really don't know. I haven't, unless I see that it's better for detecting leaks on these 454 systems or something like that. No, I'm probably not going to get one. A lot of people like those Inficons. Mine kept dying and I gave a replacement away to somebody and it died on him. So I can't speak very well of those. I have seen pictures of the new testo gauges, but, you know, I bought all the testo probes at one time, but I ended up selling them and buying a Fieldpiece. I had a software company contact me about promoting their company, and what they do is they give the salesman all the information about the house, the square footage, how old the air conditioner is, what permits have been pulled on the house, so that you have all the information you need to make a sale before you ever show up. But when I show up, I'm looking to fix it. So that company was not a good fit for me. A lot of people swear by the H10 Pro. I got a good friend that has one, and he has it, but he also has, like, multiple other leak detectors because of how awkward it can be to use the H10. Yeah, some of the... I'm okay if you're in a bigger company and you have a sales tech that comes along behind you after you say, hey, they need a new system, but I don't want a sales tech being the first person to show up on the job. I don't think that's right. Well, thank you, man. I appreciate that. I guess with me, some of the things that have been going on are going to be, you'll be seeing more of in the weeks to come and months to come. Some of the products I'm going to be using, there's this replaces the SS2 that I'm going to start using. It's called the BG301, made by Assurity. And it's like a float switch that replaces the SS2, but it has a resettable switch on it. I like that. So y'all are going to see some more of those. Some of the people, there's another contractor I know here in Georgia who is going the route of sales first. I'm not sure it's going to work out for him, but that's the path that he wants to take. And we'll see. I'm not going to try to get rich on every customer. And that seems to be the goal of some of those sales companies, like sell them everything, upsell everything you can and try to make the most off of every customer. And that's just not how it works. Working on a rental property. And they need a new system, I'll sell them what they need. I don't need to sell them an electronic air cleaner in a house where they don't even change a filter. Y'all tell me if this weather has been affecting y'all. It has affected me for like two days. I've been wanting to get some stuff out for you, but even if I wanted to, we've had the kind of weather where you leave your doors wide open and nobody's calling me on days like that. I do have that mini split install I'm working on, but during the week there's people in the office, so I'm trying to do it on the weekends. I might work on some of it this weekend, 80s in southeast Virginia. Rental work does pay well if you get the right people. Yeah, you'll notice a lot of the stuff that I work on, it's lower income housing. It's not just what I'm working on, it's also where I live. where i live most of the people are below the poverty line and a lot of the property around here is rental property um a lot of it just has to do with the demographics of this place so um there are some nice houses around um nice neighborhoods and i do work in those sometimes and even those have rental properties in them it's kind of weird um i would say in this area i work in I would say 70%, maybe 60% of the property is rental property, and that's a lot. 57 in San Diego. Oh, Jamal, are you in Cordele? Are you working in Cordele? Cordele's really close to me if y'all don't understand that reference. Cordele's really close. Down in South Georgia, Albany's like in the middle of nowhere, but it's the only city in the middle of nowhere, so everybody around us comes to Albany. If you want to get to another... city about this size you have to go like to Valdosta or your way up to Macon where they got a bigger city but right down here we're like right in the middle of a dead zone well thank you jim passing through to phoenix city phoenix city is right on the other side of the border phoenix city is in alabama around here phoenix city is known for it's right outside the military base fort benning which is in georgia you cross right over the border you're in phoenix city so it's known for all the bars and um strip bars and stuff like that well thank you man see see what i mean like in 72 degrees nobody's really turning on their air conditioner they can just open a window yeah it's no longer called fort benning but i understand there might be a movement now to rename it fort benning again um comment about that process. I just understand that that might happen. Maybe it came in on strip bars. Yeah, there's a bunch of them there. 58 in Knoxville. We are at that time of year where warm weather and cold weather is clashing and it causes violent weather. Today was for our news station, a first alert weather day, which means there was a chance of tornadoes. I was texting with another business owner in Tennessee and he said that there was a chance of tornadoes up there last night. I'm far enough south where no strip clubs in Phoenix City. Is that right? I just assumed there were. There's a road that goes right through Columbus and goes right into Phoenix City. I never stopped at any of them, so I couldn't tell you. Hello there, 83 in South Florida. You might get some no cooling calls at those temperatures. 63 in Arkansas. See what I mean? It's just slow temperature weather. Yeah, I used to go over to a place, Kind of northwest of Birmingham, Jasper, Alabama, and we would go through Columbus and Phoenix City. Well, thank you, man. I'm glad you enjoy the content. I've really been working to try to get you something for today. That's why I wanted to go live. It's been like three days. Dude, up in Indiana, but your winters are brutal, aren't they? I mean, y'all are up there with like Chicago, and it gets cold up there. I'll stay in the south. That's funny. What are you studying? That's funny, Mark. Well, I hope the guys don't take a break and run over to the strip club real quick. That's funny. I like those new Milwaukee fans, too. Y'all are going to see those. Oh, you're closer to Iowa. What temp should you switch from heat to cool? West Michigan. John Stone up front. Is that in Columbus? Because the guys from the John Stone in Columbus. Sometimes come down to see me, stop in my office and want me to order stuff from them. They're now my major Amana and Goodman dealer because our Amana and Goodman dealer, which was already 45 minutes away, went out of business or yeah, let's just say they went out of business. They lost Amana and Goodman and then several of the employees left and they closed that store. That was an associated equipment. Dude, I just tell people to keep their thermostat set where they feel comfortable. Normally, that's between 72 and 78. That's what I tell most people. Just set it where you feel comfortable and try to leave it there. I do not substitute 407C. It doesn't work with the regular oil that comes in the old R22 systems. So unless you've changed a compressor, you probably shouldn't use 407C. Yes. Yes, I do some commercial jobs. Normally it's light commercial, like a small building with a rooftop or something. Not very frequently some restaurants or like a strip mall or something like that. I think that's Matt. So I do do a little bit of commercial stuff. I feel more comfortable with residential. I feel like I can spend my time and I feel more in my element there. Let's put it that way. There's some guys that just love commercial. They don't want to have to deal with homeowners or pets or anything like that. They just want to work on commercial stuff. Geothermal used to be really popular. But since these high efficiency inverter systems have come out, I haven't had a single request from anybody about a geothermal. Not at all. Not one single time. If you can put in a 21 SEER heat pump without having to pipe any water or run loops in the in the ground or anything like that and you're having similar efficiencies it kind of makes geothermal obsolete. 410 right now I'll tell you I'm charging $89 a pound which is high but that's what I'm charging. I did go to trade school but I was already working and I had a job working full-time as a technician already but I did go to trade school here in Albany at Albany Tech. No, no boiler experience. The only boiler experience I had was a very small one that ran the heat for a bank. So you can imagine it's not a very big one. And I had to replace the circulator pump on it. That is it. That's the only real boiler I've ever worked on. What did I do before HVAC? I did a lot of things. Everything from truck driving to welding, delivering pizzas. I worked a lot of different jobs, started out in a Six Flags, was that in Georgia? But initially before working what we call HVAC, I had a job working on car air conditioners. We were retrofitting, I think it was the R12s to R134A. We were basically ripping out compressors, changing metering devices, and sometimes we'd have to change hoses. This is an... And that was a big deal when that happened in 89. Oh, is that for a jug? A video about how to use oxyacetylene. Y'all got to forgive me. The texts are appearing. Your comments are appearing and then disappearing slowly. So I'm having to read them very fast. Yeah, I did a video a few days ago where I showed very clearly how I do my own oxyacetylene welding. I thought I did a good job of showing it. But I didn't really talk about oxygen-acetylene mix and why you need a fine blue point and all that stuff. So, yeah, I could do a video on that. Oh, the swap over to Milwaukee is almost complete. I only have one Makita tool left. And part of the reason I bought the fans is because I had a DeWalt fan that I've been hanging on to. I've been powering it with a Makita battery. So, I got me some new fans. The thing that I'm waiting on to replace right now is the grinder. I have a 18-volt Makita grinder. I'm going to be replacing it with Milwaukee. A tool bag loadout. I've done some of those in the past, but I change bags and things evolve. I might lose a tool and replace it with something else, or my bag is constantly changing. Oh, ProPress. ProPress is meant for And for plumbing, do you mean like RLS? Because ProPress is... Plumbing and not rated for high pressure. What y'all normally see me use is RLS, the rapid lock system that has one O-ring. I can't put out the cost of each repair like that. Oh, I love the van. My van is that really high, what is it, Sprint? I forget what they're called, made by Ford. And it does have its drawbacks. It's nice to be able to stand up in it and walk around. But when the wind blows, you know it. The Transit, yeah. Um, forgive me, the fellow who does the WWHVAC, I don't know your name. I'm trying to answer your question about the light bulb click. Um, I think for good technicians, we all hit that point where there is like a, a light bulb click, like where everything just makes sense. Before I did that, I was Reading... Schematics a lot. I was, I was having trouble even. With hooking up like on hard start kits and then one day it all just clicked. Low voltage made sense. What we call high voltage, what some electricians would call low voltage, it all just made sense one day. And I'm trying to get that way with these inverter systems. I'm getting there. I mean, I still don't know how everything works, but they're not controlled by 24 volts. They're different. They kind of communicate. And I try to think of them as like a module and a motor, because basically that's what they are. Your inverter is your module and your compressor is your motor. So I try to simplify it and think of it like that. I do not have any employees. There was a time when I had several employees, but I had difficulty. I think my problem was being able, the grease system's doing fine. My problem was being able to attract. High quality employees and keep them. It seemed like I was getting the worst of the worst. So that part of my business was difficult for me. Advice for a 21-year-old HVAC apprentice. Try to learn everything you can. I feel like the industry is changing so fast. Some of the things you might pick up on better than some of the older people because we're having to learn some of this new stuff too. I missed that last comment and I was trying to read it. Yeah, it is really hard to find people who ain't going to rip you off or steal from you or do drugs. There are some good employees out there. There are a couple people that I would hire back if I needed to, but I've kind of made the commitment that I'm going to keep it small and just keep it me. Yes, you're constantly learning. I feel like if you ever get to the point where you think you know it all, that's when you've lost it because they're always coming out with new stuff. Yes. Well, I'm actually using my iPad. So let me see if there's a way. Oh yeah. I can scroll through some of those. Can I? Y'all forgive me. I mean, I was having trouble just getting a live started on, on my computer. So I'm not a hundred percent techno savvy. I'm watching from British Columbia. How about that? If you don't like where you're working now, still use it as an opportunity to learn everything you can. You might be learning what not to do as a company, but still learn Learn everything you can. I mean, one of the last companies I worked for before I started the business was a real low-down place doing some underhanded stuff, and I learned a lot of things not to do. I was NATE certified for a long time until it was hard for me to keep up all those CEUs or the number of credits that you had to have, and I let it go by a long time ago, and I haven't renewed it. I thought it was important, but nobody seemed to care. Link systems, no, I have not worked on those, and I haven't heard of those either. Oh, the prices of, if y'all want to talk about prices, before, I would say since the beginning of COVID, the price of everything has doubled. Now with this new refrigerant coming out, the new systems and possible tariffs, prices are going to go up again. I mean, it's getting too expensive for some people. I have not done any installs with the new refrigerants, not yet. Wait a minute, what is it, a see-through media system or something? I'm a 55-year-old and going into it, it's never too late. It's a rewarding field, it is for me. Yeah, 55 years old and getting into it, hey, I honestly believe it's never too late. I didn't really dedicate myself to HVAC until I was probably 40. And that's when I really made up my mind. that this was going to be it for me. I see some complaints about the train boards. Oh, it'd be nice if we had a disconnect with built-in surge protector. I got divorced and married to HVAC. I have a soft start on my vehicle. I think I've got two of them ready to install for somebody, but I never have. I've never had a customer request one. um i've talked to people who i've seen that have generator hookups on the side of their house um i haven't installed a soft start i've been a little bit reluctant about them I don't know, I think the proper way to do if you want your system to start up slow you need an inverter system, um, the soft starts I'm afraid are going to damage the compressor, I have no proof of that that's just how I feel and I've seen a couple videos where that has been the case Just try to get a reputable product if you're going to use one. Okay, y'all have asked about the grease system. I recently fixed the grease system at the other house where I used to live. We still have that house. I just don't live there anymore. And here we have the Bosch system. And I got to mention, that's not my favorite system. If I get the opportunity to put in a Gree, I will. Gree has a new system out that I really like. it can work for like a unitary system like a regular 24 volt control system and you can stick a mini split head on it which I think is a really good idea, I might get one of those here one day, um, what I don't like about the Bosch is that it requires heat strips, I don't like them I mean they had the opportunity to be a really good system and do away with heat strips for most of the country but they didn't do that, they kept it as a regular Heat pump. At least the one that I got last year, which was their top of the line. I understand they have a new cold weather system out now. I don't know anything about that. But the one they sent me, they have heat strips during the winter. And after having that Gree, I don't like that. I mean, I had a really high electric bill during the winter. This Bosch is supposed to help with electric bill. It didn't. So that's just my personal experience with Bosch. Goodman brand. I hope they're, I thought when they got bought by Daikin that Goodman was going to be a lot better, but I'm not so, I haven't seen the improvement yet. I don't like Linux. I don't like Carrier and I don't like Trane. I don't like Carrier and Trane because of their business model. Yeah, we talked about this a little while ago. I worked on the geothermals. They're becoming less relevant nowadays, but there's still several of them around here. I'm sorry, I didn't understand the question. Oh, why are they now shorter than five years? Yes, Ruud and Rheem are coming out with a side discharge condenser, and I would love to install them. I don't think my distributor has any, so most of the time when I call in and get a price, that's not what I'm quoted. But yeah, I would love to install those. I think it's a better idea when it comes to air discharge, simply because if nothing else, less leaves enter the system. You don't have to clean them out at the bottom. Pull them off the coil in the back. They don't get down in the bottom of the system. And I like that. Well, thank you. Uh, i'm just going to call you the plumbing guy. I'm glad you like the videos They're well one of the recent videos I filmed people didn't want me Publishing so sometimes people do say something most of the time. They don't care cheers from california all the way away. Well guys, um I haven't had supper yet, so I'm going to fix something to eat. I'm glad this live thing finally worked. Kisi. Okay. How did I learn Spanish? I spent a lot of time working with Hispanics, and I studied my tail off while I was doing it, so I'm pretty fluent in Spanish. I like the green mini splits. Guys, I do need to say goodbye because I need to get something to eat. I'm glad I was able to connect with you. I'll try to do another live if I don't have anything for tomorrow. So until then, y'all enjoy. It was nice talking to y'all and I will catch you on the next one.