New Year Challenge

The coming year promises to be a busy one for anyone teaching HVAC/R. Enrollments are up at schools across the country as people turn to trade schools and technical colleges to increase their employability and earning potential. This is happening at a time when many schools are experiencing budget cuts due to the lagging economy. Other challenges are posed by significant industry changes starting in January due to the elimination of HCFC 22 in new equipment. The year ahead is starting to look like a difficult year. But these events also have a significant potential upside. First, business is booming. The HVAC/R industry has been wishing for years that more people would choose to enter this field because the qualified labor pool keeps shrinking while the need continues to grow. We now have a unique opportunity to help the HVAC/R industry and technical education as well. If we can turn this bumper crop of students into a bumper crop of trained HVAC/R personnel we can make a sizeable dent in the technician deficit and prove the value of the technical education system at the same time. The graduates of Air Conditioning Programs all over the country will be entering the job market just as significant new technologies are being adopted. Technicians who understand how to handle the newer refrigerants, who can work with the increasingly sophisticated control systems, and who read and follow manufacturer’s instructions and technical bulletins will quickly establish themselves as industry leaders. They are the future of both the HVAC/R industry and technical education.

I can hear you saying “how am I supposed to teach more students and adopt newer technology while my budget is being cut?” I will readily admit that is a big challenge, but it is not insurmountable. First, choose course materials that provide a lot of bang for the buck. I believe that Fundamentals of HVAC/R provides an unmatched value for HVAC/R course materials. One text can be used throughout the program, saving on textbook costs. The text is provided with many free additional resources including a powerpoint presentation for each unit in the book, a large test bank of questions, a test generation and management application, and an instructor’s guide that provides a detailed lesson plan for every unit in the book including suggested class activities. However, the really unique feature is the complete turnkey online module, MyHVACLab. Online course delivery and management is the newest buzz in technical education. MyHVACLab is not simply a set of questions that can be imported into a course you are constructing with Blackboard or Angel, it is an already constructed course complete with questions, interactive learning activities, animations, powerpoint presentations, and troubleshooting simulation software. It is ready to go out of the box. However, you are not confined to the default course, you can still build or customize courses any way you want. But with MyHVACLab, you can start with a complete course. To learn more about MyHVACLab click on Fundamentals of HVAC/R.

The payoff for adopting on-line course material is more than the fact that it can simplify your life. Having on-line course material impresses administrators. Your chance of successfully competing for scarce financial resources increases when you give administrators something they can show off. People invest in success. If you show success integrating online technology with your curriculum resources will follow.

Another way to stretch your training dollars is to utilize free online materials available from equipment manufacturers. It takes an investment of time to find them, but many OEM parts manufacturers, equipment manufacturers, and even wholesalers have articles, animations, powerpoints, and educational material available online to anyone who wants to download it. This material does often come in the form of product promotion, but it is typically professionally produced, technically accurate, and free.

Talk to local distributors, wholesalers, and contractors about equipment donations. Often they can get more by way of tax writeoff for a scratch and dent special or an old model by donating it to you than if they sold it. All manufacturers send equipment to third party testing organizations for testing. Afterwards, this equipment cannot be sold as new even though it only operated for a few hours. Again they can probably do better financially by donating the equipment.

Make your own trainers. Who knows better what you need to train with than you? You already have or can get the parts, and you have slave labor (students). The students building the trainers receive great experience doing things you might not be able to have all students do. Future students receive the benefit of using a trainer designed by the person who knows the most about what your students need – you.

This all boils down to one thing: you are being presented with both the challenge and opportunity to work harder than you have ever worked before. By accepting the challenge you have the power to make a positive impact on the lives of your students and on the industry as a whole.

The Gift of Teaching

Teaching is an exchange of gifts. Teachers share experience, knowledge, and skills with their students and students share their success with their teachers. One of the most rewarding aspects of teaching is sharing in the pride and joy students feel when they accomplish the goals they have set for themselves. Students are eager to return and show you how successful they have been. I believe most teachers take more pride in what their student’s accomplishments than their own. Because you have an opportunity to participate in the success of many students, your investment in them is returned with compound interest. You will accomplish far more through the compound effort of your students than you could ever do by yourself. One of the most rewarding experiences is watching someone transform their lives and being there to help along the way.

In Georgia adult education is tied to the Technical College System. We help people who did not graduate from high school study for and obtain their GED. The state offers students who earn their GED a $500 scholarship to attend a Technical College program. Once they are accepted in a technical diploma program like Air Conditioning Technology, most Georgia residents qualify for a HOPE Grant which pays their tuition and fees. Several years ago I had a student take advantage of this series of incentives. He is a single parent who was earning a living cleaning a local McDonalds at night. He paid a babysitter to stay with his daughter while he worked at night. Although he was very bright, motivated and a hard worker, he lacked even a high school diploma. He came to Athens Tech and earned his GED. The state tempted him with the $500 scholarship and he started the Air Conditioning Technology program. So now he was a single parent working at night and attending school during the day. However, because of his initiative he quickly began to put his investment in school to work by fixing things in the restaurant at night after cleaning up. His employers noticed. He was offered a job in maintenance during the day. He continued to do well. Now he is head over all the facilities maintenance at all the McDonalds in our area, drives a company truck, and earns an impressive salary. He comes by school every now and then and I sometimes see him when I visit the McDonalds down the road from school. And his daughter, the little girl who he had to pay a baby sitter to watch while he scrubbed floors at night, well she is now also an Athens Tech alum. Sometimes we get it right. Merry Christmas to all of you. In the new year I hope you are busy sowing the seeds of success and watching them flourish.

All I Want for Christmas is a Final Rule

The EPA has released a new final ruling on HCFC reduction for Christmas! I know you are probably thinking that is not much of a Christmas present, but it really is. First, the HCFC allocations were due to expire, so without a new ruling spelling out HCFC allocations, all R-22 manufacturing and importing would have ceased January 1, 2010. A new ruling setting allocations of HCFCs has been released, fixing this potential train wreck. You can download a copy of the ruling and read all the details on the EPA website

Next, the details of exactly when you may and may not install “new” equipment which uses HCFC refrigerant have been clarified. You may recall that last December the EPA shocked our industry by announcing that they considered systems which are field installed and charged to be “manufactured” when the refrigeration system was complete and the final charge added. For split systems, this would be when the system is installed. Most people in our industry were well aware of the manufacturing cutoff of January 1, 2010, but we assumed the more common definition of manufacturing date: when the equipment is made in the factory. The EPA is sticking with their definition of manufacturing, but that does not mean all R-22 inventory becomes rubbish on January 1, 2010. Packaged equipment like window units, PTACS, and packaged air conditioning equipment can all be legally sold and installed as new provided it is manufactured (in the factory) prior to January 1, 2010. You are allowed to sell and install pre-charged R-22 component parts made before January 1, 2010 to replace parts in existing systems. So you may swap out condensing units, evaporator coils, or even both in an existing system. Replacing both the condensing unit and evaporator coil on an existing system is legal. Another interesting twist is that manufacturers may ship component system parts with a nitrogen holding charge instead of refrigerant. These “dry” components can then legally be assembled into a new system provided the system is then charged with reclaimed refrigerant and not virgin refrigerant. The impact of these regulations will be minimized by the fact that most manufacturers reduced or eliminated their R-22 equipment manufacturing the past few years. Contractors have also widely accepted R-410A and few still install new R-22 systems now. R-22 production will be reduced to 41.9% of the baseline production, but that will probably be enough. With no manufacturers using it and no new systems being installed, I believe that R-22 will still be available for servicing existing systems.

I do not believe replacing an existing R-22 system with a new R-22 system is really in the customer’s best interest. Why would someone want a system that uses a refrigerant which is scheduled for extinction? Also, all new high efficiency equipment uses HFC refrigerant, not R-22. We still need R-22 equipment in schools simply because our students need to know how to work on it. You cannot assume that every call will be on a system with the latest technology. In fact, you can almost assume the opposite. Our students will continue to see R-22, so we need to teach it. However, we need to teach toward the future and not stay stuck in the past. Your lab should have many pieces of equipment with HFC refrigerant, like R-410A. You should have recovery equipment and gauges manufactured specifically for R-410A. Your texts, manufacturer’s literature, and technical literature should all support the newer refrigerants. One of our focuses in Fundamentals of HVAC/R is support for new refrigerants such as R-410A. The newer refrigerants are not only covered in the refrigerants section, but throughout the book with detailed examples using R-410A. You can learn more about Fundamentals of HVAC/R at Pearson’s site.

Oh the Weather Outside is Frightful!

Oh the weather outside is frightful, and the furnace is so delightful. But since it dries out the air so, humidify, humidify, humidify! I took a few liberties with the popular holiday tune “Let It Snow” to point out how important humidification is to maintaining comfort. Being warm blooded, our bodies normally produce more heat than they need and then regulate our temperature using different cooling mechanisms. The primary cooling mechanism is evaporation of perspiration from our skin. Dry air makes us feel cooler because it accelerates the evaporation from our skin. Humid air makes us feel warmer because the evaporation process is slowed down. Heated air is drier because the air volume increases, creating more places for water molecules to fit. In the winter, the cold outside air simply cannot hold very much moisture because of its decreased volume. Take it in the house, heat it up, and it expands in volume and decreases in relative humidity. It still has the same amount of specific humidity in grains, but its relative humidity is much lower because it can now hold more water. Many people overheat their homes to compensate. Have you ever had a customer that wanted to maintain 78°F in the winter and 72°F in the summer? They are not batty, they are using temperature to compensate for poor humidity control. However, overheating only increases static electricity, dry mouth, chapped lips, and other humidity related discomfort. So it fixes one problem, feeling cold, and creates a whole bunch of other problems. Adding a humidifier to their system will make them more comfortable by addressing the real problem, humidity. It also can save money because they can maintain a lower thermostat setting and still feel comfortable. To read more about the effect of humidity on comfort, check out Unit 61 Fundamentals of Psychrometrics in Fundamentals of HVAC/R. To download an interactive pschrometric chart for free, go to http://www.handsdownsoftware.com/Downloads.htm

Comfort Science

A few years ago someone came into my office asking for my help regarding installing an air conditioning system in his house. He was going to save money by doing it himself even though he had no training and had never run a piece of duct, much less installed a complete system. However, he was confident he could do the job after a five minute discussion with me to fill in any gaps in his information. “After all”, he said, “it’s not rocket science.” I must confess that after he told me more than once “it’s not rocket science,” I had no interest in even trying to explain to him the many pitfalls ahead. He had already determined that there was really nothing to know.

Air conditioning professionals can also be guilty of devaluing installation. Because installation involves more manual labor than service, it is easy to view installation as simply manual labor. After all "it's not rocket science." Nothing could be further from the truth.

I recently had an advisory committee meeting for my program. One contractor stressed that she really wanted people who would take installation seriously. She was especially emphatic that understanding airflow and airflow measurement was crucial. Another contractor mentioned that with the increasing complexity of today’s systems, including communicating controls and variable capacity systems, installing technicians really needed to understand how the systems operate. Yet another stressed that many customers will pay a premium price for a system that is energy efficient. However, if the system is not installed correctly they will be disappointed with the results. Another committee member mentioned that an Atlanta contractor had actually increased their sales by 27% this year. They are performing energy audits and system performance analysis and making selling customers solutions to improve system efficiency and overall comfort. Their technicians are closer to scientists than unskilled laborers.

Properly sizing and installing an HVAC/R system is “comfort science.” If you want the system to perform as advertized selection and design cannot be reduced to a square footage per ton factor and a six inch flex run for every room. After the system is chosen and the duct system is designed, it still must be installed correctly. A 20-SEER split system full of non-condensables will be lucky to operate at 13 SEER. A system with an ECM blower will use even more energy than a typical PSC blower if the duct is too restrictive. Setting up and checking out a communicating, variable speed zone system requires technicians who can read, understand, and interpret technical instructions. This is why I believe it is critical to teach the science behind what we are doing. As HVAC/R becomes increasingly technical, technicians who understand how and why machines work will become invaluable. Installing today’s increasingly technical HVAC/R systems requires technicians that are trained, understand how systems operate, can read technical literature, and can take detailed system performance measurements. In short – comfort scientists!

Fundamentals of HVAC/R has an entire section dedicated to the science of HVAC/R. These units discuss the science foundation of HVAC/R in a straight forward, approachable manner and give practical HVAC/R examples of its application. Units include:

• Unit 4 Properties of Matter
• Unit 5 Types of Energy and Their Properties
• Unit 6 Temperature Measurement and conversion
• Unit 7 Thermodynamics – The Study of Heat
• Unit 8 Pressure and Vacuum