Rebuilding Appion G5

[JColtrane]

So there was a thread a while back from a guy in Texas who does mods to the Appion G5 and other recovery units ... wanted to take a look at his site, but can't seem to find the thread.

Any help would be great

 

[rb extractors]

http://airclean.us/Home.html

let us know how it goes!

hit me up when you are ready to upgrade to a better recovery pump... I carry the reftecs

 

[RegisPhilburn1]

I called him a while back, he definitely had a lot to say about the appion, none of it good... mostly about leak problems and possible sparks, also said there is a small spring in the compressor that is sensitive to breaking at low temps.

Ill be watching Reftec closley, talked to them on the phone and they sound like they are on our side for sure. just cant afford to risk another 1st time pump after that caresaver debacle. Keep us posted RBE!

 

[rb extractors]

will do the magical day is jan 2. hope to have it running on the third

 

[FatherEarth]

Regis,

What happened with the caresaver?No bueno?



FE

 

[Gray Wolf]

Regis,

What happened with the caresaver?No bueno?



FE

We have Regis's Caresaver for experiments to see what the ramifications are of using a non-oil less compressor.

 

[Breakover]

So, now the Caresaver isn't good?

Gotta say, I have had a rash of bad appions. Leak like a sieve. I'm willing to sell three leaky appions, two still under warranty, for $300 each if any of you are interested.

That being said, my caresaver arrived with a leak, but nothing a little brazing couldn't fix. And NASS, LTD -eBay seller - agreed to discount it for me. At least I could hear the leak during testing. The appion will drive a man nuts with the incessant fricking noise and you won't hear a leak until you're fully engulfed.

Since having the caresaver and running many, many, many runs with it over the last 60 days, we've not noticed a difference in color or quality of the end product vs processing with an appion. In fact, it just seems to keep getting better.

These results lead me to entertain the notion that the claims of oil being exposed to the gas stream in the caresaver aren't accurate.

Please don't interpret this as an attack on you or your system if you use an appion, I just wanted to share my seething effing hatred for them and my personal experience with the caresaver. Lol.

 

[nakadashi]

So, now the Caresaver isn't good?

Gotta say, I have had a rash of bad appions. Leak like a sieve. I'm willing to sell three leaky appions, two still under warranty, for $300 each if any of you are interested.

That being said, my caresaver arrived with a leak, but nothing a little brazing couldn't fix. And NASS, LTD -eBay seller - agreed to discount it for me. At least I could hear the leak during testing. The appion will drive a man nuts with the incessant fricking noise and you won't hear a leak until you're fully engulfed.

Since having the caresaver and running many, many, many runs with it over the last 60 days, we've not noticed a difference in color or quality of the end product vs processing with an appion. In fact, it just seems to keep getting better.

These results lead me to entertain the notion that the claims of oil being exposed to the gas stream in the caresaver aren't accurate.

Please don't interpret this as an attack on you or your system if you use an appion, I just wanted to share my seething effing hatred for them and my personal experience with the caresaver. Lol.

Just curious how long did each of your Appions last? I have been running one for about 30-40 hrs a week for 4 months and its been going strong. However I do want to be prepared with no downtime when this thing gives out. Also, were you using a condenser or dry ice?

 

[Breakover]

My first one went the longest, which was a fresh rebuild bought used on eBay early last year.

That went down sometime this spring - lasted about a year. Bought a brand new unit locally, lasted about 3 months, then went for rebuild. Bought another new one while sending last one out for rebuild that lasted a month or so. The rebuilt one came back and lasted about 60 days. That's when I bought a caresaver.

We run about the same hours as you. Pulled to only -10 or so with the appion on final recovery, and we have a big inlet side filter dryer and a 4"x6" cold trap in ice water.

I'm half tempted to send them out for warranty rebuild again, since two of the three are less than a year old, but just haven't done it yet.

 

[nakadashi]

My first one went the longest, which was a fresh rebuild bought used on eBay early last year.

That went down sometime this spring - lasted about a year. Bought a brand new unit locally, lasted about 3 months, then went for rebuild. Bought another new one while sending last one out for rebuild that lasted a month or so. The rebuilt one came back and lasted about 60 days. That's when I bought a caresaver.

We run about the same hours as you. Pulled to only -10 or so with the appion on final recovery, and we have a big inlet side filter dryer and a 4"x6" cold trap in ice water.

I'm half tempted to send them out for warranty rebuild again, since two of the three are less than a year old, but just haven't done it yet.

Sounds like it's a hit or miss with the Appions since your rebuilt one lasted a year while your brand new one lasted only 3 months. When you say 4"x6" cold trap did you mean condenser?

 

[JColtrane]

Right on ... thanks guys! So which RefTec unit do you recomend? Went to the sitte, and there's several options ....

 

[vapor]

Throw your diablo off a building lol, been looking at these units lately and the diablo is looking good would love to hear more from experienced folks.

 

[Kcar]

Would it help to run the appion for a few seconds after recovery, without
the hoses attached? To get rid of any butane in the cylinders?

 

[Breakover]

Sounds like it's a hit or miss with the Appions since your rebuilt one lasted a year while your brand new one lasted only 3 months. When you say 4"x6" cold trap did you mean condenser?

It's something of a condenser, yes, but for moisture mainly. It also acts as a filter for the suction side of the rec pump. Filled with mole sieve beads.

We run an mt-69 in ice water on the discharge side as well.

Frankly I agree with some other posters here, appion has seen a significant drop off in quality since 2012 and that's the reason we're all blowing pumps.

 

[rb extractors]

@northern... the caresaver isn't oilless which isn't what we want, it is slower apparently than the appion, and there is no way the caresaver will influence the color of your oil since it never touches it, and since it is slower than the appion, it might make it harder to get snappy oil since the contact time with the butane is longer

@naka... I'd just buy a backup one now, or pick up a reftec from me, since the units fail at the most inopportune time :/

@jcol... the diablo is a bit faster than the appion, and has teflon seals, the handivac is about twice as faster per the specs. I'll have a better idea next week when mine arrives. I can get you deals on both.

 

[nakadashi]

@rbe There is no opportune time for a pump to fail lol so I am definitely interested in a backup. Would love to hear about how your reftec performs before pulling the trigger on the backup.

@Northern lab: Damn Appion, no mfg date on the unit itself. What were the symptoms when your appions failed?

 

[Rickys bong]

There's a decent rebuild tutorial here: http://www.hbbpro.com/pdfs/G5_Twin_Rebuild_Recommendations.pdf

He misses a lot of points however.

I'll try to take some more pix of my next Appion rebuild.

I like the fact that Reftec seems to realize the market for a good pump for this industry but I don't see anything about the Reftec that is any different from the Appion engineering wise. Virtually all recovery pumps share similar design characteristics. They are all relatively light duty small displacement compressors with very high compression ratios.
All have aluminum pistons and cylinders which are teflon coated after anodizing. All use a similar type of seal for the piston. They all run very high piston speeds with marginal cooling. "teflon seals" means diddly.
They are intended for use with gases that usually have positive pressure and at least traces of lubricants.

The Reftec Handivac looks like two of their Diablo pumps in one housing.

The real number that needs to be published but nobody does is actual cylinder displacement. That will determine how much they can pump for the most part.

The Caresaver was desiged for the European refrigeration industry which is starting to use flammable refrigerants. The safety Nazis demanded a full enclosed recovery pump that couldn't trigger a fire in a room filled with flammable gas. It was NOT designed for pumping butane. It also has a oil bath crankcase so in the event that a piston seal starts failing a lot of crankcase oil will enter the gas being pumped.

Non oil-less designs shouldn't be used for product consumed by humans in my opinion.

The Reftec also seems to use a pressurized crankcase design which has another potential flaw. If the crankshaft bearing starts to weep grease the grease will get washed away and get into the gas stream.
The pressurized crankcase is better as any blow-by of the piston seal can't escape to atmosphere, but any crankshaft bearing contamination can also enter the fluid stream. A simple modification could keep the crankcase isolated from the fluid stream though.

The Appion will leak to atmosphere if a piston seal goes however, so close attention to any unusual noise while running is needed. We also do a pre-run pressure check to see if there is any pressure loss on the inlet side.

Bottom line is that refrigerant recovery pumps just aren't designed for the use they see in extraction systems. Without good pre-filters and an after-cooler they prone to failure. They are made to be light weight so a tech can pack them around but that means a lot of durability gets designed out in favor of light weight.

There are Fully hermetic, completely oil-less pumps that will do the job but the cost is enough to make your butt pucker.

If one of the leading refrigerant pump companies was smart they'd design a pump for this application and show users how to use it properly. (oh yeah, sub $2k price wold be kewl) Reftec, Appion et al: Are you listening?

 

[Breakover]

@rb I was referencing color and quality as circumstantial evidence that there was no oil pollution in the extract. We will be adding a backside scrubber to prevent any catastrophic leakage of pump oil, and we regularly vac still our butane supply to prevent significant contamination.

Honestly I don't think we could go back to a noisy pump like an appion. Probably just stop extracting all together. Hopefully we can get something that will satisfy everyone and remain nice and quiet while doing so.

@naka. Symptoms of a failing appion were changes in the high pitched scream and leaks. There is really no specific warning.

 

[Breakover]

Lol! A solution!

The Spooter!

http://www.rtitech.com/ac_spooter.asp

Nevermind, manual says it needs periodic oiling...

:-(

 

[JColtrane]

@rb Thanks for the "real talk" bro!!! What "expensive" oil less pumps are you refering too? I'd like to start studing design of these machines so I can start speaking inteligently about recovery pumps.