Damn copper thieves.. Co-worker came in to work on a weekend and caught them on the roof of a large office building cutting out the drain lines from all the units.. He grabbed their ladder and left them on the roof about 2.5 stories up and waited for the police to show up.. .lol
@@liam3284 A big city I lived in several years ago the lights blinked for a short time during a night and I thought it was just lighting and so I didn't thought much more about it. A month later a friend of mine asked if I remembered that the light blinked some time ago, which I did. He said that most likely an immigrant searching for copper had seen some shiny thick busbars inside some area with barbed fence and climbed over and grabbed them to what he probably thought would get them loose. What he obviously didn't knew was that he had climbed inside the citys electrical main power station and when he grabbed them he short circuit 2 phases with several MW capability with his body. The safety cameras there had seen a huge flash and a small explosion and automatically alerted personell. When they got there they saw a wet spot on a bigger area and pieces here and there and what was left of one of two arms attached to the busbars.
@@richiereeves4071Not mine or anyone else's problem if they live or die. They make choices, if the result is death so be it. It's not like they are innocent.
This was a big problem here in Prague,but they made a law that you have to show photo ID when you sell metal to a scrap yard and now the problem is almost gone. Made a huge difference!
Has been a problem. One tweaker tried to steal the copper from a live transformer here in the Denver area. The local police chief replied "The gentleman died" as a result. Denver had a problem with the underground copper pipes associated with the greenway sprinklers disappearing during the winter. They chain up the manifold and pull the pipes out of the ground using an axle of a truck. The parks department went to plastic.
Years ago, I serviced an AT&T cell site in Baltimore City that had two five ton residential style split systems. The site was in a church that held NA meetings. I had to re-pipe those units seven times due to copper theft. We built steel cages around the condensers and copper lines, but they still got in and stole the copper.
@@MatanuskaHIGH Make damn sure they're non-lethal-- court rooms have no sense of humor about that type of thing. If OTOH you wish to pack the area with enough dye-bombs to make any schmuck with the gall to try to steal from you a dishonorary member of the Blue Man Group and load it with enough OC spray to make enough the craziest chili-head pleased, have at it. Combine with something nasty like Doo-Drops or Eau Du Skunk for that extra special touch.
A little electrified fence tape around the periphery. A friend of mind stapled it on the top of his fence in the local crime ridden area he had his house. On a Saturday night he would hear "s**t! f**k! d**n it!" over and over and over again 'cause the brothers wanted in. They got their verdict and sentence all in one surprising moment.
At least the Unit just runs out of refrigerant , I had the thriving toe rags steal copper pipe from a live natural gas supply and just leave the gas pissing out from the end of the pipe.
".... and the managers weren't answering the phones..." The condition of the walk-in is why they weren't answering the phones. Where I used to work (years and years ago) both leaving the Walk-in like that and not answering the phones.... someone would have been fired..
We had no soap one night when I had just started working there. The manager I was working with that night was the bad manager who normally worked mornings not nights. Before we left I asked what we should do about the dishes and they said to leave them. I come in the next day to here that the store manager was threatening to fire both of us. Which would have been unfair to me. But yea. The manager should have been fired. They also kicked a trash can across the store during a rush.
I hope the tweaker was environmentally conscious enough to recover the refrigerant before yanking the suction line off🤣🤣. I don't think huffing all the refrigerant would constitute proper recovery under EPA regulations 😁
It's cool as long as the junkie yelled "De Minimus" while yanking the suction line off. Smart enough to turn off power but to be honest I kinda wish they had ripped the liquid line off while it was running and was treated to a high-pressure bath of R-448A.
How long have you been using 448A? We're about to commission a new freezer install on monday with 448A and none of our techs have seen this refrigerant before.
@@Jason-wc3fh It's on all the new Emerson systems and it's nothing special, just different blend that's supposedly better for the environment. It operates very similarly to 404 and only has a slightly higher liquid density. As long as you read a pt chart you'll never have a problem with new refrigerants
Who but an absolute crackhead does something like this? They destroyed an entire cooling system and caused like 1000$ of damages to get 5$ worth of scrap copper. Insane.
And these crackheads are the same that would put their own elderly grandmother out on the street with no home just to steal everything she has to get a moments fix. They're the lowest of low.
@@mwiz100 Yeah, and if you see what physical and psychological affects those substances have to those addicts, sanity and common sense are not usually their strongest features any more, which sadly automatically leads to the next problem, how do you help someone who does not want help, but just another fix? To me it seems many of them have developed such a tunnel vision towards "how to get the next fix" that they do not even realize in what a devastated situation they are. It usually needs a lot to make them realize that they need help.
@@mwiz100 - There are SO many programs for these people. We demonize them because they choose to destroy and steal rather than to be responsible and seek help.
We put two new Trane 20 ton package systems on a roof a few years back just to get a no cooling call about two weeks later... I show up and it’s 80 degrees in the office space. I climb up the inside ladder push open the roof hatch and....... Three pieces of sheet metal and a hand full of wire is all that is left.....
Sometimes I wonder if they get that creative or it happens on a bigger scale. I know a few years ago here in Germany copper, or metal theft in some places turned into an organized crime with even heavy items like large excavator buckets 2000 lbs and above beeing stolen or live contact wires from a rail track, or live 10 kV wires beeing ripped out. must have ben quite sparky. And for some of the amounts stolen within one night they sure needed something like a dump truck with an excavator or crane arm mounted to it.
Reminds me of a time about 11 years ago. A church/school had 8 medium sized split systems vandalized. Line sets and condenser coils were stolen. We spent a solid week out there fixing everything. About a week after we finished they called back all pissed off because one of the units wasn’t working. While I was driving back out there I said to myself wouldn’t it be something if they got ripped off again. Well, they did. I’ll never forget the look on the administrator’s face when I took her outside to show her.
As a Supermarket tech yes we have to burn and turn and get it going because we have multiple calls behind us and then on the weekday go back and get the long term repair done.. Great video Chris
Actually looks like those boxes were stacked and fell over, knocking the door open. All three boxes were on their side and why would someone place the boxes like that to prop the door open? Definitely not putting it past anyone, but looks more like the frozen fries got soft and fell over. The other stacked fry boxes were leaning too.
If you closely to the door handle at 11:46 you see a bungee-cord tying the door handle to a rack. The boxes of fries still might have fallen though, would be weird if someone put them like that.
@@davejohnsonnola2758 made me wondering if the same crackhead who stole the lines was also tasked with shelving the deliveries. j.k. but if someone left a task like putting new stuff into the freezer like that, I almost have to wonder if the building was set on fire and made them leave in a hurry. I know a lot of places where the stuff lying on the ground outside the freezer or with the freezer doors open would be considered a break in the cold chain that has to be documented and uninterupted for certain food items or otherwise they will be considered spoiled. Not sure if fries are that much at risk, but other things in the freezer might be.
@@alexku8452 I know exactly what restaurant that was, not the specific location but the chain itself as someone who's worked for them. All I will say is that in my experience they are not that strict on the precise cold chain documentation. That said, they don't carry much that'd be overly sensitive.
I was working late one night in an office and overheard strange sounds... and I noticed the air conditioner stopped working, Turns out they ripped the copper out of the lineset and the outside unit while I was there. My car was parked next to the unit outside, too.
I had a similar call on Jefferson Avenue in Detroit. A pizzeria had a WIC at 70°f. I get on the roof and found the line set from the condenser to the roof penetration gone. So I took pictures and showed them to the owner. I told the owner I had the right size copper to make repairs, but he told me to wait. He was going to get his insurance company involved. So I taped off the open lines, sent him the pictures, and moved on. A month later we get approval for making repairs. So I go up again and what was left on the roof was total devastation. Not one inch of copper tubing or wiring was left on the roof. All of the RTUs were destroyed and all the condensing units were stripped down. I got all the information for repairs or replacements that I could still find for our customer, and I was told to let everyone else in the strip mall know what happened. Now the property management company is insisting that I stay on site and gather all the information for every tenant. Here's the kicker. The strip mall is the front wall to a gated community with only one entrance, and that community has security that patrols the parking lot and the community housing areas 24/7. So where was security?
I don't call them tweakers, I always call them thieves and I get the local law enforcement to come look over the damage, write a report and put that location on the "watch list." Those thieves don't need to be understood, they need to be jailed. Ron W4BIN
I just looked at a whole little strip mall. Every condensate line gone. Multiple drain pans broken and they took the condenser coils off 4 10 ton Lennox rtus.
I went to a factory that had closed in our town a few years before. It is 200 feet off of one of the busiest streets in the city. The reason for the visit was to see about what could be done to the five 15 ton York HVAC units in order to split the factory into individual units and have multiple businesses. When I got to the roof I found five condensers and four evaporators missing from these HVACs. That pretty much solved their zoning issues😂. The building is currently divide into about eight businesses and each has its own HVAC.
some wiseguy stole all the underground cabling from a new housing estate local to me, about 100 miles of it apparently, took a week to get the services back and two days later it all went again
The GC’s I work with all use cameras at their sites for this reason. I now have insurance companies requiring the cameras and in some cases 24/7 security guards.
When I was in electrical school, I saw a picture of an Iraqi spark who was an Arc Flash vic. I wish tweakers were guaranteed that man's fate when they rip off utilities (aka other people's hard work).
The boldness of these guys is astounding. We had 8 complete condensing units cut out and stolen at work a few years ago. The repair cost was not even close to the value of the material stolen.
Back when I was doing new construction work, we did this 147 unit apartment complex with mini splits. 1 unit per apartment with most units having at least 2 heads, some 3. Well, the area was a gentrified development bordering an area known as felony flats and was known for its tweaker population. As well as having instances of them ripping out our linesets during construction, after all was said and done, some lovely guys went through and huffed the gas out of a few units, so we had to go through and install locking caps on each unit. Thats an average of 4 caps per unit, across 147 units.......I love tweekers.
I had to bite my tongue..... I will discuss this on my Livestream this evening 3/1/21 @ 5:PM (pacific) on UA-cam come over and check it out ua-cam.com/video/eJBUOQQNEFo/v-deo.html
I literally prefer them over 99% of the fools here advocating for more of the same because they reject the lessons learned from prohibition every single time it's tried and failed.
the cages just slow the crackheads down here. either ram car/truck into cage knock it off its base or chain cage to car/truck, drag cage and condenser half a block down the street. gotten so bad, the crackheads were popping fire hydrants off, manhole cover and storm drain grates for the cast iron
@@rickw4160 That happened to my middle school when i was a kid. They backed a truck in one night and took 5 or 6 whole units from the science buildings. Nice part of SF Bay Area. Replacement units were put in cages.
Where I live people put cages around the units but take it a step further, they electrify said cages with electric fence transformers, when you cut power to the unit inside the building the transformer discharges and after 30 seconds it's safe to work on the unit
11:47 is exactly why I got out of doing light commercial refrigeration work. What really killed me was the fact the not even the owners understood or cared about why you can't prop the doors open. "I QUIT"...LOL
reminds me of my favorite phone company story, guy called in demanding we fixed his internet, we get there, and someone ripped out all the copper in the whole building, after which he calls back, demands a supervisor, and says our tech molested his niece. after he's placated, we go look the place up on google maps and there's one round spot on the otherwise snow-covered roof that's just spotlessly thawed.
Great stuff, I retired a year ago next month and the "on call " was the absolute worst thing about my job. I was only on call 7 days every 7 weeks but your life seems to stop for those days weather you get called or not. Plus I didn't have a choice but to respond when called. No bonus for being on call either except for the overtime. Again Good Video, Retirement Life is so good, Thanks thumbs up...
Most homebuilders have switched to plastic water pipes too. The tweakers know to watch new construction and steal the copper plumbing during construction.
a german i worked with, use to talk about how when he was in another country they put an end to this stuff by setting up a fake system on a building a ways from the main structures, in reality it was just an elaborate setup charged with some hyrogen, liquid hydrogen, and well... the security video he had a copy of... grainy as all fuck but... 3 guys, one gets on a ladder to get a wall mounted condenser, rips it lose cracking a line... as one of the jackasses below was lighting a smoke... shockingly nobody died but, they all got burned pretty bad, and the local news, well... it made a big deal of it, and apparently... that one big hit...almost ended that crap for a few years in that part of the city...where it was the worst.. they could get away with it, because unlike here, the culture/society there...view it as "well, you got hurt/killed trying to rob/harm/rip off/etc somebody else...why should we feel bad for you?"
Your language was a lot nicer than mine would have been after frying my finger ... For instance I would have said ... wow , oh my , gees , and golly that hurt ... Lol ... Good vid as usual Chris ...
yeah, when the skin starts to turn white the feelings get pretty intense. happened to manage something similar when accidentially touching a quartz heater in an oven some years ago. My skin turned white on the edges, with a nice and crispy browned stripe alon the middle. I bet I even made up new words that minute.
This is exactly it, you can not do the job but the customer will find someone else. I'm guessing that HVAC is similar to IT in that there are a thousand other people out there more than happy to take any customers off your hands if you don't treat them right or choose not to do the work they need. It's always good to see your work ethic in there videos and that you treat your customers right. I may be on the other side of the world but these things apply wherever you go.
that's my experience I've only had people steal refrigerant especially R22 from air conditioning units and how I have overcome this problem is I put dye in the units and I put a big sign on the unit. if they were going to steal the copper the dye would be all over themselves and the copper and their car and they're not coming, back try it
This is beyond frustrating. I see it in telecom often these days. They’ll break into a remote building, take the back up batteries and all the copper from the power system effectively killing communications to entire communities for $20-$50 in copper. $1000’s in labor and materials to rebuild a site not to mention how much of the public is put at risk while their communications network is dead. Hope the fix was worth it!
Hi again from the UK Chris. Great video as always. When I was a service tech myself, I went out to a couple of service calls where someone had chopped and stolen the entire line set, and even the whole condensing unit on one occasion.
Imagine this is how restaurant management responds to you getting worked up about the doors being propped open: “well we need air conditioning anyway.”
I have no idea how I ended up here but you sure know what your doing and that’s interesting enough to hear you talk about what you do. Most hvac refrigerant guys I’ve dealt with don’t seem to have half the knowledge you do. I think your customers are in good hands
Customer should have a camera on the equipment! You have to respond when your customer has an emergency call and take care of it! That's part of customer service! If you are there for your customers in an emergency then when it comes time to replace and pm equipment you be the go to person for the job and the customers confidence in you will result in a stable source of income for you! Thanks for another awesome video!
The damages go far beyond the cost of repairs. Valuable foods lost in large quantities can be in the thousands. You are at risk being at the site of a felony crime so glad your help came by. with the number of occurrences they should install cameras. Other than huffing the value of scrapping this small amount couldnt have brought more than $20.00. I recently discovered stashes of stolen goods behind a rooftop unit. Cameras were in place and a search identified the theifs, You are a real trooper getting this going in the middle of the night.
On call right now, just got home from a call just to watch Chris, be on call. Decided to buy the Viper stuff for a reversing valve changeout, stuff works wonders compared to just wetting a rag. 100x less heat to the surrounding areas. Stuffs great!
Not long ago one of the local stores shut down, the tweakers got on top of the building and basically did the same thing, ruining all of the food that required refrigeration, and they hit the freezer unit as well.
An important part of how hard you try to be perfect most of the time is relevant to your closing words. All the communication, and diligence, and avoiding callbacks that you do the rest of the time really helps out with a night like this. When you tell the customer (at midnight) that things aren't gonna be perfect you have a long track record of giving them your best. All that makes it much more likely that having to go back and change the driers on this system wont cost you the customer.
A pox on tweekers! Its not like its an emergency call and you find some component decided to retire early. Its an issue that somebody deliberately caused and knew would disable the system. That would tick me off too especially knowing I had installed everything correctly.
I worked in Riverside and San Bernardino for 20 years and I had one site we replaced the whole until on the roof twice and the 3rd time we move it into a concrete housing to protect it. Another one in Riverside same thing and we had to build a metal cage. A different site in San Bernardino wall unit , but cages around them. It really sucks.
Just the kinda channel I was looking for. I've got one of those jobs where I don't throw anything that has a second purpose away, even if it's something for my own small projects like water barrels and metal strapping. Still need to learn all this stuff too though
We deal with this all the time on retail stores and family dollars stores , we have the customer hired a welder to build steel cages on their equipment....
Awesome! I love the new Heatcraft WiFi condensing units! Lol As a supermarket guy I can only imagine if someone would try to cut out one of our exposed lines for our remote condensers. 2100lbs of 404a spraying from a snapped off 2-1/8 drop leg would look impressive though
As an owner - We are a drop store- driver has keys to the store and signs for the delivery- it’s carelessness on his part I have found my cooler door open as well from stuff falling or him not putting stuff in far enough for the door to close-
Again really appreciate the knowledge gained from your videos, has helped me asvace into service faster than I could have without the hours of learning I get from all these. Much appreciated
Thanks Again for another awesome video! I learn how to do things professionally & right the first time by watching you & HVAC School. I have encouraged my fellow techs to subscribe & support your channel. I love watching your videos! Thanks Again!!!
Is the part where the pressure control would normally have been tapped into part of the tubing that was stolen? I'm guessing that, as the pressure test "passed".
We've had people cut through walls in warehouses we were building up with office front space and tear wiring out of the walls. Not even going to touch on "cat burglars"; the one time we left a work truck outside overnight someone came through and got them. There was also the time someone cut and peeled up a wall to get into a storage shed housing power units we rent out and stole all the radiators. The rural midwest is bad for people like that, it's gotten a hell of a lot worse in the last few years though compared to when I was growing up in the late 90s/00s.
You should frome what your attitude and the good crew you have, even with the customer bad attitude/actions, get recall frome them or word of mouth from others and that you know you have done a good job re the circumstances. Thanks for the video.
Been in the AC trade for over 45 years, had one job they stoled the copper from three times. Security installed a camera and they would backup to the copper line set and hook it to the bumper and drive off. Copper was tied into the A/H and it took the whole system down.
gotta love the door propped.... I have a customer who cools a panel room with 2- 3 ton splits, everytime i go there they have the door propped open to the factory.......everytime we tell them this is why your stuff keeps failing lol.
motion sensor dye sprayer to spray the copper thieves with the dye from the dye packs that banks use, just have an off switch in the building that requires a special key. Then just section off the area that things like this are in using bars/razor wire, warning signs, etc... then require the scrap yards to report all the tweakers or face fines.
Went to a call, went to roof to check out RTUS. Units were fully caged up individually. Open up the cage to check out the units, locked out on low pressure. Check pressure, nothing. Check evaporator coil - it was gone. Opened up other units, evaporator coils gone. What I believe happened was in between the welder coming to assemble the cages and them getting locked up, the thieves struck. They probably didn't take the condenser coils to let anyone know the jig was up.
Surround this with stainless steel no climb security grating. Will take them forever to cut it while still allowing for ventilation. They would need a plasma torch to cut it.
Hope the AH's got caught on somebody's cameras. A house about half mile from me was totally stripped from all the copper, water pipes, refrigeration, electric wire etc. Than froze up what was left, sinks, washer, boiler, etc. They went to Fla. on a vacation. Cost about 40K to fix it up. House was about one yr. old.
what's the punishment there though? here they get slapped on the wrist and told "no" with maybe a short jail stay, then right back out to do it again and again (and again x900 times or until they die/overdose)
Damn copper thieves.. Co-worker came in to work on a weekend and caught them on the roof of a large office building cutting out the drain lines from all the units.. He grabbed their ladder and left them on the roof about 2.5 stories up and waited for the police to show up.. .lol
Too bad the thieves didn't try and jump, LOL
Plol.
@@adamdnewman Yep, no loss.
@@liam3284 A big city I lived in several years ago the lights blinked for a short time during a night and I thought it was just lighting and so I didn't thought much more about it. A month later a friend of mine asked if I remembered that the light blinked some time ago, which I did.
He said that most likely an immigrant searching for copper had seen some shiny thick busbars inside some area with barbed fence and climbed over and grabbed them to what he probably thought would get them loose. What he obviously didn't knew was that he had climbed inside the citys electrical main power station and when he grabbed them he short circuit 2 phases with several MW capability with his body.
The safety cameras there had seen a huge flash and a small explosion and automatically alerted personell. When they got there they saw a wet spot on a bigger area and pieces here and there and what was left of one of two arms attached to the busbars.
@@richiereeves4071Not mine or anyone else's problem if they live or die. They make choices, if the result is death so be it. It's not like they are innocent.
UA-cam: We have noticed you have not watched any videos about tweakers and fridges, you will be interested in this.
Me: Yes
Freezers?
Imagine how many drugs they can afford if they just learned HVAC repair.
Oh they know alil something I bet
Dan yeah copper prices
Double wammy, steal it and fix it.
@@ironcross420 you beat me to it
@@ironcross420 then steal it again and let another company fix it
This was a big problem here in Prague,but they made a law that you have to show photo ID when you sell metal to a scrap yard and now the problem is almost gone. Made a huge difference!
Thats racist. Showing an id.
@@bearblackhawk9362sAYs SomEThinMg tO StaRT ArguEMENt
@@Silverdev2482
/whoosh
@@Silverdev2482 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 it helps illustrate the idiocy of that argument that people use when they say people who vote dont need an id.
It's incredible; the effort he put in to net 5 bucks when he could be doing demos for existing equipment and probably make 20+ an hour lol
Working for a living isn't in some peoples' ethics.
@@johnpublic6582 drugs are
Tweakers gonna tweak.
Has been a problem. One tweaker tried to steal the copper from a live transformer here in the Denver area. The local police chief replied "The gentleman died" as a result. Denver had a problem with the underground copper pipes associated with the greenway sprinklers disappearing during the winter. They chain up the manifold and pull the pipes out of the ground using an axle of a truck. The parks department went to plastic.
Years ago, I serviced an AT&T cell site in Baltimore City that had two five ton residential style split systems. The site was in a church that held NA meetings. I had to re-pipe those units seven times due to copper theft. We built steel cages around the condensers and copper lines, but they still got in and stole the copper.
Need electrified fences and 24 hour video security.
Needs booby twaps
@@MatanuskaHIGH Make damn sure they're non-lethal-- court rooms have no sense of humor about that type of thing. If OTOH you wish to pack the area with enough dye-bombs to make any schmuck with the gall to try to steal from you a dishonorary member of the Blue Man Group and load it with enough OC spray to make enough the craziest chili-head pleased, have at it. Combine with something nasty like Doo-Drops or Eau Du Skunk for that extra special touch.
They are going to come back. The customer should try and protect it.
A little electrified fence tape around the periphery. A friend of mind stapled it on the top of his fence in the local crime ridden area he had his house. On a Saturday night he would hear "s**t! f**k! d**n it!" over and over and over again 'cause the brothers wanted in. They got their verdict and sentence all in one surprising moment.
@@silasmarner7586 LOL just have it grounded to the metal housing so when they mess with it they get zapped 😂
@@williampatriot5622 probably cant protect it with the state hes in.
He needs to find something slimy to wipe over everything. Something that won't hurt the equipment or people but enough to make them say ewwwww.
@@williampatriot5622 Hook it to high voltage, just fry them.
At least the Unit just runs out of refrigerant , I had the thriving toe rags steal copper pipe from a live natural gas supply and just leave the gas pissing out from the end of the pipe.
@@liam3284 I'm sure the boom was the last thing he heard!!
".... and the managers weren't answering the phones..." The condition of the walk-in is why they weren't answering the phones. Where I used to work (years and years ago) both leaving the Walk-in like that and not answering the phones.... someone would have been fired..
We had no soap one night when I had just started working there. The manager I was working with that night was the bad manager who normally worked mornings not nights. Before we left I asked what we should do about the dishes and they said to leave them. I come in the next day to here that the store manager was threatening to fire both of us. Which would have been unfair to me. But yea. The manager should have been fired. They also kicked a trash can across the store during a rush.
I hope the tweaker was environmentally conscious enough to recover the refrigerant before yanking the suction line off🤣🤣. I don't think huffing all the refrigerant would constitute proper recovery under EPA regulations 😁
That might be whats wrong wtih the tweakers head.
We can only hope tweaker tries this on a R-717 system.
@@logan4215 can't wait til they try it with 290 and 600a too
@@logan4215 no they use that to make the meth 🤣
Too bad it wasn't R290 and he decided to light a smoke while nabbing the lineset...
It's cool as long as the junkie yelled "De Minimus" while yanking the suction line off.
Smart enough to turn off power but to be honest I kinda wish they had ripped the liquid line off while it was running and was treated to a high-pressure bath of R-448A.
The amount of times i heard that in school lol
@@prettycureforever7102 HAHA FR, whenever someone in shop messed up you’d hear someone yell “Deminimus Release!”
How long have you been using 448A? We're about to commission a new freezer install on monday with 448A and none of our techs have seen this refrigerant before.
Too bad it wasn't R-717
@@Jason-wc3fh It's on all the new Emerson systems and it's nothing special, just different blend that's supposedly better for the environment. It operates very similarly to 404 and only has a slightly higher liquid density. As long as you read a pt chart you'll never have a problem with new refrigerants
Who but an absolute crackhead does something like this? They destroyed an entire cooling system and caused like 1000$ of damages to get 5$ worth of scrap copper. Insane.
And these crackheads are the same that would put their own elderly grandmother out on the street with no home just to steal everything she has to get a moments fix. They're the lowest of low.
Addiction is a powerful thing and drives people to insane means. The sad reality is we demonize these people rather than offer them quality help.
@@mwiz100 Yeah, and if you see what physical and psychological affects those substances have to those addicts, sanity and common sense are not usually their strongest features any more, which sadly automatically leads to the next problem, how do you help someone who does not want help, but just another fix? To me it seems many of them have developed such a tunnel vision towards "how to get the next fix" that they do not even realize in what a devastated situation they are. It usually needs a lot to make them realize that they need help.
I will discuss this on my Livestream this evening 3/1/21 @ 5:PM (pacific) on UA-cam come over and check it out ua-cam.com/video/eJBUOQQNEFo/v-deo.html
@@mwiz100 - There are SO many programs for these people. We demonize them because they choose to destroy and steal rather than to be responsible and seek help.
We put two new Trane 20 ton package systems on a roof a few years back just to get a no cooling call about two weeks later...
I show up and it’s 80 degrees in the office space.
I climb up the inside ladder push open the roof hatch and.......
Three pieces of sheet metal and a hand full of wire is all that is left.....
Sometimes I wonder if they get that creative or it happens on a bigger scale. I know a few years ago here in Germany copper, or metal theft in some places turned into an organized crime with even heavy items like large excavator buckets 2000 lbs and above beeing stolen or live contact wires from a rail track, or live 10 kV wires beeing ripped out. must have ben quite sparky. And for some of the amounts stolen within one night they sure needed something like a dump truck with an excavator or crane arm mounted to it.
How did they get it off the roof?
Reminds me of a time about 11 years ago. A church/school had 8 medium sized split systems vandalized. Line sets and condenser coils were stolen. We spent a solid week out there fixing everything. About a week after we finished they called back all pissed off because one of the units wasn’t working. While I was driving back out there I said to myself wouldn’t it be something if they got ripped off again. Well, they did. I’ll never forget the look on the administrator’s face when I took her outside to show her.
As a Supermarket tech yes we have to burn and turn and get it going because we have multiple calls behind us and then on the weekday go back and get the long term repair done.. Great video Chris
Actually looks like those boxes were stacked and fell over, knocking the door open. All three boxes were on their side and why would someone place the boxes like that to prop the door open? Definitely not putting it past anyone, but looks more like the frozen fries got soft and fell over. The other stacked fry boxes were leaning too.
If you closely to the door handle at 11:46 you see a bungee-cord tying the door handle to a rack. The boxes of fries still might have fallen though, would be weird if someone put them like that.
@@LeviVoorintholt Ahhh yes... I see it. So the boxes did fall out.... but they door was tied open and that's why they fell.
Friday afternoon delivery.... and not a fuck was given
@@davejohnsonnola2758 made me wondering if the same crackhead who stole the lines was also tasked with shelving the deliveries. j.k. but if someone left a task like putting new stuff into the freezer like that, I almost have to wonder if the building was set on fire and made them leave in a hurry. I know a lot of places where the stuff lying on the ground outside the freezer or with the freezer doors open would be considered a break in the cold chain that has to be documented and uninterupted for certain food items or otherwise they will be considered spoiled. Not sure if fries are that much at risk, but other things in the freezer might be.
@@alexku8452 I know exactly what restaurant that was, not the specific location but the chain itself as someone who's worked for them. All I will say is that in my experience they are not that strict on the precise cold chain documentation. That said, they don't carry much that'd be overly sensitive.
I was working late one night in an office and overheard strange sounds... and I noticed the air conditioner stopped working,
Turns out they ripped the copper out of the lineset and the outside unit while I was there. My car was parked next to the unit outside, too.
I had a similar call on Jefferson Avenue in Detroit. A pizzeria had a WIC at 70°f.
I get on the roof and found the line set from the condenser to the roof penetration gone. So I took pictures and showed them to the owner.
I told the owner I had the right size copper to make repairs, but he told me to wait. He was going to get his insurance company involved. So I taped off the open lines, sent him the pictures, and moved on.
A month later we get approval for making repairs. So I go up again and what was left on the roof was total devastation.
Not one inch of copper tubing or wiring was left on the roof. All of the RTUs were destroyed and all the condensing units were stripped down.
I got all the information for repairs or replacements that I could still find for our customer, and I was told to let everyone else in the strip mall know what happened. Now the property management company is insisting that I stay on site and gather all the information for every tenant.
Here's the kicker. The strip mall is the front wall to a gated community with only one entrance, and that community has security that patrols the parking lot and the community housing areas 24/7. So where was security?
LOL down in the "D" the security was probably their look out.
_So where was security?_ Guarding what they're paid to guard... the gated community, not the (cheap?) strip mall next to it.
Why are all the Jefferson avenues Crackhead highways I've been to 3 in 3 different states all were the same!!
security was busy stealing the copper with their buddy....
I don't call them tweakers, I always call them thieves and I get the local law enforcement to come look over the damage, write a report and put that location on the "watch list." Those thieves don't need to be understood, they need to be jailed.
Ron W4BIN
I agree 100%
Mike KC2...
Down here in southern california there are tons of tweakers
I just looked at a whole little strip mall. Every condensate line gone. Multiple drain pans broken and they took the condenser coils off 4 10 ton Lennox rtus.
Man, you're too hard on urself, with that perfect vacuum. As far as i've experienced, what you've gotten it down to is perfect enough
Definitely good enough considering the equipment is likely to be vandalized again within the calendar year.
Are you sure it’s not one of the new pipe less systems?
The refrigerant goes through the system through Bluetooth?
I went to a factory that had closed in our town a few years before. It is 200 feet off of one of the busiest streets in the city. The reason for the visit was to see about what could be done to the five 15 ton York HVAC units in order to split the factory into individual units and have multiple businesses. When I got to the roof I found five condensers and four evaporators missing from these HVACs. That pretty much solved their zoning issues😂. The building is currently divide into about eight businesses and each has its own HVAC.
Doing their part for the environment by recycling.
What was the factory for?
It was an injection molding plant. They would produce plastic parts.
some wiseguy stole all the underground cabling from a new housing estate local to me, about 100 miles of it apparently, took a week to get the services back and two days later it all went again
That blows. You know things are getting bad when it comes down to people needing to pull these stunts. Have to nail down everything and then some.
The GC’s I work with all use cameras at their sites for this reason. I now have insurance companies requiring the cameras and in some cases 24/7 security guards.
Wow, how the hell do you get away with that?
I stopped wondering why China cracks down on hard on people who get out of line.
When I was in electrical school, I saw a picture of an Iraqi spark who was an Arc Flash vic. I wish tweakers were guaranteed that man's fate when they rip off utilities (aka other people's hard work).
This video shows how real world problems in society impacts our skilled trade.
This. ^^ Poverty, addiction, homelessness... it's everyone's problem.
About 3 years ago I help replace 4 condensing units that thieves stole.
Nothing a few firing squads can't stop.
Lack of poverty doesn't end addiction. If anything, it ENCOURAGES it. Backward ass thinking.
@@nickwallette6201
Wrong
The boldness of these guys is astounding. We had 8 complete condensing units cut out and stolen at work a few years ago. The repair cost was not even close to the value of the material stolen.
Back when I was doing new construction work, we did this 147 unit apartment complex with mini splits. 1 unit per apartment with most units having at least 2 heads, some 3. Well, the area was a gentrified development bordering an area known as felony flats and was known for its tweaker population. As well as having instances of them ripping out our linesets during construction, after all was said and done, some lovely guys went through and huffed the gas out of a few units, so we had to go through and install locking caps on each unit.
Thats an average of 4 caps per unit, across 147 units.......I love tweekers.
I would not have been a nice guy coming in and seeing the fridge door propped open after all the work you put into the system.
I had to bite my tongue..... I will discuss this on my Livestream this evening 3/1/21 @ 5:PM (pacific) on UA-cam come over and check it out ua-cam.com/video/eJBUOQQNEFo/v-deo.html
You did the right thing for the customer. This repair will lead to getting the other work that comes up because you were attentive to their needs! 👍
"Quick shoutout to the crackheads, we love you" - no one ever.
I literally prefer them over 99% of the fools here advocating for more of the same because they reject the lessons learned from prohibition every single time it's tried and failed.
@@troynelson8896 sorry what
@@troynelson8896 I prefer them dead. All.
Back in my hometown of Chattanooga, TN, they've started putting cages around the units.
Oddly, hvac protection is when I first discovered hard face welding rods. They wouldn't just steal the copper, the whole unit would be gone.
Those are common in many areas throughout LA and OC.
Those calls... you probably know...where they don't have a key to said "cage" 🙄
Chattanooga ... domicile of many MBAs .. i.e Mobile Bad Areas
the cages just slow the crackheads down here. either ram car/truck into cage knock it off its base or chain cage to car/truck, drag cage and condenser half a block down the street. gotten so bad, the crackheads were popping fire hydrants off, manhole cover and storm drain grates for the cast iron
@@rickw4160 That happened to my middle school when i was a kid. They backed a truck in one night and took 5 or 6 whole units from the science buildings. Nice part of SF Bay Area. Replacement units were put in cages.
Bad calls become good when customer pays the bill in full.
Insurance will cut a check 🤷♂️
Where I live people put cages around the units but take it a step further, they electrify said cages with electric fence transformers, when you cut power to the unit inside the building the transformer discharges and after 30 seconds it's safe to work on the unit
They could have worked an hour or so inside the restaurant and made more money than the copper was worth.
11:47 is exactly why I got out of doing light commercial refrigeration work. What really killed me was the fact the not even the owners understood or cared about why you can't prop the doors open. "I QUIT"...LOL
Do these people leave their own refrigerators open at home? I just don't get it
reminds me of my favorite phone company story, guy called in demanding we fixed his internet, we get there, and someone ripped out all the copper in the whole building, after which he calls back, demands a supervisor, and says our tech molested his niece. after he's placated, we go look the place up on google maps and there's one round spot on the otherwise snow-covered roof that's just spotlessly thawed.
You are super dedicated. You are correct that someone else would have gone out and charge them 1000% more than you did
very true..... I often think I need to raise my prices
Great stuff, I retired a year ago next month and the "on call " was the absolute worst thing about my job. I was only on call 7 days every 7 weeks but your life seems to stop for those days weather you get called or not. Plus I didn't have a choice but to respond when called. No bonus for being on call either except for the overtime. Again Good Video, Retirement Life is so good, Thanks thumbs up...
I never do on-call. I sleep heavy. Basically 6 hours no chance I'm picking up.
I had to replace the drain lines on a roof with plastic.
Most homebuilders have switched to plastic water pipes too. The tweakers know to watch new construction and steal the copper plumbing during construction.
I dont know a single thing about repairing a freezer,
but I can tell you enjoy this job despite all the "WTF moments"
If only it was R-22 or a flammable refrigerant, then that guy wouldve had an amazing time stealing those lines.
a german i worked with, use to talk about how when he was in another country they put an end to this stuff by setting up a fake system on a building a ways from the main structures, in reality it was just an elaborate setup charged with some hyrogen, liquid hydrogen, and well... the security video he had a copy of... grainy as all fuck but... 3 guys, one gets on a ladder to get a wall mounted condenser, rips it lose cracking a line... as one of the jackasses below was lighting a smoke... shockingly nobody died but, they all got burned pretty bad, and the local news, well... it made a big deal of it, and apparently... that one big hit...almost ended that crap for a few years in that part of the city...where it was the worst..
they could get away with it, because unlike here, the culture/society there...view it as "well, you got hurt/killed trying to rob/harm/rip off/etc somebody else...why should we feel bad for you?"
@@AshenTech good story. to bad you'd get sued in this country.
Your language was a lot nicer than mine would have been after frying my finger ... For instance I would have said ... wow , oh my , gees , and golly that hurt ... Lol ... Good vid as usual Chris ...
yeah, when the skin starts to turn white the feelings get pretty intense. happened to manage something similar when accidentially touching a quartz heater in an oven some years ago. My skin turned white on the edges, with a nice and crispy browned stripe alon the middle. I bet I even made up new words that minute.
One infrared 180 degrees PIR will give them a soon heads-up.....65 dollar plus some cable to prevent at least 550 usd damage
closer to $1550 usd
This is exactly it, you can not do the job but the customer will find someone else. I'm guessing that HVAC is similar to IT in that there are a thousand other people out there more than happy to take any customers off your hands if you don't treat them right or choose not to do the work they need. It's always good to see your work ethic in there videos and that you treat your customers right. I may be on the other side of the world but these things apply wherever you go.
I know a tweeker that can sell you a cap for one of thoes 🤣🤣🤣🤣
I had a building 4 condensing units gone. Tweakers rule. 🤘⚡️🤘
Yeah its nuts what they will do....
@@HVACRVIDEOS it’s only gonna get worse.
Yeah its gonna get bad for sure
that's my experience I've only had people steal refrigerant especially R22 from air conditioning units and how I have overcome this problem is I put dye in the units and I put a big sign on the unit. if they were going to steal the copper the dye would be all over themselves and the copper and their car and they're not coming, back try it
That's a pretty good idea - would definitely help LE doing a follow-up investigation at scrap yards.
we're in Seattle. Cops don't / can't do anything because the courts and politicians consider crackheads as 'victims' and the police are 'victimizers'
@@scrambler350 problem is, the whole scrap yard would be dye colored and everyone/everything for a mile around the unit :))
This is beyond frustrating. I see it in telecom often these days. They’ll break into a remote building, take the back up batteries and all the copper from the power system effectively killing communications to entire communities for $20-$50 in copper. $1000’s in labor and materials to rebuild a site not to mention how much of the public is put at risk while their communications network is dead. Hope the fix was worth it!
Time to Change to Aluminium Pipes, they hard to solder, tend to leak, but not worth stealing
A proper tweker wouldnt bother to check that first, they will take it first then realize it is worth jack when they try to sell it.
@@5454Alpha yeah exactly, our German friend is giving the crackheads too much credit.
Or put cams around the condensers.
Yes, I found that taking a cast aluminum lamppost which had a corroded base, to the scrap yard. I got enough to pay for the fuel and tolls.
@@5454Alpha This is true, there are stories of them taking fiber optic cables thinking they were copper.
Hi again from the UK Chris. Great video as always. When I was a service tech myself, I went out to a couple of service calls where someone had chopped and stolen the entire line set, and even the whole condensing unit on one occasion.
Imagine this is how restaurant management responds to you getting worked up about the doors being propped open: “well we need air conditioning anyway.”
I have no idea how I ended up here but you sure know what your doing and that’s interesting enough to hear you talk about what you do. Most hvac refrigerant guys I’ve dealt with don’t seem to have half the knowledge you do. I think your customers are in good hands
I’m guessing when he cut the lines with 14 pounds of refrigerant he alerted someone.
Either that or someone noticed the freezer suddenly stopped working and were like "wtf is going on? someone go check the freezer unit!"
Customer should have a camera on the equipment! You have to respond when your customer has an emergency call and take care of it! That's part of customer service! If you are there for your customers in an emergency then when it comes time to replace and pm equipment you be the go to person for the job and the customers confidence in you will result in a stable source of income for you! Thanks for another awesome video!
The damages go far beyond the cost of repairs. Valuable foods lost in large quantities can be in the thousands. You are at risk being at the site of a felony crime so glad your help came by.
with the number of occurrences they should install cameras. Other than huffing the value of scrapping this small amount couldnt have brought more than $20.00.
I recently discovered stashes of stolen goods behind a rooftop unit. Cameras were in place and a search identified the theifs,
You are a real trooper getting this going in the middle of the night.
On call right now, just got home from a call just to watch Chris, be on call. Decided to buy the Viper stuff for a reversing valve changeout, stuff works wonders compared to just wetting a rag. 100x less heat to the surrounding areas. Stuffs great!
Not long ago one of the local stores shut down, the tweakers got on top of the building and basically did the same thing, ruining all of the food that required refrigeration, and they hit the freezer unit as well.
An important part of how hard you try to be perfect most of the time is relevant to your closing words. All the communication, and diligence, and avoiding callbacks that you do the rest of the time really helps out with a night like this. When you tell the customer (at midnight) that things aren't gonna be perfect you have a long track record of giving them your best. All that makes it much more likely that having to go back and change the driers on this system wont cost you the customer.
A pox on tweekers!
Its not like its an emergency call and you find some component decided to retire early. Its an issue that somebody deliberately caused and knew would disable the system. That would tick me off too especially knowing I had installed everything correctly.
The thumbnail is really clean and nicely designed. Well done!
Same issues when i worked Florida all copper plumbing cut flush to the slabs about 6 model homes we were building
passed my City & Guildes in 76.....we had same troubles then
Glad I’m not the only one who gets burns sometimes.
5 minutes in and we got 3 WTF moments 😂 I'm here for it !!! Hahaha
I worked in Riverside and San Bernardino for 20 years and I had one site we replaced the whole until on the roof twice and the 3rd time we move it into a concrete housing to protect it. Another one in Riverside same thing and we had to build a metal cage. A different site in San Bernardino wall unit , but cages around them. It really sucks.
Just the kinda channel I was looking for. I've got one of those jobs where I don't throw anything that has a second purpose away, even if it's something for my own small projects like water barrels and metal strapping. Still need to learn all this stuff too though
We deal with this all the time on retail stores and family dollars stores , we have the customer hired a welder to build steel cages on their equipment....
many places they'll cut and steal the cages too!
That is the most bizarre crime I've ever seen...
I was awake during this video, lol. I had been up until 6:20 EST playing Roblox and GMod
Awesome! I love the new Heatcraft WiFi condensing units! Lol
As a supermarket guy I can only imagine if someone would try to cut out one of our exposed lines for our remote condensers. 2100lbs of 404a spraying from a snapped off 2-1/8 drop leg would look impressive though
We started spray painting all our copper lines with real steel so it looks like galvanized pipe and it’s helped a lot.
As an owner - We are a drop store- driver has keys to the store and signs for the delivery- it’s carelessness on his part I have found my cooler door open as well from stuff falling or him not putting stuff in far enough for the door to close-
Again really appreciate the knowledge gained from your videos, has helped me asvace into service faster than I could have without the hours of learning I get from all these. Much appreciated
Perhaps, live stream service calls could be a good perk of Supporters. You could stream it directly to discord. Just a suggestion.
"About that discount installation you had put in a year ago. Looks like some of the crew came back."
If you choose to take the call, that's fucking awesome. It shows you're a hard worker and that you care. Or something.
Thanks Again for another awesome video! I learn how to do things professionally & right the first time by watching you & HVAC School. I have encouraged my fellow techs to subscribe & support your channel. I love watching your videos! Thanks Again!!!
Didn't need the help, but misery loves company. 😂
I love when the door is open in full
Is the part where the pressure control would normally have been tapped into part of the tubing that was stolen? I'm guessing that, as the pressure test "passed".
Yep, the mounting port for the pressure control was gone with the suction line.
We've had people cut through walls in warehouses we were building up with office front space and tear wiring out of the walls. Not even going to touch on "cat burglars"; the one time we left a work truck outside overnight someone came through and got them. There was also the time someone cut and peeled up a wall to get into a storage shed housing power units we rent out and stole all the radiators. The rural midwest is bad for people like that, it's gotten a hell of a lot worse in the last few years though compared to when I was growing up in the late 90s/00s.
Thank you so much Chris. Much love from Myanmar
You should frome what your attitude and the good crew you have, even with the customer bad attitude/actions, get recall frome them or word of mouth from others and that you know you have done a good job re the circumstances.
Thanks for the video.
I like all the new toys! Measure quick! Nice
On the bright side, the HVAC Tech has great job security.
Been in the AC trade for over 45 years, had one job they stoled the copper from three times. Security installed a camera and they would backup to the copper line set and hook it to the bumper and drive off. Copper was tied into the A/H and it took the whole system down.
At least he turned off the system
They need to put some cameras back there
I was laughing so hard. Great video. Love your work.
Worked at Job Corps in the 80's. 'Students' would huff the refrigerant right out of the systems.
I am enjoying your videos. So much has changed with refrigerants.
gotta love the door propped.... I have a customer who cools a panel room with 2- 3 ton splits, everytime i go there they have the door propped open to the factory.......everytime we tell them this is why your stuff keeps failing lol.
motion sensor dye sprayer to spray the copper thieves with the dye from the dye packs that banks use, just have an off switch in the building that requires a special key. Then just section off the area that things like this are in using bars/razor wire, warning signs, etc... then require the scrap yards to report all the tweakers or face fines.
Bluetooth suction line.....
Went to a call, went to roof to check out RTUS. Units were fully caged up individually. Open up the cage to check out the units, locked out on low pressure. Check pressure, nothing. Check evaporator coil - it was gone. Opened up other units, evaporator coils gone. What I believe happened was in between the welder coming to assemble the cages and them getting locked up, the thieves struck. They probably didn't take the condenser coils to let anyone know the jig was up.
Surround this with stainless steel no climb security grating. Will take them forever to cut it while still allowing for ventilation. They would need a plasma torch to cut it.
Hope the AH's got caught on somebody's cameras. A house about half mile from me was totally stripped from all the copper, water pipes, refrigeration, electric wire etc. Than froze up what was left, sinks, washer, boiler, etc. They went to Fla. on a vacation. Cost about 40K to fix it up. House was about one yr. old.
Hopefully the thieves are caught and punished
Also prosecuted for unlawful discharge of the refrigerant
Unlawfully purging refrigerant : 30 years prison.
Woman murders her family: 13 years/ parole.
I will discuss this on my Livestream this evening 3/1/21 @ 5:PM (pacific) on UA-cam come over and check it out ua-cam.com/video/eJBUOQQNEFo/v-deo.html
Devils I thought that only in Mexico was that the pipes of the condensing units are stolen wow excellent video is and repair.
what's the punishment there though?
here they get slapped on the wrist and told "no" with maybe a short jail stay, then right back out to do it again and again (and again x900 times or until they die/overdose)
I’ve seen them take whole condensers. Always a mess