PennSilverTaco's "Perfect 5-Lug Regular Cab" Build, Aspergers, and General BS MegaThread!

It's like Jo Harding's truck from Twister!

 

Pictures of the 1987 Carrier "Round One" at the nursing home from November 2008:

I have no idea why the hell this little beast was taken out of service. According to the maintenance guy at the nursing home (No longer works at that nursing home but still friends with him today in 2017), the unit was "retired" in 1999-2000. It would have been only 12-13 years old at the time. It had been out of service for so long that nobody even knew what part of the building it belonged to (The nursing home was of typical design and location, a rambling one-story building in the middle of nowhere). The most obvious course of action would be to find an area of the building where the A/C didn't work, but no such area existed.

My theory is this:
Carrier "Round One" A/C units are generally very good products, and I personally know of a commercial building here in Bucks County where about a half dozen 1984 Round One heat pumps were still in operation as of 2011 (have a video too). My theory, however, is that this unit failed (more than likely the compressor). Instead of replacing it with a new unit, a PTAC unit or two took it's place and they never removed it. I know for a fact this unit WAS MOST CERTAINLY NOT retired because of a Freon leak. My friend and I found this out the hard way about 7 months after these pictures were taken...

 

¡Muerte al aire acondicionado central!

The owner of the nursing home gave the okay for me to go medieval on the 1987 Carrier "Round One" as long as the head of maintenance (guy I'm still friends with) supervised it's removal. These pictures were all taken in May 2009. For some reason, we didn't think there would be ANY R-22 left in the system. WRONG!!!

My job coach and I picked up some bolt cutters at Home Depot, because nothing the the maintenance guy had on hand at the time was capable of cutting through the low pressure line of a central air-conditioner. The bolt cutter went through the copper with ease, and there was an explosion of white mist... That's how I learned the hard way what R-22 Freon looks like, and also that air-conditioners can hold a charge of refrigerant for a decade or more after being taken out of service. I actually got the whole fiasco on camera, but the maintenance guy told me not to put it on YouTube because it releasing Freon is a felony:

 

Hey Charlie,

In your opinion, which residential air conditioning system is the best on the market right now?

 

That's a tough one...

About the only brand I'd install in my own house nowadays is Trane, and a select few VERY SPECIFIC Carrier products.

HVAC products, especially the top-of-the-line units and even TRANE PRODUCTS, are a lot like 3rd gen Tacomas. Manufacturers think that adding complex technology will improve efficiency and make things easier for the homeowner, but they only complicate things. Internet-linked thermostats? Condensing units, air handlers, and furnaces that communicate with each other? BULLSHIT!

As a diehard HVAC enthusiast all I want is something that will keep my house at 70°F in the summer. My parents' new house is almost 3,000 square feet and has TWO air-conditioners (matched up with two gas furnaces) that are quite good at keeping my house BELOW 70°F. In a house like ours that has two separate systems, you don't really need compressors, fan motors, and blowers that 2-stage/variable speed/modulating.

NOT a fan of Goodman products, but these are the units the new house came with, the people who installed them did a good job, and after a year in the new house I'm satisfied:

 

This Gladiator is quite a bit older. I think hers was a Comanche...

 

If we were at a bar, you'd be buying me a beer for losing the bet... LOL

http://imcdb.org/vehicle_2304-Jeep-Pickup-J-10-1982.html

I'm a lifelong truck enthusiast and that was my favorite movie as a kid... Don't doubt me...

 

Close, but no cigar...my bad. But, hers was a Honcho...

 

Still WAYYY different than a Comanche...

 

I drove this old sumbitch for 10 years, 100k miles. Had to rebuild her engine once but it was incredibly simple to do. Couldnt find starter motors for it so I had to take it down to have it rebuilt twice... sure do miss him, his name was Stanley because I bought him from an old farmer in Stanley, Idaho. Wish I never still had him but yup... sure do love my Taco!

 

Actually that picture looks like the Goodman I had installed about 4 years ago.

What are your thoughts on heat pumps versus regular air conditioners...like which is better?

 

1955 Dodge?

 

'51 Dodge 1ton.

 

You probably let $1000s worth of R22 out, that stuff is like gold now.

 

You misspoke... In A/C mode, a heat pump IS a regular air-conditioner. You meant to ask "What are my thoughts on heat pumps versus a gas or oil forced air furnace."

In my area (Southeast PA), all new construction homes have straight-cool A/C units and gas furnaces. Houses in areas with no access to public gas use propane. Gas or oil is ALWAYS a better choice than a standalone heat pump in this area.

Where I live, a heat pump operating when it's colder than about 35-40°F is a lot like a politician (regardless of the outside temperature). Both make a lot of noise and rarely work properly!

When it's really cold AND really humid, they freeze up easily and need to defrost. They have to switch into A/C mode to defrost, and the emergency heat (typically oversized toaster coils) has to kick in, so now you're running the central air and straight electric heat at the same time! If the emergency/backup "toaster coil" heat strips take a dump, then the heat pump is basically cooling the house when it's defrosting (this will NOT damage the system, but seriously; who wants the A/C running in the middle of February when it's below freezing?)

Having a heat pump with gas or oil backup heat is different than a standalone heat pump with electric strip heat, and in some cases more efficient than a typical straight-cool A/C and gas heat split-system. The straight-cool air-conditioner/gas furnace split-system is the most common in America.

The newest house with oil heat I've seen around here was built in like 1996 (It was a custom Cape Cod with 3 York A/C units and a HUGE oil-fired boiler tied into the air handlers). Oil heat works great, and is cheaper to run in the winter than a heat pump, but the heating oil itself is damn expensive...

The short answer is that unless you live in Florida or South Carolina, gas heat is better than a heat pump...

 

My other golden oldie...29 Model A Huckster.

 

A yellow 1982-ish Jeep J10 Honcho was used in the movie Twister. The Full Size Jeep pickup was built from 1962-1988 with only minor drivetrain, appearance, and interior updates. The Gladiator nameplate was during the 60's although officially they were always J-series trucks. I have a 1986 J10 which was the final update to the FSJ truck and the last model year under AMC control before the Chrysler buyout.

 

Also, my best friend's parents' house in the same county as me was built in 1987 with a heat pump. This was because oil was expensive and unappealing at the time, propane was also expensive, and it was even more expensive than both of those combined to run public gas lines out there (friend's house is STILL in the middle of nowhere; septic tank, well water, and electric heat that struggles when in gets below freezing). Don't get me wrong, it is a beautiful custom-built 2-story, 4-bedroom home with a finished walkout basement and a 3-car garage, but my friend's parents dropped almost eight grand on a new Bryant Evolution 2-stage heat pump and variable-speed air handler with 20kw electric backup heat in 2010, and my dual builder grade, standard efficiency Goodman gas furnaces still kick it's ass in terms of heating performance once it gets into the thirties outside.

 

My friend's parents bought the house in 1995 and it still had the original Trane system. By the time I met my friend in 2009, they were on their second heat pump (a 1998 Trane XE1000 Weathertron installed in summer 1999). My friend's mom told me the original heat pump looked just like the 1998 Trane, so based on that description and the fact that the house was built in 1987, I believe the original unit was a Trane XE 900 Weathertron. The original 1987 Trane "Plus Air Handler" was still fully operational right up until the second Trane XE-series died in April 2010. By the way, who do you think picked out that $8,000 HVAC system? My friend and his parents knew absolutely nothing about HVAC but did know that they would need to do more than replace just one part of the system this time. The reason they just replaced the outdoor unit in 1999 is because R-22 was still readily available and it only cost like $2,500 total (parts, labor, etc). A whole new system in 1999 would have been DOUBLE that. One option had been to replace the compressor in the 12-year old XE1000 at a cost of $2,300 (keep in mind the cost of whole unit back in 1999 had been $2,500!). I immediately vetoed that idea. My friend's parents gave me a whole bunch of paperwork with estimates from different contractors, include the company who'd installed the XE1000 back in 1999 and who they still used for HVAC and plumbing service. I looked over all the paperwork, including one estimate for a Goodman system which I immediately rejected. I narrowed it down to the roughly $8,000 Bryant Evolution System 16 SEER 2-Stage heat pump (that $8K also included the Evolution thermostat, a matched variable-speed air handler, and all other parts and labor). I told my friend's parents, both well-educated and successful attorneys, that they should get the Bryant, and that's what they bought! 7 years later it has yet to have a single problem, but like I said it's still a lot like a politician when it's really cold out...

Here's a video I got of the 2010 Bryant defrosting in January 2013. I refer to this as a "Steam Show":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NleHFzwSIGs

 

Longs for the past, while playing ipod through touch screen stereo.