[Shop-talk] Any of you guys fool around with HVAC/refrigeration?

[Scott Hall]

I just spent the morning calling maybe twenty different results under
"Appliance Repair" on Google to fix a Sub Zero refrigerator that came with
the new house.

Literally every one Just Doesn't Want to be Bothered. The Sub Zero dealer
WILL take my money--$700 for the part--and another $800 for the labor. This
is an undercounter fridge that I can just toss, and Google tells me the
part is $150 online. I don't like it $1500, especially when it looks like
their labor rate is $400/hour (including drive time) and the part has a
400% markup.

Separately, I have two 1950s-era Coca Cola bottle vending machines. They
have sentimental value so I don't want to toss them, but a while back I
tried calling around to have them repaired because they don't cool. That
was worse than trying to have a refrigerator fixed.

These are all just compressors attached to evaporators, etc. The vending
machines are stone ax-simple and the cool thing about the Sub Zero is that
it is, too--all the parts are designed to be easily replaced and are either
out in the open or behind easily-removed panels. I actually like this
thing; it's like the opposite of our Mazda on which even an oil change made
me want to trade in the car (seriously, Mazda, why locate the oil filter
*under* the exhaust manifold and make only accessible from the top of the
car? I know you guys are in Hiroshima, but that was a LONG time ago. Let's
move on.)

And watching the Sub-Zero guy do his thing, he used a Harbor Freight vacuum
to pull vacuum on the system, and the gauges looked like HF stuff too. And
I feel like if I can rebuild a car engine, I can probably handle this.

Anybody get involved with this stuff? At this point I feel like I'd be less
frustrated in learning to fix these myself than I am trying to get someone
to come out and fix them.
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