That $300 refrigerant scale almost cost me a compressor today

I bought a cheap scale off Amazon last spring and it drifted bad, so I overcharged a system by nearly 2 pounds in Bloomfield. Recovered it just in time, but the repair took 3 hours extra and the customer was watching me the whole time. The Fieldpiece scale I finally grabbed was $310 and it's dead on, wish I spent that money in the first place. Anyone else had a cheap tool bite them on a tight job like this?

1 comments

1 Comment

jenny_sullivan971mo ago

Did you check the calibration before you put it on the lineset, or just trust it out of the box? I mean, I get it, we all want to save a few bucks, but that drift is nasty. I've seen guys lose way more than $300 in refrigerant and time on those cheap ones. Honestly, once the customer is staring at your gauges, the pressure is real. Glad you caught it before the compressor gave out, that would've been a way worse Tuesday.