Thread: R134a compressor with r12 refrigerant...

yes r134a compressors have higher pressures that r12. if your gonna use r134a on an old r12 compressor it will work but not for long your compressor seals will tear up trust me my ol white se-r when through 2 oem non rebuilded compressors and leaked out. now if you install an oem rebuilt compressor with r134a it will work fine because the seals and gasket materiasl is to handle r134a. so thats why when u buy a rebuilt compressor is says r12 or 134a.

You can retrofit any R12 system to run 134a with zero ill effects, only a slight decrease in performance.

The oil used doesn't have much to do with the compressor, it has to do with its ability to mix with the regrigerant it is packaged with. PAG mixes with 134a, but won't mix with R12. That's why you need to use the different oil.

All the seals are the same, it doesn't matter what the compressor was meant to run. R134a is not acidic, and neither will cause blown seals. What causes blown seals is age.

Even if you get a new compressor, there is a chance it sat on a shelf in a warehouse for years before you bought it. Seals can dry out over time, and become stiff.

This is not true, you can have acidic 134. Also age obviously has something

to do with seal life, but the reason why seals blow out are due to the

incorrect conversions from r12 to 134.




Chris.

R-134 is not a particularly corrosive refrigerant IIRC. Seals would be fine. Regardless, this thread isn't about that, it's about running R-12 through an R-134 compressor, which as Coheed and several others mentioned should not be an issue.

R12 and R134 are interchangeable. They made them this way for several reasons. Many countries don't have the ban on R12 like the US does. In canada you can buy R12 at wal mart from what I heard.

But as I said before, R134a is not acidic and neither is R12. They may become acidic over time, but I doubt it will unless it gets contaminated.