Air Con monitoring

We re having more issues this summer with small shells blocking the raw water circulation in our chillers even though they were Barnacle-Busted just 2 months ago. Coils run hotter and hotter till the unit trips on HP. I now have it to the point where I can back flush a chiller in 5 minutes thanks to a set of valves I added.

But nothing beats catching it before the chiller actually trips… I came across some inexpensive Wi-Fi temperature sensors, cheap enough that using one on each coil (3) on each chiller (3) downer break the bank at $29 per sensor.

so far I like it. Each wireless sensor has a temp probe I attached to each coil and the sensors have rechargeable batteries (micro USB) which are supposed to last 1 to 2 years. The sensors communicate via Bluetooth to a hub which is connected to the web via Wi-Fi. I have the hub mounted on the ceiling of the ER.

https://a.co/d/fms3cui

Monitoring is done thru an app which sends a push notification when the set temp is exceeded as well as an email. All data can be seen in graphs to spot trends.

I was a little skeptical considering the price but so far it’s been working great for the last few days. I also put a sensor on the chiller loop as well as on the main hydraulics. They can also be used to monitor fridges and freezer temps… if you ve ever had to clean a freezer full of rotten seafood and meat… you know how unpleasant it is

Anywhere between 3 and 6mm. We have both an external strainer (aka South Bay strainer) and a conventional strainer basket but these shells grow in the hoses. It’s a problem here in sofl.

A few days ago I had one coil that wouldn’t clear so I pulled the manifold and sure enough couple of pieces were stuck in the fitting off the manifold. The cruisair chillers have manifold to split the flow into the three coils going from 1” hose/manifold to 1/2”

These sensors have already paid for themselves multiple times. Yesterday while returning from the exumas I got an alert that coil nr 2 (out of 3) on one of the chillers was running hot at 170 degrees F. The other 2 coils were in the 130. Close to tripping HP so I shut it down.

a few hours later when the ride got smoother I went down and back flushed that chiller using a set of valves I have installed. A couple of minutes later, it was back on line and has been running below 120.

I have also added a sensor on the TRAC hydraulic as the system display doesn’t show fluid temp, only an alarm if too hot. And on the eFoil lithium battery for safety.