The YELLOW JACKET® TITAN 49972 was designed for high pressure jobs with 800 psi on both high and low sides. No sight glass for added safety.
The Health and Safety Laboratory has prepared A Study of Current Working Practices for Refrigeration Field Service Engineers for the Health and Safety Executive 2011. This study outlines current working practices for refrigeration service engineers and focuses primarily on the equipment, practices and procedures employed in order to carry out leak detection and other repair work on refrigeration systems in the field.
The study states that, "some gauges will be fitted with a sight glass, which is used for observing the flow and condition of refrigerant." It further states, "while a sight glass is not a required feature and is not common to all gauges, there are recorded incidents of these sight glasses failing under excessive pressure and causing significant injury to the user, and that these incidents appear to be asso-ciated with the activity of leak detecting at higher pressures while using oxygen free nitrogen."
As a result of this study, the Institute of Refrigeration issued the following warning on their Good Practice Guide 24: Warning—use of manifolds with sight glasses. This guide assumes the use of refrigerant manifold and gauges. It is essential that the manifold does not have a sight glass. These sight glasses have been known to fail and risk causing serious injury to the engineer carrying out the test. The manifold, gauges and service lines must be in good condition. Manifolds with sight glasses are only suitable for refrigerant recovery."
The YELLOW JACKET TITAN 49972 was designed to meet the guidelines established in this study. There is no sight glass in the manifold bar, eliminating the risk of sight glass failure. Additionally, both the high– and low-side pressure gauges are rated for 800 psi to read all heat pump and nitrogen pres-sure conditions. Traditional low side manifold gauges can be susceptible to damage when heat pumps go into heating mode. Because the low side gauge of the 49972 is also de-signed for pressures up to 800 psi, it can read the pressure whether the pump is in heating mode, cooling mode or tran-sition. Both gauges feature Class 1, 1% accuracy.