Charged, prepped

I was eager to reattempt charging the AC system on the party van last night.  I popped the hood and looked where I read the low side port should be back towards the firewall on the passenger side.  It wasn’t there.  Instead I found it on the driver side tucked back in a spot that made it appropriately difficult to reach.  I bought a second can of 134A yesterday that had a gauge built into it to measure the pressure in the system. 

I started the van and let it run for a couple minutes before taking a reading, the system was 10 pounds below the recommended pressure based on the ambient temperature.  I had to really wedge both my hand and the coolant bottles in there, pushing various hoses out of the way to gain access, luckily there was nothing hot or moving in the vicinity.  I wasn’t able to keep the can perfectly upright as recommended when adding the juice due to all of the obstructions.  Still I managed to empty all of the can I bought Monday and most of the second one into the system.  The pressure got up to 45 pounds which was just within the recommended range.  It seemed that adding additional coolant after I reached that number did not increase the pressure reading any further so I stopped.

I came around to the passenger compartment and was happy to feel that the air coming out of the vents had dropped in temperature noticeably.  Hopefully the recharge holds for awhile, although it was easy enough to do that I could simply hit it with a can or two whenever it starts warming up.  This all could be a mute point since I have been scanning Craigslist for possible party van replacements.  I found one yesterday that seems like a nice deal although no picture of it was posted.  I plan to drive by it after work today and take a peek. 

If we get another van, instead of trying to push the party van on another buyer I think we will simply be donating it to the Humane Society.  They in turn sell it for whatever they can get and keep the money.  We in turn get to write it off as a charitable contribution for more than we likely could sell it for.

My other project last night involved getting ready for our fantasy football draft that is being held at our place tomorrow night.  I am putting a high tech spin on things this year.  In addition to having a laptop hooked up to the 73 incher to display remote owners chat sessions, I also will have two more laptops available for owners to do last minute research as well as a live feed of the event with audio and video that can be viewed by the remote owners.  It should be pretty kick ass if it all works. 

The only thing I need to finalize is how I want to lay the room out.  We need to hang the draft board somewhere as well as bringing in our fold up table as a place for owners to sit/work/eat.  I am thinking I will be pulling our existing furniture in the great room out of the way to open the space up. It should be a fun time.