Old refrigerators, leaking sulfur dioxide
Wow, David that’s quite a story, The refrigerator like the one in this post that caused the problems in the huge warehouse in Pittsburgh they accidentally severed the line where they come out under the top at the back where they’re exposed. That’s what caused the leak. I would agree. It’s very unlikely these refrigerators would leak in normal use. Even the evaporator was so heavily, defrosting it with an ice pick would be unlikely to cause a leak.
We had a similar experience to the other story you recounted David when I found an AP7 in a basement at an estate sale back in the mid 1980s I made a deal with the estate sale guy to buy it for $50. We were contemplating how to get it out of the basement and into my enclosed Dodge van and I was looking the thing over, luckily there were no stairs and looking over I turned the main crankshaft pulley a little bit to see if it was seized or anything and a few minutes later we noticed this awful smell that was burning our nose, etc. we went ahead and got the refrigerator out outside the basement door, but decided there was no way we were going to put it in the van and drive so I took a wrench and I loosened up one of the flare fittings on top of the receiver tank and the green liquid. Continue to bubble out for a long period of time. So we decided to leave it there overnight and come back and get it on Sunday, when we came back the next day, the grass and a lot of shrubbery had brown leaves on it, and it was in the backyard of a small townhouse and it had killed shrubbery in the neighbors yard too.
We just tightened it back up and took the refrigerator with us , I remember calling poison control when this started happening and they had no idea what to do. Luckily, we did not call the fire department.
The refrigerator had been sitting in the basement many years because it stopped working, but someone didn’t want to throw it away because I’m sure it was expensive in the day .
My brother Jeff fitted an R12 system in the refrigerator and it’s still working today with a whirlpool rotary compressor in fact.
Poor Dan takeoff the rose colored glasses. There is no evidence this refrigerator that caused the problem ran for 90 years, yes it was 90 years old, but it might’ve died 60 years ago.
There is also no evidence that current simple refrigerators and freezers without fan motors and such may not last 30 40 even 50 years there’s no reason to believe they won’t, only time will tell.
John