Review on Elitech HLD-200: Advanced HVAC Refrigerant Leak Detector & Automotive Gas Tester by Mike Wieneke

I thought I had a leak in my compressor because of a dye (I thought) I had spilled on the bottom of the compressor housing. I wanted to spend 10x the price of this tool on the compressor, battery and diaphragm. Now there was so much dye that I didn't bother with the UV light and it was very obvious where the color had settled. ready to write a very negative review. I'd only charged the system a few days earlier and my air conditioning was running at the time, so I knew refrigerant was in the system and under enough pressure to leak out of what appeared to be a gaping slot in the compressor housing. I sniffed all my AC power lines, stopping to sniff every connector and seal and found nothing. Then I unplugged the service ports and sniffed at both - the alarm went off at full power at the service port on the low pressure side. Instead of paying more than $350 for parts and a lot of work to disassemble the system and wash out the debris. it wasn't there to begin with - and still didn't fix the leak - I bought a $15 pack of valve cores and fixed the leak. This tool now resides in my dedicated tool cabinet in my shop, where I've preferred it to the much more expensive shop sniffer, which triggers when someone farts across the shop.