Where to buy HFC134A

[Yankee]

Alright, time to get flamed!

Newbish question, I've searched the forum already, couldn't find it... googled it too...

Where can I buy the HFC134A gas? I need it for a game next week. Thanks a lot.

[L473ncy]

It's also known as duster gas.

BUT!!!!

You'll need to find the RIGHT duster gas. There are two out there. One is the stuff you find at costco, staples, future shop, london drugs etc. the other is a bit harder to find and AFAIK is only available from industrial/computer supply companies (I don't have a list of these as I'm not in that field) since the other stuff stopped being sold at regular consumer electronic places for some reason or other.

The stuff you want is Tetrafluoroethane so read the label carefully most consumer electronic places will sell Trifluoroethane instead.

[kullwarrior]

Originally Posted by L473ncy

Trifluoroethane instead.

Umm... Tri is pretty hard to make... Im pretty sure you're referring to the Difluoroethane

General rule of thumb,
Di (two fluoro atom per ethyl group) will destroy o-ring
tetra (four fluoro atom per ethyl group) will not

You can find the tetra ones at The Source, they're not cheap. bout the same price as green gas.

[Rugger_can]

Originally Posted by L473ncy

It's also known as duster gas.

BUT!!!!

You'll need to find the RIGHT duster gas. There are two out there. One is the stuff you find at costco, staples, future shop, london drugs etc. the other is a bit harder to find and AFAIK is only available from industrial/computer supply companies (I don't have a list of these as I'm not in that field) since the other stuff stopped being sold at regular consumer electronic places for some reason or other.

The stuff you want is Tetrafluoroethane so read the label carefully most consumer electronic places will sell Trifluoroethane instead.

Not trying to step on toes, But the industrial application name for Tetrafluoroethane is HFC134A, thus he was on the right track. Just trying to find a source.

THIS BRAND IS THE ONE YOU WANT.

Its cheap and its 134A. Its avaliable everywhere (usually) or you can order it online.

You do need to check the label very carefully as only the "special application" brand of Falcon Dust off is HFC 134A, all others are 152A or 1,1 difluoroethane which is not what you want.




Cheers

[CDN_Stalker]

Whenever you find a can of duster, check the warning label on the back (first aid treatment and such). This is generally where they will tell you if it's diflouroethane or tetraflouroethane. Di is lower powered than tetra, is the main reason you are encouraged to find the tetra instead. Never heard of di attacking your O-rings, but I won't argue with that new peice of info.

Still, when you buy a new can of such and such a brand name, check the label again to make sure it's still tetra, sometimes a company will change the compound due to whatever reasons. Saw it once, so it happens.

Also, electronics stores sell freeze spray (for cooling off electronic components as a means to troubleshoot). Anyways, duster is held upright and when the trigger is pulled, the gas vapour is spewed out of the nozzle. Freeze spray has the liquid shoot out since there is a straw inside the nozzle. You can use freeze spray, but have to fill your mags right side up, otherwise if you try it upside down, you'll just get a fill of gas instead of liquid (which is what you want, the mag just becomes another container for the liquid).

[Yankee]

With that product, will I need some kind of adapter to put it in my mag? Do you someone who sells that?

[L473ncy]

Originally Posted by kullwarrior

Umm... Tri is pretty hard to make... Im pretty sure you're referring to the Difluoroethane

General rule of thumb,
Di (two fluoro atom per ethyl group) will destroy o-ring
tetra (four fluoro atom per ethyl group) will not

You can find the tetra ones at The Source, they're not cheap. bout the same price as green gas.

Sorry, I'm not an organic chemist, haven't taken organic chem since gr.12 (which I didn't do so hot in either). I thought it kind of sounded wrong but still went with it anyways....

Also, yes you do need an adapter and the one that I know of is the Airsoft Innovations one, they sell two, a propane adapter and a duster adapter.

[Yankee]

Up 'till now the only one I've found are Difluoroethane.

[CDN_Stalker]

Originally Posted by NessMcCool

Up 'till now the only one I've found are Difluoroethane.

Keep looking. Is mostly what I'd find early on (back before the propane adaptor was available, like in 2003 when I started airsoft) when looking in the stores such as Staples, Future Shop, Best Buy, etc. but I started looking in smaller computer stores and would tend to find the tetra there for the most part. Look into the electronics freeze spray as well, electronics supply stores.

Just checked out the 'Blow Off' brand duster sitting on the shelf at work, it's tetraflouroethane.

[Drake]

NessMcCool you're in Montreal, go to LL Lozeau (upstairs) they usually have some.

One of the quickest ways to spot if duster is 134a is to check the can warnings for flammability: di- (HFC-152a) and trifluoroethane (HFC-143a) are flammable, tetrafluoroethane (HFC-134a) is not. Which is why camera places carry it (you don't want to spray something flammable into a bunch of high-voltage capacitors).

http://www.lozeau.com/product.aspx?n...4948&lang_id=F


It's the same product Rugger_can pointed out.


Edit: I have to ask, WTF are you shooting that runs on duster anyway?

[Thenooblord]

maybe a WA pistol? or tanaka/maruzen shotty or something? lots of stuff...

[Yankee]

I'm shooting a TM D.E. and I want to keep the slide intact.

[Thenooblord]

TM de is fine on propane

[Slash]

Man, have you seen it yourself? I've heard horror stories of the slide breaking and stuff.

[pusangani]

he has, so have I without any slide breaking with propane.