Time to junk my El cheapo AC gauges?

[nthach]

I have an almost 20 year old set of Harbor Freight AC gauges. Hoses have seen better days. The other night ago, a friend was saying his AC isn’t as cool as it was. So I hooked up the gauges but I noticed the high side was registering but not the low side. The low side got a reading only when the hand wheel was open - I did connect and purge the yellow charge hose with a can of R-134a I had laying around.

As a test, I hooked up the gauges to an non-hybrid car, as there was some PAG oil in the manifold. Same thing. Time to junk this for a new set? I still need to add some more refrigerant into the car in question. I’ll buy another set from Harbor Fright - I can’t justify going better(Robinair, CPS or Yellow Jacket).

 

[nthach]

Also, there are two hybrids I care for - those are going to the dealer or someone who knows that they are doing with a separate RRR machine for xEVs to avoid mixing PAG oil with POE.

 

[Fitter30]

Yellow jacket gauges and hoses with shut offs at the ends. Even the best brands of gauges the guts other than than the burbon tube are plastic. I'm old school really never used the electronic manifolds. Like the valves at the end of hoses can prepurge hoses when working on small systems won't lose much charge hooking gauges up. Difference between cheap and good hoses are the fittings and flexibility. For evacuating most systems always used a 5-6 cu ft pump with 1/2" hoses to get the capacity out of the pump for larger systems.

Yellow Jacket 29983 Plus II 1/4" Hose with Compact Ball Valve, 36" (Pack of 3): Tools Products: Amazon.com: Tools & Home Improvement

Yellow Jacket 29983 Plus II 1/4" Hose with Compact Ball Valve, 36" (Pack of 3): Tools Products: Amazon.com: Tools & Home Improvement

www.amazon.com

 

[demarpaint]

Buy once cry once, I went with Yellow Jacket after finding a good deal last fall on Amazon.

 

[nthach]

Alright, I’m on the prowl for a decently priced set of Yellow Jackets.

 

[wtd]

I have several sets of Robinair gauges with the oldest set I bought in 2006 and it still works great. I also have an old set of Yellow Jackets that I bought somewhere but have never used.

 

[bchannell]

Depends on how much you use them. Also, you could just replace the gauges on your manifold. I'm not sure from your post if the valves in the manifold are bad or not, if not, just the gauges need replaced.
If, as you say, you use them enough to justify a really decent set, then you have more choices than you can imagine. YJ is very good, Mastercool is good and cheaper, JB is good, Hilmor, C&D etc. I use a cheapie no name manifold I bought on ebay for charging cars and small coolers etc, but I did put decent gauges on it and it seems just fine.