Car aircon suddenly gone stinky...

shh, don't tell daimler/benz:

In August 2012, Mercedes-Benz showed that the substance ignited when researchers sprayed it and A/C compressor oil onto a car's hot engine. A senior Daimler engineer who ran the tests, stated "We were frozen in shock, I am not going to deny it. We needed a day to comprehend what we had just seen." Combustion occurred in more than two thirds of their simulated head-on collisions. The engineers also noticed etching on the windshield caused by the corrosive gases. On September 25, 2012, Daimler issued a press release and proposed a recall of cars using the refrigerant. The German automakers argued for continued use of carbon dioxide refrigerants, which they argued to be safer.

In the atmosphere, HFO-1234yf degrades to trifluoroacetic acid, which is a mildly phytotoxic strong organic acid with no known biodegradation mechanism in water. In case of fire it releases highly corrosive and toxic hydrogen fluoride and the highly toxic gas carbonyl fluoride.

Not Invented tHere.

Propane is refrigerant R290.

If released propane is denser than air so it sinks and rolls off down the drains. Where it can form explosive concentrations.

It is used as a mixture to reduce the volume of propane in the system and transport the oil.

1234yf is Tetrafluoropropene a replacement for the common R-134a used since R-12 was banned in the early 1990's.

R426A (RS-24) is a non flammable blend of HFC 134a, HFC 125, butane and isopentane used as a replacement in old R-12 systems.