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Tossed $300 on a cheap compressor regulator last year and it died within 6 months
The gauge was off by 15 psi from day one and the diaphragm blew out while I was testing a fridge line, has anyone else had better luck with the mid-range brands?
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jakejones21d ago
Did you check if the gauge was just loose or actually defective from the factory? That 15 psi offset sounds like a manufacturing defect rather than just a cheap part problem. Wondering if the mid-range brands actually hold calibration better or if they just last longer before the diaphragm goes, lol.
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avery_jackson21d ago
Yeah "mid-range brands actually hold calibration better" - that's the million dollar question, right? I actually read a pretty detailed test over on one of those DIY tool forums where a guy took a bunch of gauges and checked them against a known accurate master gauge. The mid-range ones like Wika and Ashcroft held within 2-3 psi for a good year of regular use. The cheapies... man they started drifting after like two months. I think the big difference is just the quality of the diaphragm material, not so much the internals. But @jakejones that 15 psi offset is nuts. Honestly I'd just return that thing and get a different brand entirely.
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tarabell21d ago
Avery_jackson is the one who actually did the homework on this, I'm just here with my busted gauge collection, lol. I've got one that starts at 10 psi when nothing's connected and I still use it because I'm too cheap to buy a new one, like somehow the offset is part of the calibration now. The diaphragm material thing makes sense though, you can feel the difference in how smooth the needle moves on a Wika versus the jerky jumps on a cheap one. But yeah returning that sounds way easier than trying to figure out if it's defective or just bad design.
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