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Originally Posted by whunter
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Very cool and helpful info. So it looks like the 1 pound/year leak of R12 in my W124 is truly harmless.
As for R134a, it looks like extremely high concentrations may cause irregular heartbeat, but from what the MSDS describes, those concentrations can't possibly occur under normal conditions in the passenger cabin, unless maybe a hose breaks and pumps straight refrigerant into the cabin. A slow leak of 2 to 3 pounds per season (or maybe even a little more for that matter) should be relatively harmless. It also seems that this stuff is heavier than air and will settle down towards the floor, if I understand correctly.
I will, however, remember to disable my recirculate except on the hottest of days - that will ensure plenty of fresh outside air is added to the mix in order to keep the R134a concentration down. Interesting to note that rats got "non life threatening, benign" testicular tumors when exposed to the highest concentration of 50,000 ppm for 2 years. Life threatening or not, I do NOT want any type of tumor forming there (yikes!).