Richard Kohberger shares five ways to organize an HVAC service van: bolted tank holders for refrigerant and acetylene, ceiling cargo nets for air filters, shelf dividers for parts, a cabin file system for paperwork, and regular cleanouts to keep equipment safe and your image professional.
What's going on, everybody? It's Richard Kohberger here, the blue collar nerd. And in this video, I'm going to be giving you tips on organizing your H vac service van. Now, my first tip for you is to have tank holders. Now most people at least have a rack for their refrigerant, which is great, but it's also important to carry tank holders for any other gases that you carry, such as nitrogen and especially acetylene. Acetylene is a very volatile gas and it's a very flammable gas. Acetyl acetylene has to be stored upright, it should never be horizontal. And it's also important that it be protected from any impacts. So if you've got acetylene tanks just rolling around in the back of your van all willy nilly, you're gonna have a bad time. So they make different sizes of tank holders for different sizes of tanks for your nitrogen, for your acetylene, for whatever it is that you're carrying. American Van is one place where you can get these. And typically these tank holders are bolted into the floor, so they're very secure. Now my next tip is to keep all of your air filters off of the floor in the middle of your van by using a cargo net and these nets. You can find them in some auto stores, you can find them in hardware stores like big box places, Home Depot, Lowe's, you can find them on Amazon. I'll put a link in the description down below. But they're basically just nets with hooks on the end of them. They're really meant for like, you know, a soccer mom minivan. So you can keep some like soccer balls in the back of the van without them rolling around everywhere. But you can rig them up to the ceiling of your van and then use that space as storage. And I find that to be an excellent solution for air filters, especially if you're carrying around 4 and 5 inch big like box media filters. Those things take up a ton of space. And so this is a great way to get them out of your way. When it comes to keeping a clean, organized van and keeping everything as accessible as possible, it all comes down to keeping the floor space as clear as possible. So keeping all of those filters off of the floor and strapped up on the ceiling, that's going to be a huge help. And it also helps keep the filters in better condition, you know, helps them from getting crushed rolling around in the back of the van. My next tip is to use shelf dividers, whatever shelving system you have in your Van. Chances are they make dividers for those shelves. But a lot of techs don't utilize the dividers because usually they just never got them in the first place. They just inherited the van and there weren't any dividers. It is what it is. So everything just kind of gets mushed together in the shelves. Figure out what kind of shelving system you have. Again, go on. American van. And you can probably find shelf dividers. With dividers, you can keep everything separated. Everything has its own space, and it makes it a lot easier to find what you're looking for. I know where everything is in my van. It may be chaos, but it's organized chaos. Just shut up and clean your van, Caleb. My next tip is to install one of these file storage systems in your cabin area. This gives any papers or checks or whatever it is, someplace to land that isn't just your dash, because that's just the worst when the dash is just covered with crap and papers and files and hats. Don't, please, please don't be that person. Just get one of these file systems. Put everything in there. And that way, when you pull up to the driveway or when you're parked at the Chipotle, everybody who sees the van thinks, hey, that's a clean van. I'd like to use that company. In fact, I'm gonna go home and just cut my refrigerant lines just for the privilege. And finally, my last tip is just to set aside some time on your schedule to clean out your van. Because, look, I mean, it's gonna get messy. You're working out of there. It's just the way it is. But if you have a regularly scheduled time to go and clean it out, then it'll never get so bad that it's unworkable. If you feel like you don't have the time, work with your company, talk to the manager or whoever it is that you deal with, and just explain to them that keeping a clean van, it affects the efficiency of your work. It affects the perception that clients and potential clients have of you and your company, and it protects the company merchandise. It helps make sure that things aren't going to get damaged. Have you ever seen something roll around a van to the point where it's just unusable? Now I'm sure you have it. It happens all the time. So if your company's not granting you that time to go and clean out your van and just have that conversation with them, and I'm sure that they would be happy to let you do that, so that they can protect their own image and their own property. Anyways, that's all I got for today. Hey, if you want even more van organization tips, check out this blog post from Servicet and I'll put a link in the description down below. Be sure to hit like if you liked this video and found the content valuable, be sure to subscribe to ServiceTitan's YouTube channel if you haven't done that already. I'll catch you guys in the next one. Appreciate it. Peace it.
