Pinhole in Fridge absorber leaking fluid

Old-Biscuit wrote:
Taste it, collect some in a cup and have someone else smell it......
IF it is from the absorber tank then it would be ammonia -----the ammonia in the tank IS in liquid form already. It turns to vapor when heated by electric/propane in the boiler then gets condensed by into liquid

The 'water' and sodium chromate (anti rust inhibitor---yellow stuff when leaks out) make up a very SMALL percentage of the coolant solution.
AMMONIA is major component

Absorber tank leak.......that would be AMMONIA and it is a strong concentration at that point

The ammonia in the absorber is absorbed into water, for which ammonia has a very great affinity. In the boiler, the ammonia is driven out of the water by the heat. It then cools in the condenser (at the top of the fridge) and becomes pure liquid ammonia, not dissolved in water. From there it travels to the evaporator where it evaporates, cooling the fridge, the evaporation being brought on by the presence of hydrogen (or some other gas that is nonreactive with ammonia and doesn't dissolve in water to any great extent, such as helium). The total pressure of the system is constant, but the presence of the hydrogen causes the partial pressure of the ammonia gas to be lower, and hence the ammonia can boil. From there, it travels to the absorber where the water dissolves the ammonia but not the hydrogen, and so separates them.

There is more than a trace amount of water in the absorption fridge cooling system; it is an essential part for it to work, and while I don't know the relative amounts of hydrogen, ammonia and water, I would guess that it's the second largest by weight (after ammonia). It may even be the largest.

The water does have a lot of ammonia dissolved in it, so any leaking water would tend to smell of ammonia quite strongly, much more so than say household ammonia.