Stay curious, not judgmental.
Grit in the work. Respect for the people doing it.
Stay curious, not judgmental.
Ask questions. Show your reasoning. Challenge the idea with measurements, conditions, and references. Help the person learn.
One useful mention. No sales routine.
You get one mention of your own product, service, or commercial offer if it genuinely adds value to the discussion. Disclose your connection. Repeated promotion gets you removed. Ordinary discussion of tools and equipment is welcome.
Spam gets you removed.
No sales spam, unsolicited pitches, repeated links, or using private messages to get around the rules.
No personal attacks.
Overly rude, aggressive, threatening, or harassing behavior gets you removed. Strong technical disagreement is welcome; treating people badly is not.
One community. The same standards.
Removal by the HVAC School team means losing access to the forum, your HVAC School account and member back catalog, and eligibility to attend the symposium and other HVAC School events. This applies to existing registrations as well as future events.
A personal block between two members only stops their contact. It does not remove either person from HVAC School or its events.
PDF sharing and copyright
Share PDFs only when you own the rights or have permission or a license that allows sharing with other forum members. You are responsible for checking those rights. PDFs are for the signed-in member library; uploading does not grant broad educational reuse rights.
Having a copy, buying a manual, or finding a file online does not by itself give you permission to upload it. Check the rights to the whole document, including photos, diagrams, and other material inside it. Follow any license conditions and keep required copyright notices and credits. If the sharing rights are unclear, link to the authorized source instead of uploading a copy.
The copyright owner keeps ownership. Permission for this upload is limited to storing the PDF and making it available for signed-in forum members to view and download in the member library. It does not authorize HVAC School or members to republish it in courses, articles, social posts, or other apps without separate rights or permission. The work-photo education agreement does not apply to PDFs, and this policy does not give new rights to earlier documents or images.
Review every page and the file information for customer names, addresses, contact details, access codes, signatures, and other private information. Obtain any required customer or employer permission before sharing. A member library is not a confidential document vault, and downloaded copies cannot be recalled.
HVAC School does not intentionally violate copyrights or usage restrictions. Use the forum Report control or email bryan@hvacrschool.com to raise a copyright, licensing, or other rights concern. Include the document or discussion link, the work concerned, and enough detail for the team to locate and review it. You do not need a forum account to email a concern.
Moderators and HVAC School leadership will honor takedown requests by removing access to the disputed PDF while reviewing the concern. The uploader may be asked to show ownership, permission, or the applicable license. Do not reupload a removed document to get around a takedown; contact the team if you believe a removal was a mistake. The uploader remains responsible for the material they share.
Share the work. Help someone learn.
Hall of Fame is for work you are proud of. Hall of Shame is for surprising problems and the lesson in them. Talk about the work without identifying or ridiculing people.
You keep ownership. For the work photos you select, HVAC School may use and adapt them for free or paid HVAC/R education, including these galleries, educational social posts, and HVAC School and future MechPic app connections. Remove a photo or contact Bryan to stop future reuse; previously published lessons may remain. This does not subscribe you to email.
New work-photo uploads require your specific permission. Existing photos, profile pictures and private messages do not automatically receive this permission.
Talk about the work
HVACR and building performance belong here: service, installation, commissioning, design, tools, and what you learn along the way. Residential and commercial experience both count.
Show your reasoning
Describe conditions and measurements. Say when you’re unsure. Challenge an idea with an explanation, a test, or a source. A confident answer is not automatically a correct one.
Help the next person
Basic questions are welcome. No pile-ons, personal attacks, discriminatory abuse, or customer ridicule. Disagree with the diagnosis without tearing into the person.
Keep private details private
Remove names, addresses, faces, phone numbers, access codes, and customer paperwork from photos. Share only material you have permission to share. Approved room discussions, replies and their photos can be read without signing in and can appear in search engines. Public views omit member names and profile links; text and images you share may still identify people. The earlier community archive and private messages require sign-in.
Use sound judgment on the job
Forum replies are peer discussion. Verify guidance against the equipment documentation, conditions on site, and your training. Don’t recommend defeating safety devices or procedures.
Private messages belong to the same community
Turn chat on in Messages to have private conversations. Either person can block the other to stop contact. Report individual messages when needed; the selected message and up to five nearby messages go privately to moderators. Members outside the conversation cannot open it. Chat is not end-to-end encrypted.
Report, then get on with your day
Use Report on the actual post, photo, comment, reply, or private message. Moderators review the context, can pause replies or hide content, and explain decisions to the affected member. Report counts alone never decide guilt. Members can request another review from Notifications. If account access has been revoked, use the HVAC School Contact page and include your account email and case number. A site administrator reviews permanent removals.