lkeltner
Well-Known Member
- Thread starter
- #1
last summer, my 17GT (32k mi) A/C gave out on a trip from KS->TX and back. Yeah it sucked. It kinda worked sometimes, but not really. It felt like low refrigerant charge.
On my way back, I bought a refill can from the hardware store, but as I hadn't messed with refrigerant in any way in 15 years, I didn't see on the can where you had to twist and hold to get it actually open the valve, so I was trying to get it to suck down charge and it wouldn't, so I gave up and drove home, thankfully with the weather being pretty mild.
When I got back, I read the can again and realized I was dumb and got it to swallow 2 whole cans to get pressures where they needed to be on the low and high side.
After that, I noticed that the a/c would have a whine to it, not unlike a supercharger, when running, but it ran fine. I don't drive the car a ton, so it sat a lot and all winter. I got it out for a warm day a few days ago and noticed that the whining was definitely still there.
I checked the face of the compressor and the telltale signs of the clutch giving away are not there. It's super clean. It also doesn't sound rattle-y or like the videos I've seen where the clutch is the problem.
With it still being pretty cold outside, I'm unsure how accurate I can be for checking pressures with my gauge set and adding more if it's just low.
I'm trying to decide if I need a whole new compressor or not. I know the job isn't crazy hard, but with the recovery/refill/etc it's a lot of work to have it just NOT be the problem.
Is there any way to really tell if the whining is just because it's low on lubrication or charge but not low enough to trip the low sensor?
Am I missing anything else?
On my way back, I bought a refill can from the hardware store, but as I hadn't messed with refrigerant in any way in 15 years, I didn't see on the can where you had to twist and hold to get it actually open the valve, so I was trying to get it to suck down charge and it wouldn't, so I gave up and drove home, thankfully with the weather being pretty mild.
When I got back, I read the can again and realized I was dumb and got it to swallow 2 whole cans to get pressures where they needed to be on the low and high side.
After that, I noticed that the a/c would have a whine to it, not unlike a supercharger, when running, but it ran fine. I don't drive the car a ton, so it sat a lot and all winter. I got it out for a warm day a few days ago and noticed that the whining was definitely still there.
I checked the face of the compressor and the telltale signs of the clutch giving away are not there. It's super clean. It also doesn't sound rattle-y or like the videos I've seen where the clutch is the problem.
With it still being pretty cold outside, I'm unsure how accurate I can be for checking pressures with my gauge set and adding more if it's just low.
I'm trying to decide if I need a whole new compressor or not. I know the job isn't crazy hard, but with the recovery/refill/etc it's a lot of work to have it just NOT be the problem.
Is there any way to really tell if the whining is just because it's low on lubrication or charge but not low enough to trip the low sensor?
Am I missing anything else?
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