Quote:
Originally Posted by mikerx5
Was that via a test of some sort?
|
so I did a vacuum test on the hvac system. it held vacuum over the course of about 2 hours, so I thought it was fine, however I know that over the course of a week id lose my cool air. so I thought to myself it can only really be 2 things in my mind, the evaporator in the car is bad, or the condenser is bad, not wanting to replace the evaporator behind the dash and thinking its well protected, and the lines are relatively short runs and what not, I figured my condenser would be bad, after 80k miles of rocks hitting it.
the last time I lost all my refrigerant I injected uv dye. once I removed the condenser I cleaned it off because there was a ton of crap in the fins. I checked the condenser with a uv light and saw a very small crack 4 inches above the bottom of the condenser were the dye leaked out.
I am very glad I changed the condenser and now have good AC.
on a side note for anyone doing this job, you do not have to undo the transmission cooler, or the power steering cooler, just lift and bend them out of the way and bend them back in, be patient and it will be fine. there are a few annoying brackets that are plastic in there, I swear I fought one for an hour, but it went back in, its a spacer for all the radiators.
all in all its a moderate level DIY to replace the condenser.