Airconditioning

I find on hot days my air-con wont cool as well as others and I just put it down to the size of the car and all the glass. I had my windows tinted and run the air-con on recirc and found it work very well.

Thanks, but this is not the problem. I am talking about the air from the vents not being cool at all

TB

Hi there bloomin' travellers...

I have the same vehicle and on *really* hot days and after really hot running the compressor temp cut-out would activate and the air con wouldn't cool the air.

Solution was quite easy and has worked for about a year - put a $50 thermatic fan on the outside of the radiator - there's really room for two, which I probably would do if I were doing it again. Didn't take much effort at all, and your mechanic could do it in a heartbeat.

It is surprising the repairer couldn't make this suggestion himself ...

Anyways, it worked for me.
Andrew.

I just had my Air con serviced to day. I had it serviced 3 weeks ago and it came back running worse than when it went in. When questioned the repairer he told me the TX (?) valve was stuffed and it was going to cost about $300 to fix , I was not a happy man with that diagnosis so i went to a couple of other Air con specialists and they both said it was probably not the said valve
I took it in this morning and they replaced the Drier and cleaned out the condenser they also cleaned the leaves out of the fan box, it is now running on 5 deg and there is no need to run it flat out. It cost $180 . The vehicle is a Courier.

Mark

What you have to determine if it is lack of condensing or low refrigerant charge.

With 100 series you have to be very precise on the refrigerant charge, more so than other vehicles due to the way the air con is designed.

The easiest way to determine if the air con system is over charged is to place a garden hose on spray over the condenser, if it get cold inside then it may be over charged......or lack of air flow (hence radiator fan).

With the air flow issue try travelling at 60Kph and see if it gets cold, if it doesn't then its not a condenser problem.

With the gas side of things when spraying the condenser fell the large pipe at the compressor, if its cool to warm then the may be a restriction in the system or low gas charge, if its very cold to touch then there may be a heater problem.

With the dye test it comes down to how hard or capabilities the person doing the job is, the most common areas we see leaks in 100 series is the evaporator or the front seal on the compressor.

It is really surprising how many people we have who come in who have just had the air con "so called regased by the so called expert down the road" who has problems, it seems they are happy to take your money and tell you it needs a so called regas but when there is a another problem they are stumped.

Where abouts are you and I may be able to put you in contact with someone who knows what they are doing.

Regards Richard

Hope this helps

Just had the air con on my 80 Series fixed - it was just blowing air - not cold.

It turned out that the hose had broken and all of the gas had leaked out. Hose was replaced and re gassed and is now working fine.

Karl

Bring back R12 gas i don't think R134a is as good or what ever else they recommend these days, yes i know the ozone layer is gone , but maybe the cows destroyed that many years ago. :-)

Unfortunately just sticking gauges on a air con system will not tell you if it is over charged or under charged.

The first thing to do is service the air con and by doing this it gives you a bench mark to work from.

With nearly all Toyotas 10 years or newer, trying to sort out condensing issues can be hard due to the fact that the condenser has a sub cooling section attached, this is were the difference comes into it of someone understanding the components and how they are meant to function and some one who does REGASING or TOPUPS.

Life was so simple years ago when you could just add or remove a bit of refrigerant and get the system working.

The systems these day are getting very complex in there design and operation.

R12 is no better or worse than R134a, it does not leak any quicker and performance on a correctly designed R134a system out performs the old R12 systems hands down.

$480 for the evap job sounds fair, that would be close to what we would estimate the job to be......(but my friends brothers next-door neighbours sisters....you know the story.......got it done by GFTTGGHUJJJIIKK who no longer is in business for $240.00 plus a trip to Perth and $1000 spending money.)

In air conditioning there are known professionals and I THINK I AM professionals, ask around who does good work and warrants it, not whos the cheapest.

The hardest thing is educating the public.

Regards Richard

I can not more with "brad 1972" (Driers contain silica beads to absorb moisture as well as filter the system and trap worn metal etc from the compressor so yes mate driers do block up).

The other reason we replace driers every 2 years is when moister and refrigerant mixes it turns into an acidic acid and corrodes alluminiun, your air con system contains about 95% aluminium.

If the drier is more than 5 years old we also see the filter mesh inside the drier corrode, when this happens the desiccant beads in side the drier gets released into the system blocking the liquid line and tx valve. The only way is to replace the liquid line (in most cases a factory item) and tx valve.

So for the sake of saving $30 to $70 for a drier for most common vehicles is it worth the risk.

Real professional air con people get a bad deal from the general public, we get accused of ripping people off or we are to expensive because the guy down the road can do it for half the price because he does quarter the work.

I would sooner see the customer leave and go elsewhere because we are to expensive than lower our standard.

Believe me I am very very passionate about this subject.

Regards Richard