Hey Scotty!
Man, I wish I’d have discovered your channel just a tiny bit earlier! I’d have driven my car down to you when you were in Texas to check out instead of getting the run around from some shops up here. Thanks for making car repair less intimidating for us all! My dilemma is this:
I have a 2004 Ford Explorer with 116,000 miles on it, automatic 4wd 4.0 V6. Great deal too, so I want to drive it as long as I can. In the last number of months I discovered that it didn’t blow cold anymore. I took it to two different shops in town, and each shop gave me a different fix.
- Shop #1: Remove and replace A/C hose and recharge refrigerant. Total: $703.
- Shop #2: Replace compressor, accumulator, and orifice tube. Then recharge refrigerant. Total: $1300+
I got the system recharged by Shop #2 and left with no more work done, and it blows cold now. My question is do you think it needs anything else done? If two shops looked at the same system and found different things, are they just trying to pick my pockets? And if I do need to replace my compressor (which with your help on YouTube I have confidence I can do), how do I know which one to buy? The OEM one costs about as much as one of my kidneys, after all. You know better than I do how hot these Texas days can get so any help or assistance would be appreciated. Thanks a ton!
Matt
On a 17-year-old vehicle it's not unusual for the system to need recharging. They all leak a tiny bit around the compressor shaft seal in order to keep it lubricated. It's the first thing to check on an old vehicle where the AC isn't working well any more.
If the AC system is working OK now and the compressor is not making any noise and not leaking badly there is no need to replace it. When the time comes an aftermarket new compressor can work OK. (I've had good luck with UAC brand.) The thing is to see if the system holds the refrigerant over time or whether there is a leak somewhere that needs to be repaired.
It does sound like either the shops you went to misdiagnosed the problem or were trying to take you for an expensive ride. It's possible the first shop used a leak detector and found a problem with the hose they wanted to replace but the price seems excessive for a hose plus recharge.
That does sound a bit odd. What you can do, is get a pair of those yellow eyeglasses and a UV light out of the leak dye kits and look around inside the engine compartment. As Chuck Tobias said, if the first shop did indeed find a hose that's leaking with leak dye, you will also see it with those glasses and the light. The AC system only has a couple rubber hoses, most of the conduit in an A/C system is metal, not rubber. If you don't find dye, you can get a refrigerant sniffer at Harbor Freight and check around the engine bay for leaks, and in the vents in the dashboard. If you don't get any hits, you'll know they were probably trying to take you for a ride. If the compressor doesn't clunk, make grinding noises, etc. then the compressor is fine and probably doesn't need replaced -my 1999 Ranger has 269,000 miles on it and is still running on the original compressor after I replaced several pieces of the system myself and recharged it last year. It's still blowing freezing cold.
well you have a leak. So which shop is right?
It seems that shop #1 determined that a hose fitting was leaking.
It seems shop #2 determined a compressor seal is leaking.
Your AC works when properly charged.
Refrigerant doesn't disappear. It escapes through a leak somewhere in the system.
Your mission, if you choose to accept it, is to find where it's leaking from.
Ideally, one of those shops put some UV dye in the system and you should be able to use a cheap UV light to see where the leak is.
But if they didn't, you can. But you don't want to mess with it now.
Wait until the you notice the system isn't blowing as cold as it does now.
Maybe get a thermometer and stick it in the vent and leave it there.
When you notice it's blowing around 10 degrees warmer than it does now, get yourself a small can of R134a with UV dye.
They sell 1.7 ounce cans, buy one of those and use one of those AC recharge kits to add it to the system.
This way, you aren't risking dangerously overcharging the system with a 12 ounce can. If your Explorer has just the front A/C option it holds 38 ounces of R134a. If it has front and rear a/c it holds 56 ounces. So, adding that 1.7 ounces won't dangerously overcharge it especially when you already know that the issue is a leak and it it starts blowing warmer.
The other way is to buy a Halogen Leak Detector. I'm not an A/C guy but I work on them occasionally so I bought the Elitech WJL-6000S Refrigerant Halogen Leak Detector from Amazon. (about $28).
I wasn't expecting much when I bought it. Afterall, 28 bucks. A good leak detector costs over $500 but like I said, I ain't a professional A/C guy and I figured, what do I have to lose, 28 bucks? I'll give it a try.
So with these you just hold the wand (closely) over different areas and components of the A/C system. (hoses, compressor fittings and seal areas, condenser, hose fittings.....).
When it detects a leak it starts rapidly beeping. Now this is certainly no $600 detector. It's not nearly as sensitive.
But in my case, when I can't find any UV dye leaking out of a system, I use it to probe areas I can't see.
In a couple of cases I've crawled under the vehicle and stuck it at the evaporator drain and the thing started chirping rapidly. So even though I couldn't see the UV dye in the evaporator housing, it told me there was a leak in the evaporator.
And that's all I needed to know. I have to say, for $28 I was impressed with how well it worked
I've read in other places that Elitech detector works really well for the money. I have a Matco "Leak Seeker" detector inherited from my late AC technician friend who I learned from, but it's pretty old (so old it's made in USA) and it's started flaking out, parts no longer available from Matco. I'll give one of these a try and see how it works out. Hard to go wrong for the price if it works at all. I've used that AC Pro dye can as well. A bit expensive for what it is but it's just about the easiest way to inject dye into the AC system.
Hi Chuck. Yeah, it's pretty impressive for the money (I spend more than that for a bottle of Absolut)
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It certainly isn't comparable to the quality of your Matco leak detector
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I think it's a good tool to use in combination with UV dye and especially for "sniffing" the evaporator housing drain
Wow all this is great info. Thanks guys! I don't hear it making any racket, but I will still monitor the temp output and proceed with the cheap UV light idea. Shop #2 told me they did put dye in the system so that'll definitely get me on the right path.
Jack, I wish I could get that Matco working again but like I said it's an old model (AC750) and Matco no longer has any parts or support for it. The detector just breaks into uncontrollable squealing most of the time now. I installed a spare ion pump tip it came with but no difference. Of course that one might be bad too but new tips are no longer available. (Used detectors this model do come up for sale on places like ebay but I figure they're likely to have or soon develop the same problems this one has.) Not being a pro I cannot justify the expense of a pro-level detector. I just work on my own AC systems and occasionally help friends or family out.
So I'll see how the Elitech works out. As you say, it's less expensive than many favorite beverages so not a huge gamble to take. 🙂
Elchillerino, yeah, if there is dye in the system definitely pick up an inexpensive UV light and poke around for leaks, especially around the hose that shop wanted to replace.