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Air Conditioning Repair My DeLorean has been plagued with some minor air conditioning system leak for three summers now. After having no success relying on local shops to locate my leak (and paying ridiculous prices for R-12 all along the way), I'm now taking matters into my own hands. I got my EPA Section 609 certification with an investment of $20 and one hour of time (while also watching a movie - tough test...) at epatest.com. Then I bought the necessary equipment for A/C work: 
I bought this used R-12 refrigerant recovery/recharging machine from a Land Rover shop and after cleaning off some dust, it looked like new! This thing was a top-of-the-line machine back in the day and it will reclaim/recycle the R-12 from the car, vacuum the system, hold the vacuum and test for leak-down, then charge it back up; all with the press of a button. For those who may own this machine, I've compiled a page for Snap-On ACT-3120 maintenance items that will save you a bundle. 
The business end of the recharging station. 
I picked up this ACT-5500 R-12 sniffer on Ebay. It's not terribly useful for pin-pointing leaks on the car, but it is useful for checking the service ports' schrader valves for leaks, checking for leaks around hose connections and lines on the recycling machine, and sticking the sensor into places like the evaporator housing where you can't (easily) perform a visual check for dye. 
Once again the rule "Don't waste your money on crappy tools" holds true. The cheap and crappy pen-style UV light that I got from the auto parts store would barely illuminate dye even from a distance of only a couple of inches. So I got a real leak detection kit that's actually useful: a Blue-Point ACTUVKITA. This one works quite well and can make dye glow brightly from quite a distance. The UV lamp gets its power from the battery post in the engine compartment, but while its 8' of cord is overkill for most other cars, it doesn't cut it for the DeLorean, where the A/C system runs the entire length of the car. I crafted an extension for the lamp's wiring to solve the problem. Now that the gear has been procured... 
After servicing the machine, it's time to recycle the remaining refrigerant, evacuate the system, then recharge it. 
R-12 being reclaimed from the DeLorean. 
And after a thorough vacuuming, 2.25 pounds of R-12 goes back in. While testing my car, I discovered that the system pressures were off; the low side was too high and the high side was too low. The compressor seems weak and after examining the system with the UV light, the compressor appears to have a leak anyway. There's also a leak in the relatively-new condenser! Since fall is setting in around here, I'll be reclaiming the R-12 from the car and replacing the necessary A/C parts this winter. To be continued next spring... Next SpringI had replaced the weak compressor during the tune up and then the new condenser went on without a hitch. While I had the main hoses disconnected, I ran some flushing agent through them and cleared it with shop air. The good news is that there wasn't any "black death" in the lines, so we're in good shape. |
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