How To Find Out If There’s Refrigerant In My A/C Compressor
Posted in Air Conditioning | Asked on Jan 21, 2012
Below is the question about How To Find Out If There’s Refrigerant In My A/C Compressor, I have a 2000 Honda Civic LX and my A/C stopped working three years ago. I want to get it fixed because I moved to South Florida and its hot. I know my clutch coil is shorting the condenser fan fuse and my clutch pulley doesn’tt rotate (my armature plate does however). So I need to replace the clutch and the coilat leastt. I may also have to replace the compressor is there is no refrigerant in the system because that would meanthere’ss a leak and possibility of contamination. The Honda Dealership said it looked like my clutch seized which made my ac clutch belt snap, I want to make sure the compressor is good before I go through the trouble of replacing the Clutch and coil.
How do I check if the A/C compressor needs to be changed? I will be doing the repairs myself.
There are 4 Answers for "How To Find Out If There’s Refrigerant In My A/C Compressor"
Good Luck.
The most cost effective way to service your air conditioning is to let a pro do the work for you.
A pro will find and fix the leak first. You wouldn’t have a problem with your A/C if you didn’t have a leak.
There are a lot of special tools required and specific training that will be worth the money.
With the new refrigerant r134a there is little room for a learning curve and no substitute for training on this system.
Take your car in and have the job done right the first time.
By attempting to perform this work on your own you risk costing yourself a lot more and getting a less than professional job due to lack of proper tools and training.
There are three areas of the car where I farm out the work – the exhaust (because pros are much faster than I am, are cheap and I don’t weld anyway), automatic transmissions (beyond my expertise) and air conditioning refrigerant systems (because it is not possible to properly do anything that involves refrigerant at home).
You can do the clutch yourself, though. The bearing has seized but the compressor has not, based on your description. It is a good bet the A/C was nominally working when the bearing seized, and since the pulley couldn’t rotate there was nothing to kill the compressor. One point about the clutch, though – there are usually shims on the shaft that set the clutch gap. It will be more reliable if you get the gap right. It should be pretty close anyway. Once you get the clutch replaced a standard service (about $100 and worth every penny) should get you riding in comfort again.
You have asked a very complex question. I will try to answer it as thoroughly and informatively as I can. Your Civic was equipped with either a Sanden TRS 090 compressor, or a Nippondenso 10pa15c compressor. One thing you said in your question, is shortening my answer considerably. You say your pulley will not turn. THAT is a bearing failure. You are not going to be able to remove the pulley from the from the bearing shaft after the bearing has failed to the point of seizing. I can also assure you that there is NO refrigerant left in your system. When the bearing failed, it got extremely hot… so hot in fact that the bearing shaft swelled enough to prevent the bearing from ever coming off that shaft without destroying it. That intense heat also cooked away the shaft seal inside the bearing shaft that seals the center shaft which turns the compressor. Re-manufacturing a compressor that has suffered a bearing failure, is not really even worth it, due to the damage from all the heat. Your coil is also partially melted to the inside of your pulley. Those coils are filled with epoxy to protect the winding’s, so when the bearing failed, your coil turned to crispy toast.
I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news, however I am quite sure from whence I speak. After further digging for info on your car, my information is telling me you have a Sanden Compressor, which is what you will need to replace yours with. The two different kinds used that year for Honda Civics will not interchange. In fact… here is a link to a picture of the very type and model compressor you will need to acquire. http://www.discountacparts.com/viewpictu…
You can expect to spend about $200 on a re-manufactured compressor such as the one in the pic .
The compressor you have still has some value to someone like myself, who re-manufactures them. Otherwise it’s a door stop, or a boat anchor. Good luck Man