Help! AC went out & I'm in Texas!
 

Ok, so a Friday night a number of us went out to have some fun. My buddy with his SE-R with an SR20DET and no radio asks if he and I can swap cars, so needless to say, I said sure! Later on that evening he pulls up next to me and tells me that the radio has completely turned off and he can't get it back on. We pulled off and found out that it was just a fuse. Why it happened in the first place I don't know.

The next day, our group had a dyno day and it was hotter than a mug. While leaving I naturally decided to turn on my AC and it NEVER blew out cold air.

Yesterday (sunday) I had a free moment and checked both fuses for the AC and both looked fine. I pulled out the relay, but wouldn't know if it was bad or not. My question is what could be wrong and how can I fix it or check it.

thanks in advance.

BlueBOB

can you even hear the compressor turn on?

Turn on the AC and see if you hear the clutch on the compressor kick in. The rpms should also raise slightly ~200 rpms or so at idle. To check the relay swap one that is the same amperage (same color) that isn't necessary to run the car. If the relay is blue you can borrow one from the drivers side fuse box for the power locks/windows. If the relay, fuses, and compressor all check out my next guess would be freon. I had my car in the shop once and one day the AC worked fine, the next it didn't work at all. They recharged my freon with no charge, and everything has been great for a year.
-hype

ok....

when it used to work, at idle, when I turned the AC on the rpms would actually drop a bit. I thought this always seemed a bit odd, but didn't think about it. Now it does nothing, so I have a pretty good feeling the compressor is not even coming on. Thomas should be bringing me a relay tonight, but if it's not the same color, I'll try the power window one.

jump the relay. take it out and stick a wire to both terminals to see if it will click on. if it does then your relay is bad.

or maybe you should get one of these:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...tem=2420574837

:laugh:

Thanks Thomas. I know I can ALWAYS count on you for good sound advice! ;)

I am shooting out to a friends house (t56gen3 on the ORG) to see if we can figure this crap out. I swear it gets hotter and hotter each day.... it's killing me... :(

Re: Help! AC went out & I'm in Texas!
 

i know exactly what your problem is: You live in Texas. Move, and everything will be better. The only thing that sucks is that everything is smaller outside of texas, and you won't have the benfits of saying," Don't mess with Texas".....but other than that it'll be just fine.

heh ouch. I live in houston.. it was 103-110 today... good luck

Yeah mine is out too. I live in DC and its gonna be 100 tomorrow Im scared. I never even thought about checking the fuse... Which fuse is it? I hope to god that is it.

How can you hear if the compressor comes on or not?

my ac sometimes run sometimes it doesn't. i can hear it turn on but the fan won't blow. and if i step on the gas hard, it will work. any reason to this?

thanks

AC compressor clicks when It goes on...just turn off the radio and leave the window down and you'll hear if It clicks on or not

the maxima uses freon?

R134A same thing
-hype

Thanks for the uplifting comment.. ;)

R134A is similar to Freon but it's different but safer. Some argue it's better than R12 and some would argue that R12 is better... at this point I could care less.... I just need my AC for this focking triple digit weather. Thank god it rained today... 80s.

We replaced the relay with a new one and it didn't change anything so i put my old one back in.

I feel your pain man, I have to survive in this weather everyday. Good luck!

Ouch man, sorry to hear about your a/c going out. Also living in Texas, I know exactly how hard it can be just for ONE day without the luxury of a cooled car. Luckily for me, my a/c went out in early May before it got terribly hot (Dallas area) and I was able to do the simple recharge that it needed.

Hope all goes well... :)

My AC stopped working yesterday. Today I went to Pepboys, bought a kit that includes a can of refrigerant, a hose and a system pressure gauge for $25. I hooked up the gauge and it said the system pressure was low. I charged up the system with the refrigerant and it's now back to normal.

I'd be surprised if you weren't just low on refrigerant.

can you tell me more about that $25 package? Was it specific for a maxima? How long did it take to recharge? What symptoms did your car have before you did it......Just blowing warm air?

just turn the windows down heheh

Obviously, you've never made a trip to Texas. :p

It was a can of R134a with a hose for connecting to the low pressure valve of the AC system. There was a valve for connecting to the can. A gauge was also included that you can connect to the hose instead of the can of refrigerant for checking system pressure.

Symptom was AC suddenly just blowing warm air. Once the refrigerant pressure gets low enough the pressure switch prevents the compressor from operating, so one day the AC works, the next day it doesn't.

you can get it at any autoparts store. It's a r-134a recharge kit. After you're done with the can, and you need to recharge it down the line, you can just buy individual cans of r134.

sorry man, but i have no sympathy for you texans. I drive in a truck that has no AC, and i'm in bumper-to-bumper traffic all day, so there's no breeze going through either.

At least down south all you get is the heat. We get the heat and humidity and the snow.

Oh, we get the humidity all right. Don't forget we have the Gulf of Mexico to pump hot, humid air into the state. People up in Dallas have it better in that regard since they're far enough north they get mostly just the heat. But it can get pretty brutal even without the humidity.