How long can aircon work?

jensked

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Mar 31, 2005
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Hey there, hi there

I just got back from a fantastic holiday in the south of France. We had to drive 950 km (took us no more than 10 hours, which is quite fast). Luckily I have (manual) aircon in my 2006 Toyota Corolla wagon.

But I nearly got a heart attack when we had been driving for about 5 hours (aircon had been working for nearly 4 hours on like 50%) and the aircon looked like it didn't work properly anymore. It just didn't give enough cold air and when I set it on 100%, it made a weird noise.

Then, after it had "cooled down" for about 20 minutes, it started working properly again. And we had that a couple of times.

Is that normal for a "cheaper" car? Does the aircon need a rest sometimes or is there something wrong with my aircon...

Someone I know said it's the same in his Fiat Ducato, but then again, that's a Fiat.

Any experiences? :|
 
Is that normal for a "cheaper" car? Does the aircon need a rest sometimes or is there something wrong with my aircon...


AFAIK this is not normal for any car. Either your aircon is srsly fucked or it hasnt been maintained properly. You did get them to check your aircon before leaving?

My dad's Audi 100 did several trips to the south of france that felt like 12hrs, with the aircon on at full tilt (was 36?C outside) and we always arrived there with it still being 21? in the car
 
Perhaps it froze up.
 
Yeah, having the core freeze up sounds plausible. Manual climate control systems tend to do that a lot more readily than automatic types.

Either way, someone needs to look at the car.
 
I once had a car that did exactly what you described, except that instead of just making a weird noise, it started wheezing and spitting out small chunks of ice (sort of like crushed ice in a drink). Like the people above, I would think that your evaporator is icing up like mine as, but the fan isn't stong enough to spit small bits of ice out at you. I never got around to investigating how, why or actually fixing it.
 
Well, the cause of the freezing might be something as simple as drain tubes being partially plugged, not allowing enough condensate to run out.
 
I once had a car that did exactly what you described, except that instead of just making a weird noise, it started wheezing and spitting out small chunks of ice (sort of like crushed ice in a drink). Like the people above, I would think that your evaporator is icing up like mine as, but the fan isn't stong enough to spit small bits of ice out at you. I never got around to investigating how, why or actually fixing it.

That sounds like the same problem, the fan sounds like it chokes.

Thanks everybody. That's definitely worth a trip to the dealer to complain :mrgreen:
 
I hadn't refilled my aircon since i bought the car, which was more than 2 years ago, but it looks like i'll have to do it now, it's not cooling as vigorously as i'd hope. Other than that, no problems. The car's 11 years old.
 
No its not normal. All our cars aircon will work on a 40c day all day without faulter, my old 1988 laser's aircon will work without stoppage as well.

Yes, but it's not the heat that's the problem it's the humidity. If it's that hot then you're likely somewhere with low humidity.

Generally air con units will pick up a little ice, if you pull over you'll notice the car dripping underneath as it melts again and falls out of the engine bay.

If it were me i'd not be too worried about long term damage if it's done it once. If it's a repeat problem then you may want to get it looked at.
 
we had a commodore that had that issue, except that instead of draining under the car it dripped ice cold water on your legs.
 
we had a commodore that had that issue, except that instead of draining under the car it dripped ice cold water on your legs.
Plugged drain hole(s).
 
Did you have the vent controls set to recirculate, instead of drawing air from the outside? I had a similar problem with one my cars.
 
how often do you need to refill your aricon and at what cost ?

You should never have to refill it. It is by theory a sealed system, so if you have to refill it, you've got a leak somewhere that needs fixed.

One thing to keep in mind, those aircon refill bottles at stores are not a good buy, it's not really safe to refill or top off your system yourself because the little plastic nozzles and gauges on those bottles are not a good substitute for real aircon equipment and you can end up doing more harm than good.
 
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