A/C R134 retrofit from prev. R12 = poor performance..any ideas?

[David.Ullrich at ferguson.com]

What all did he do for the retrofit? What was replaced? What are your vent temps? There are quick/cheap retrofits and long expensive ones. I had my CGT done against the advise of the list (I naively believed my mechanic rather than the list) and it was a nightmare. It took over 3 months to get straightened out. At first, the best vent temps I could get were in the 70s on an 85 degree day. Totally unacceptable and I told him so. I told him the vent temps had to be below 50 on an 85 degree day before I would be happy. His guy fought with the system for ever. He blamed everything under the sun as the cause. After doing tons of work and having my car in his shop for 2.5 months he only had vent temps of 63-65 degrees. Finally, I sat him down and forced him to read the TSB on retrofitting (I had given it to him weeks earlier, he never bothered to read it). There was one part that Audi says has to be replaced that he didn't do: the expansion valve! As soon as the expansion valve was replaced, my vent temps dropped to 47 degrees on an 89 degree day with high humidity. If your guy didn't change out the expansion valve (or orifice tube) have him do that.

Dave

Too Many Toys:
2002 VW Jetta GLS 1.8T Tiptronic
1993 RX-7 R1
1987.5 Audi Coupe GT "Special Build" 2.3 - Anthracite Black
1985 Chevy Impala Interceptor
Former:
1981 Audi 4000 5+5
1982 Audi Coupe
1988 Audi 90 Quattro
1998 VW Passat GLS 1.8T



-----Original Message-----
From: JordanVw at aol.com [mailto:JordanVw at aol.com]
Sent: Tuesday, June 25, 2002 9:09 AM
To: quattro at audifans.com
Subject: A/C R134 retrofit from prev. R12 = poor performance..any ideas?


--
[ Picked text/plain from multipart/alternative ]

i had R12 in my a/c system up until a few weeks ago, then it stopped blowing
cold. so i was advised to retrofit my '86 5kT to R134. Now, with the R134
retrofit, the performance sucks.  its not even enough to cool the car.  with
the R12 it was nice and cold, now it's not.     mechanic says that's all i
can expect from a retrofit.  is this true??
 any ideas?
TIA
chris
'86 5kT w/ lousy a/c