darcong

Hello all,

new to the forum, I have a 2006 Civic LX and the A/C was blowing nothing but hot air when kicked it on this year. I ordered a can of R134a with the gauge but the one i got was without the gauge. Me being impatient, used it anyways... So I did what the instructions said; turned it on "MAX A/C", plug into low side, and pump contents of can into the unit until the can is empty. it accepted most of it but not all. still nothing but hot air, so i started researching and found my clutch was not engaging. i don't know if it was engaging or not before i emptied the can of refrigerant into it or not. I know (now) that over pressurizing is just as bad as under pressurizing but not sure what to do now. I did check the clutch and it spins freely with no binding and it's obviously not frozen. Does this mean that my compressor is good and I need to check the clutch relay? never really had anything go bad on my civic before so repairs are kinda new to me on this car, any advice would be a big help. thx!

darcong

Come on... nobody has a clue?????

BlueEM2

iTrader: (1)

You need to check the pressure in the system before you do anything else now.Return the pressure to it's normal level them you can start troubleshooting. Do some research tons of people (myself) included have had similar problems. Is it working intermittently? Does the light come on in the dash telling you the AC is on?

darcong

GOOD NEWS
I went to Advanced Auto, Autozone, and NAPA and none of them had the ability to check my system pressure or a set of gauges to lend/rent BUT, i figured since my clutch spun freely, it must be either a pressure problem or electrical so i bought a cabin filter (needed one anyways) because i heard sometimes it reads the differential pressure and won't run if it is clogged, then when they didn't have gauges, i said i think it might be the relay under the hood, but none of the three stores i went to had it. The guy at NAPA did offer golden advice though, he said there should be more relays in that cluster that are the same and he was right, switched a good one in and magically my clutch engaged and I have ice cold A/C again! then the went to the NAPA 5 miles down the road and picked up a new relay to replace the other and now am good as gold. $7 sure beats thousands of dollars i thought this would all cost me. whew! dodged that bullet, hope this helps others. And the cabin filter swap was a breeze, it had been changed out by the dealer a couple years ago and I just figured it was something hard to get to... nope, just gotta open the glove box, pinch the hinge side to drop the glove box and BAM, you have acces to your filter, so easy a caveman can do it...lol

BlueEM2

iTrader: (1)

Relay is a common problem though. You still need to make sure your system isn't over pressurized.