Hi,my car is at the dealers for its 5 year old service.They just phoned me to say the air con needs regassing and cleaned for £69.Does this seem a good price ?

thanks

Hi,my car is at the dealers for its 5 year old service.They just phoned me to say the air con needs regassing and cleaned for £69.Does this seem a good price ?

thanks

my octavia was done for the same price last week. pretty much a standard price. empty old stuff, vacuum the system and hold at that for about 20 minutes to check for leaks, regas, deodorise and hey bobs your uncle

Nice smelling car and a cold one

I bet its a top up for that and not a regas.

Ask.

Has to be a complete regas mate...you can't just top up aircon gas (which is called R134a).

They will evacuate system, vacuum it then refill completely! ;-)

Hope that helps!

Doesn't seem to bad some places charge £90-£100!!!

you can't just top up aircon gas

What is this for then?

I'm not advocating that we go and start servicing our own air con systems, but this is surely only a 'top up' option...

The halfords part could result in permanent damage to your aircon system, anything that measures aircon gas by pressure in the system is the same. Aircon gas is messured by weight when filling a system from empty, to much in the system can cause more damage than none at all. When I had a leak fixed on a previous car, the cylinder containing the gas was weighed on precesion scales and the operator watched the scales and stopped when the weight of the cylinder had gone down by the appropriate value for the car.

thanks for the help,just been to collect it,only thing i noticed when i got it was the smell.!!

The halfords part could result in permanent damage to your aircon system, anything that measures aircon gas by pressure in the system is the same. Aircon gas is messured by weight when filling a system from empty, to much in the system can cause more damage than none at all. When I had a leak fixed on a previous car, the cylinder containing the gas was weighed on precesion scales and the operator watched the scales and stopped when the weight of the cylinder had gone down by the appropriate value for the car.

Bang on!....professional AC equipment will not let you top up! 100kg of R134a and 1kg of R134a will read the EXACTLY the same pressure in the same container! Its all on weight! (checking running pressure - your compressor efficiency - is different)!

This dates back from the R12 to R134a changeover...mixing them causes explosions lol!

There is a lot of legislation around AC system and charging / filling (especially now there is a new refrigerant coming) in...but trust halfords to sell cr4p to people who can harm themselves and others with no pre-requisite of education!

£70 for a regas, filter change and efficiency check is good! If you think a carbon element pollen filter is £20 rpp and a 5kg tank of R134a is a few hundred ££

I wasn't advocating the use of self-top up kits, but questioning whether the "can't top up" statement could have been misleading especially as you hear stories of companies not emptying the system, cleaning it and then re-gassing it properly.

Just ring around all the 'chain' garages that guarantee the lowest prices - play them against each other until you get the price you want.

Edited 27 April, 201214 yr by atomic

I dont think Halfords would open themselves up to potential law suits for selling a product that at best, wont work, at worse can explode and cause a major catastrophe. In addition, the product they sell is widely available anyway so to point the finger at them is a litle unfair! I have seen proper garages use this stuff just to offer a top up so it must work at least some, if done properly. It will never acheive the results of a proper drain and seal check, followed up with a re-gass, though!

Skoda quote a price when done in conjunction with a service, so you only have to take the car in once and they will do the job properly or you will be back to get them to do it again or refund your cash!

If you own an older car and do or get the servicing done elsewhere, Kwik-fit do re-gasing for £50 and offer a refund if the car does not get cooler by a certain amount!

Do kwik fit empy, check and refill the system or is it literally just a top-up?

Phil

Sorry KB, weren't saying you were mate! :-)

No automotive professional should be using this equipment if they properly understand how an AC system works!

If you as a customer own an older vehicle with R12 and top up with R134a...it explodes when heated! In a Dealership you will have to be certified to work on an air conditioning system so as to understand the legal, environmental and safety implications involved!

But as I said before, topping up a system when you dont know how much is already in it is dangerous....would you put a litre of oil in your engine without checking the dipstick?

AC gas pressure does not change with quantity in the system, so 100 grams in an AC system will read the same on a pressure gauge as 10kg in the same AC system!

Thats why this tool is probably sold as "get out of jail free card" for your AC and advises you to visit an approved AC specialist sooner rather than later!

As for Kwik Fit, with the custom they have I hope they are doing it correctly and evacuating, vacuuming and refilling the system with the correct weight of refrigerant! If you aren't sure just ask them.

I know Skoda retailers will be as it is a franchise standard to use only an VWG approved AC service stations and NONE of those stations can simply top up! This is because there is no pressure difference between the vehicle system and the AC service station to "push" the refrigerant from one to the other, which is why it is vacuumed out of the vehicle, the vehicle AC system is placed under vacuum - so the refrigerant is then drawn back in.

I imagine the Halfords can has 2 pressure chambers, top chamber you connect to the filling pipe which holds a certain amount of R134a and the lower chamber is just full of "air" that is a higher pressure than the holding pressure of the R134a in the chamber above (R134a rests at 5 bar), so it is pushed in!

Sorry, a bit in depth! lol

On the original comment, £69 looks pretty good value, other cars I have owned had be more than this for the same work.

Kwii fit quoting £49

ATS Euromaster £45

Had the previous furby recharged at ATS and other than being slow all seemed fine.

Kwik-fit state that it empties, checks and re-gasses, so it is a full job. As the other chap (bonnevillevrs) who stated that the people who do the job professionally should be certified, in theory, they SHOULD be just as good as anyone else at doing the job but I know from previous experiences and discussions that the reputation of said tyre chain is less then it should be... That said, they have been in business manymany years and repair, re-tyre and re-gas a large volume of vehicles every year and simply, by law of averages, will always have some unhappy customers and unhappy customers ARE ALWAYS the first to express an opinion!

Hi,my car is at the dealers for its 5 year old service.They just phoned me to say the air con needs regassing and cleaned for £69.Does this seem a good price ?

thanks

Hi,

Is air con recharge an as and when it needs it or should it be done after a period of time.

Mine hasn't been touched in 4 1/2 years

Hi,

Is air con recharge an as and when it needs it or should it be done after a period of time.

Mine hasn't been touched in 4 1/2 years

Recharged my old furby after 5ish years, probably could have done with it sooner!

For me it seems to vary from car to car. I know friends with a 6 year old car that is still running fine but my old octy needed it about every 2 years!

As I understand it, if you don't use the air con for a protracted period the seals dry up and the gas can escape. Sure I read somewhere to run it regularly over the winter.

Anyone recovering or replenishing Freon has to be Fgas certified....like me

Its an EU regulation, its only enforced by not allowing the sale of R134A freon to non cert holders although I doubt its rigidly enforced.

Any half decent recovery rig is fully automatic and flushing isnt needed unless you had a problem. All freon systems leak a little bit over time. Freon gas particles are tiny little critters and over time find an escape route. There is a legal leak maximum but I forget what it is. After a few years your car is bound to benefit from a replenishment.

I dont do cars, I do planes but the process and tooling is identical....benefit is I do my car as well for free

BTW top up kits seem to avoid the regs somehow, not all of them are R134A and you have no idea how much your putting in. If you have an issue its always better to get to a reputable air con servicer. Only way to get accurate replenishment is suck the whole lot out and put in the right amount with perhaps additional measured oil quantity depending on how much comes out with the Freon

On a car its about 30 mins to fully suck it down and 5 mins to replenish.

Yes its a god idea to run the system periodically to keep the compressor seals moist. No real need on the newer Fabia i think as the compressor is always engaged. It bypasses compression when not engaged but i think still passes some freon through to keep things moist. Not sure to be honest

Its been illegal to replenish with R12 for quite some time now. Shame as it works a lot better than R134A. Its on the EU naughty list as a destroyer of Ozone

I try to remember to run the ac for a few minutes every couple of months during autumn/winter/spring.

Only had car for just over a year but doesn't seem as cold as my horrible old 406&407 pug diesels.

Skoda quote every two years, I think, along with most manufacturers. Sooner would be a waste, longer and it will not be as effective!

Same for brake fluid...

Edited 29 April, 201214 yr by mrgf

Midland VW are doing it for £49.50 at the moment - a summer special (if we get one...)

From what I read on this forum, they have a better reputation than other companies already mentioned with low prices...

Am booking mine in for some new suspension springs and geometry realignment (needed realigning anyway) this month so thought I'd take them up on their offer whilst its there.

Will let you know how it goes in case anyone is in the Midlands area.

Anyone recovering or replenishing Freon has to be Fgas certified....like me

Its an EU regulation, its only enforced by not allowing the sale of R134A freon to non cert holders although I doubt its rigidly enforced.

Any half decent recovery rig is fully automatic and flushing isnt needed unless you had a problem. All freon systems leak a little bit over time. Freon gas particles are tiny little critters and over time find an escape route. There is a legal leak maximum but I forget what it is. After a few years your car is bound to benefit from a replenishment.

I dont do cars, I do planes but the process and tooling is identical....benefit is I do my car as well for free

BTW top up kits seem to avoid the regs somehow, not all of them are R134A and you have no idea how much your putting in. If you have an issue its always better to get to a reputable air con servicer. Only way to get accurate replenishment is suck the whole lot out and put in the right amount with perhaps additional measured oil quantity depending on how much comes out with the Freon

On a car its about 30 mins to fully suck it down and 5 mins to replenish.

Yes its a god idea to run the system periodically to keep the compressor seals moist. No real need on the newer Fabia i think as the compressor is always engaged. It bypasses compression when not engaged but i think still passes some freon through to keep things moist. Not sure to be honest

Its been illegal to replenish with R12 for quite some time now. Shame as it works a lot better than R134A. Its on the EU naughty list as a destroyer of Ozone

Kind of off-topic. But is the UK and EU allowing hydrocarbon refrigerants in cars?

If its still blowing as cold as always its pointless. I had the Bora done after 6 years and there was a slight difference in the temp.