My dad had the second major service on his Yeti yesterday.

The car is 2 years old with only 5000 miles on the clock.

The main dealer advised air conditioner 'refreshment' at a cost of £79.

He decided against it for now as it sounded pricey for something he didn't think he needed.

Is it an essential or is it another way of the dealer making money?

My Fabia and my wife's Citigo will be coming up to the second service soon and I guess they'll offer the same.

Any advice welcome.

Some think it is essentially, personally I have done lots of miles in cars with air con without bothering. No problems or bad smells resulted.

I wouldn’t waste money on it.

Can you not agree a cheaper service regime. I would not service a car twice for 5k miles. When on variable it needs a service at 2 years or 18k miles.

You could justify an intermediary oil change at worst!

That is expensive. There are a couple of places arround here that will do similar for around £50.

Whether it is worth it or not appears to be a personal matter, and one worthy of long popcorn moments. I suppose it depends on what you want to to do. I have my a/c on nearly all the time so that should help with keeping the fluid moving and the seals lubricated, but also realise that there will always be some slight leakage from the system, so in the past I have had mine serviced every 3 years, which has entailed the system purging, pressure testing and then refilling.

 

With the mileage you are doing I would be concerned about the oil degenerating due to never getting properly hot, so annual servicing seems correct.

Edited 17 January, 20188 yr by Llanigraham

When did you last top up the refridgerant in your fridge/freezer? It's a sealed system, if it leaks the new stuff will go the same way. Save your money. 

Edited 17 January, 20188 yr by ben4012

13 minutes ago, ben4012 said:

When did you last top up the refridgerant in your fridge/freezer? It's a sealed system, if it leaks the new stuff will go the same way. Save your money. 

In a fridge or freezer the compressor is sealed into the refrigerant circuit so no chance of leaky seals like in a car.
But saying that my last car a Fabia never had a top up or recharge in 11 years.

My Yeti is coming up to 3 years old and is going in for an MOT tomorrow, the garage phoned to remind me today and said it's due an A/C refresh charge, I told them no thanks.

If its smells ... unlikely is its used regularly, then check they have changed the pollen filter .... otherwise unless there is a problem, its a "nice little earner" .... £79 for a £3.50 air-con refresh/sanitiser spray and 10 mins labour.

Actually the aircon should be serviced every 2 years, first of all the system naturally loses the gas (its freon gas, which loses it's density, it loses it quicker if the aircon is not used.) secondly the system contains oil which is changed at the same time as the gas, as with engine oil changes, the air con oil should be changed to keep the rotating bearings on the compressor in good nick.

 

I do agree £70 is expensive, we charge £49 for our aircon service  which takes about an hour and a half to do.

 

I never turn mine off, and aircon is the best demister ever in winter.

 

Edited 17 January, 20188 yr by Ju1ian1001

3 minutes ago, Ju1ian1001 said:

as with engine oil changes, the air con oil should be changed to keep the rotating bearings on the compressor in good nick.

Engine oil is a totally different animal with all the contaminants from combustion and condensation etc.
Compressor oil is more like a gearbox oil, a system with none of those acidic contaminants.

1 hour ago, ben4012 said:

When did you last top up the refridgerant in your fridge/freezer? It's a sealed system, if it leaks the new stuff will go the same way. Save your money. 

 

Domestic fridges DO leak, especiaally if the pipes from the compressor crack with the vibration of the pump.

And the biggest difference is that a domestic system does not have rubber pipes with numerous connections, or a radiator that gets hit by road debris, or suffers the amount of vibration caused by roads and engine movement.

1 minute ago, Urrell said:

Engine oil is a totally different animal with all the contaminants from combustion and condensation etc.
Compressor oil is more like a gearbox oil, a system with none of those acidic contaminants.

 

Still worth changing, same with the gases, plus it's a must when doing an aircon service, the machines won't let you inject gas into the system unless you inject the pag oil as well.

 

7 minutes ago, Llanigraham said:

 

Domestic fridges DO leak, especiaally if the pipes from the compressor crack with the vibration of the pump.

And the biggest difference is that a domestic system does not have rubber pipes with numerous connections, or a radiator that gets hit by road debris, or suffers the amount of vibration caused by roads and engine movement.

A refridgeration engineer too! So any leak would remain, service or no? 

 

21 minutes ago, Ju1ian1001 said:

Actually the aircon should be serviced every 2 years, first of all the system naturally loses the gas (its freon gas, which loses it's density, it loses it quicker if the aircon is not used.) secondly the system contains oil which is changed at the same time as the gas, as with engine oil changes, the air con oil should be changed to keep the rotating bearings on the compressor in good nick.

 

I do agree £70 is expensive, we charge £49 for our aircon service  which takes about an hour and a half to do.

 

I never turn mine off, and aircon is the best demister ever in winter.

 

Do skoda change oil with regas? Genuinely interested in the volume thing, where does it go? A level physics says Boyle's law defines pressure/volume/temp. 

Most aircon service machines will change the aircon oil (not engine oil) at the same time as the gas, they recover both at the same time, then they normally hold a vacum on the system (we set ours for 20 minute hold, the longer the better) if the system dosen't hold the vacum then the aircon system has a leak and the machine will shut off and stop, if it does hold vacum then it will inject aset amount of oil and a set amount of gas back in. it never injects oil oil or gas back in, always fresh gas and fresh PAG oil.

 

The aircon machines are simply connect, set vacum time, how much oil to inject, how much gas to inject, press start (i'm not allowed to press start yet as i'm not signed off for aircon, will be soon) go do another job for an hour or so.

^ What's the minimum legal vacuum time?

 

43 minutes ago, Ju1ian1001 said:

 

Still worth changing, same with the gases, plus it's a must when doing an aircon service, the machines won't let you inject gas into the system unless you inject the pag oil as well.

 

How often do you change your gearbox oil?
Or is it just you have to recommend it because of your job?      

8 minutes ago, Wino said:

^ What's the minimum legal vacuum time?

 

AFAIK there isn't a minimum legal vac time (as i say i can connect it to the car and set it up but thats it, need to complete the aircon course or F gas as it's called and be signed off) our machines minimum vac time is 5 minutes but the longer the better as we have found you get more stable and lower tempretures the longer the vacum, i don't understand why but you do.

Just now, Urrell said:

How often do you change your gearbox oil?
Or is it just you have to recommend it because of your job?      

 As said the machine won't complete the cycle with out injecting fresh oil as it recover's the old oil when it recovers the old gas, so must inject fresh oil.

 

And i change my gearbox oil every 30-40k, makes a world of difference to the gearchange quality, gearbox oil does were out over time, 22 years in the motor trade has shown me that. I recomend and aircon service though dirct experiance, not my job.

50 minutes ago, ben4012 said:

A refridgeration engineer too! So any leak would remain, service or no? 

 

Do skoda change oil with regas? Genuinely interested in the volume thing, where does it go? A level physics says Boyle's law defines pressure/volume/temp. 

 

So personal experience of having a home fridge leak gas doesn't count then? And yes it was because the ppe between the compressor and radiator had cracked. Resulted in a new frodge being bought.

 

And funnily enough my last Yeti's a/c failed and they put an infra-red dye into the circuit, pressurised it and then could see where the leak was from, which was from one of the joints at the radiator.

 

 

1 minute ago, Llanigraham said:

 

So personal experience of having a home fridge leak gas doesn't count then? And yes it was because the ppe between the compressor and radiator had cracked. Resulted in a new frodge being bought.

 

And funnily enough my last Yeti's a/c failed and they put an infra-red dye into the circuit, pressurised it and then could see where the leak was from, which was from one of the joints at the radiator.

 

 

So on both systems, when they're working, they're working. As I said, any leak will remain; we've learned that the tools won't regas a compromised system. If AC is cold I can't see a reason to fiddle.  Though I accept there is an aspect of oil, I'll keep my £79. 

 

It was an ultraviolet dye, totally different wavelength. As always. 

I seem to remember @Tech1e saying a while back that adding dye is no longer legal?

(Can't remember why, but easy to imagine it's a cheap/lazy way to find a leak, using environmentally damaging refrigerant to push the dye out?).

 

Ah, hang on though, they may have pressurised it with something else temporarily?

Edited 17 January, 20188 yr by Wino

Rick,

you have paid for a car with air-con, so you should maintain and use it.

It will typically loose about 10% liquid and efficiency each year. As this is gradual you will probably not notice a drop in efficiency, but it will decline.

The best thing is to use it regularly, every day, summer and winter. Ideally leave it on all of the time as this will keep the oil/lubricant in the liquid pumped around and lubricating the seals, slowing down the drying out of the seals and leakage.

A two year service regime is best, three years OK. Shop around though as £50 should be nearer the mark.

 

Colin

2 hours ago, eribaMotters said:

Rick,

you have paid for a car with air-con, so you should maintain and use it.

It will typically loose about 10% liquid and efficiency each year. As this is gradual you will probably not notice a drop in efficiency, but it will decline.

The best thing is to use it regularly, every day, summer and winter. Ideally leave it on all of the time as this will keep the oil/lubricant in the liquid pumped around and lubricating the seals, slowing down the drying out of the seals and leakage.

A two year service regime is best, three years OK. Shop around though as £50 should be nearer the mark.

 

Colin

well said that man

 

Since I have had Yeti, I have managed to get Brake fluid change and Aircon checks done as a freebie.

I cannot remember the details but watch for the dealers e-mail offers.

I KNOW a service manager at a merc dealership.

 

Aircon "refresh" falls into the same category as "Forton oil treatment".

And is a complete cash-cow for dealers with ZERO actual benefit to the customer.

 

Avoid it at all costs.