I have a 2010 TDI elegance and have had the air con re-gassed as it was more chilly than the usual ice cold...... made zero difference ? Given the car is 10 years old could anything else be a problem other than the gas side of things, can a system be simply be '' worn out '' over time. I have had it done in the past by this garage and it has been what i would expect where my face can develop frost bite is left on too long, not so now..........

Read through a few threads about Skoda air conditioning being particularly poor versus previous cars, but just depends on the life it's had.

 

Your air conditioning failing prematurely does sound like a leak. Ideally air conditioning needs to be on all the time. People switch it off to improve fuel consumption, but in effect you run the risk of drying out the system's seals. Add in the vibration of the car, heat from the engine and wear and tear so anything is possible. If you know someone with VCDS, then that could help pinpoint any system errors if the car is scanned. The compressor could be on its way out, the condenser, etc.

 

I bought a 15 plate VW Polo 1.4 TDI last year after parting company with my Skoda at 100k miles. Luckily the new car came with a Das WeltAuto warranty. The car was fine until the summer, and regardless of the setting on the climate control it wasn't cold enough. It flagged up a couple of electrical errors when I scanned it, so I managed to claim on the warranty, which incidentally isn't straight forward. I had errors for refrigerant pressure being too low and electrical ground for compressor fault. Typical main dealer approach is they have to scan the car which is fair enough at £140, but if the fault isn't covered by warranty you pick up the tab, otherwise it's free of charge.

 

If you're mechanically minded there's a few YouTube videos for recharging the system, Halfords sell bits and pieces. Looks straight-forward. STP also sell a leak kit, but suspect that's a short term fix. I suppose you need to weigh up how long you plan to keep the car, and if you're in for the long haul get it fixed properly. That means checking refrigerant level, pressure testing, changing seals, etc.

 

 

Edited 8 April, 20206 yr by spartacus68

49 minutes ago, spartacus68 said:

 Ideally air conditioning needs to be on all the time. People switch it off to improve fuel consumption, but in effect you run the risk of drying out the system's seals. Add in the vibration of the car, heat from the engine and wear and tear so anything is possible.

 

That has not been true for over 15 years of VAG group systems since they moved away from the electromagnetic clutch compressors to the Sanden type clutchless ones, the compressor is rotating all the time and if Climatronic switched on will be running the aircon all the time at various duty cycles, if turned off or a manual system switched to aircon off the refrigerant will be recirculated by the compressor.

 

Dried out seals are a thing of the past and were a bit of an urban legend in any case.

 

Hudson. sounds like they did not add any refrigerant, maybe they had run out, maybe they didnt vacuum down the system and simply tried topping up, in which case they may have needed to warm their cylinder to get it to gas off enough to add more refrigerant to your system.

 

I topped up mine today and could not get the full charge in, had I vacuumed down I could have done.

 

If you have a VCDS scan done then you can note the high side pressure which will be dependant on ambient temperature and compare it to what it should be, if too low then they didn't refill or top it up properly.

Edited 8 April, 20206 yr by J.R.

unless it has a leak which exits pretty quickly after a recharge.

 

Unfortunately the standard vac systems used at the likes of kwik fit and apply a vacum often dont show leaks, its needs pressurising with nitrogen and a dye adding.

 

Incidently if you use kwik fit and it does not work, there is no charge.

That is what I'm kind of hoping when things get back to normal, ie  KwikFit will vac out my wife's 2015 and refill with R134A and then I can maybe keep an eye on it or try to locate any leaks, I sort of trusted the AC system on this Polo to hold onto its R134A - ie I ignored checking it last year and considered that the low pressure fault codes were wrong - they were not I've since discovered!!  I think the "short to earth" fault codes might be getting logged due to programming error, I never bothered to request an update while that Polo was in warranty, so another regret - maybe!

 

Heating up cylinders, ah yes, very effective, I used to have a band heater to make things happen a bit quicker when I was messing with another sort of refrigerant at work, an old fridge engineer used to get me to cool down recovery cylinders to make his life a bit easier.

Edited 8 April, 20206 yr by rum4mo

Thanks for that, they did say there could be a leak from the compressor but due to it being a very wet morning when it went in it was difficult to tell, I am looking at having the compressor checked/changed as i do intend to keep the car a little longer, it is getting a few issues (just about to post another topic on the DPF pressure sensor), but overall its in fine form and not worth a great deal given its age and its a diesel, even though it is of low miles and very good condition after say 5 years they start to drop off in value very quickly.

13 hours ago, UrbanPanzer said:

unless it has a leak which exits pretty quickly after a recharge.

 

Unfortunately the standard vac systems used at the likes of kwik fit and apply a vacum often dont show leaks, its needs pressurising with nitrogen and a dye adding.

 

Incidently if you use kwik fit and it does not work, there is no charge.

 

I think that may have been the case with mine, I fitted a new condensor as part of the accident repair, pulled a vacuum & left it an hour, held well so I considered no leak, regassed it and all was well.

 

Some while later while it was still working I removed one of the service port caps and could see liquid refrigerant gassing off, wondered if it had been trapped there when the cap refitted, dumb in hindsight.

 

I think it was leaking until the pressure dropped to a level stopping the second stage from pressurising but not low enough to cause a low pressure fault code & will continue to leak, I will keep an eye on the pressure and remove the caps to look, they are actually a secondary seal (important to always refit them) and I probably didnt tighten the one over the leaking valve enough.

 

Everyday is a learning day and thats why I am happy to continue to invest in diagnosis and repair equipment that may not on the face of it pay for itself, €220 for a cylinder of gas is more than a recharge but were I to believe their bull***t that the pump was leaking "everywhere, inside, outside, high & low circuit" (one damaged O ring) and paid to have the pump replaced plus system flush, regas etc it certainly would have cost more.

 

For me the learning and having the diagnostic equipment will save me from the incompetence or simple greed that I would ultimately be exposed to when I could no longer work on my vehicles and would otherwise have no choice but to swallow whatever line was being fed.

 

I am going to add some dye while its still holding pressure unless someone can tell me that new 13.6kg refrigerant cylinders already have a tracer dye.

Edited 9 April, 20206 yr by J.R.

I'd only expect the port caps to be dust caps, that is their sole function, really to protect the installation and your fridge manifold.

 

I'd also consider for someone that looks after their AC in their, dye is the last thing you want to add, it is only used to offer a quick indication of the first leak, it then hand about and will totally confuse you in the future unless you know how to remove all traces of it from the area as you fix the leak.

 

These AC systems are single stage, ie only one circuit, two stage systems are systems that employ 2 completely different fridge systems that dump the recovered heat out from the space, ie cabin into one system and use another system to dump that heat load into and then out into the environment.

 

What you do have within that single AC system, is a High side and a Low side, one on one side of the compressor, the other on the other side of the compressor - using a fridge manifold set lets you work out what is happening on both sides under varying load conditions and so help you work out if the system is working as intended or not.

 

For looking for leaks, I use an ARN134 which is just a pumped sniffer, but beware is using a sniffer, if you have cleaned greasy area up with a degreaser, that might get detected by a leak detector - I've been there done that!