Hi, Skoda Fabia 2008 1.4 tdi Greenline.

So noticed air con is blowing warm so presumed re gas is needed. Have checked fuses all ok and compressor is turning. After a 65 mile motorway run left engine running to see if fan would kick in which it didn't. Not having a temperature guage fitted ( why Skoda ?)  gave up on waiting as not sure when it should kick in although presume with air con selected the fan should cut in and out. Checked fuses on battery holder all ok.

Noticed today that climatic control display panel flashes approx 14 times before going into normal mode so wondered if this and non working air con are connected? The car was last regassed in 2016 so presume it may just be a re-gas needed. Any thoughts please? Thanks

Hi, same car as you here!..  When the display flashes repeatedly like that, its an indication of a fault.

There is a way to perform a set-test and then the air-con goes through all the flap changes, air speeds, directional flows, etc and then ends up with some numbers, which I think guide you to which fault. It is fiddly thou and I will need to try doing it again to say how its done as it requires pressing buttons together and switching ignition on, to start the function. Its aimed at dealers, not owners, really I think so the codes may then mean nothing without knowledge of the system. 

 

I also think you mean climatronic, not the climatic system. Digital settings, around seven fan speeds, along with auto settings. Climatic have four fan speeds, on a numbered dial.

 

Could be low on gas, could be pressure switch, they are the simple options to eliminate. Pressure switches are around £23 on eBay, for proper ones, much less for copies but may/may not be worth buying. 

 

Can be hard to notice the fan spinning... My suggestion is to use a bright coloured marker felt to make a line on the fan outer rim and on the fixed plastic frame. You can then see if the fan has moved after running the car anytime. re-line and drive a few times to be sure it has not just vibrated out of alignment. It may also be a good idea to not do this where the fan has already settled, so as to be sure it does not align up due to weight balance issues.

Edited 21 May, 20206 yr by mrgf

Hi MGF thanks for the prompt reply . You're right I did mean climatronic. Had the car just over a year now and this is the first prob.

The flashing display panel literally started last night .

Car only does 2 trips a week to and from work 130 miles in total so not much use. 

Regarding the radiator fan  I've noticed on previous diesel cars it doesn't run much if at all in normal use, indeed even had it disconnected on our old car as it ran all the time.

I've got it booked in for re-gas tomorrow at a Formula one garage ( no fix no fee) so I'll try the simple first.

As you have the same car can I ask one question pls? Noticed yesterday when checking fan on tick over the engine seems to rock back and forth a little. Never noticed this before , and know it's not the quietest of engines .

Car up till last year had fsh with Skoda , has 116,000 miles but no record of engine mounts being changed.

Have been pleased with it so far , averaging 65mpg and took 4 of us to Ireland last year in reasonable comfort.

Thanks again.

So bit of an update. Had a look online for MRGF's suggestion of doing the self test on the climatronic unit. 

Ignition on, pressed recycle and Econ buttons at same time and the code 318 on left side of display and 00 on right. Turned the temp dial to find any other codes and the 318 code went to 00. Started engine , fan still didn't kick in but sure ac was trying just no cold air, so maybe a re-gas will sort.

Car went into our local Formula One today for re-gas and touching wood air con now  working. Climatronic display no longer flashing also.

Formula one are doing the same no fix no fee deal like others. Having been in this situation b4 over the years with air con where it works for just a couple of days, I asked the chap who said if it loses gas over the next couple of weeks they would refund me. Whether they would I hope not to find out..........

On now to sorting out the spawn of the 😈- the air con on our Renault Mégane, god help me.....

 

I regassed my Yeti yesterday. I had done it from scratch after the accident repair but it went wrong & I ended up overcharging it, I let out gas until the guages read where they should but had lost track of the weight added.

 

Since then the cooling degraded a bit so I topped it up again by using the guage set, it was cold weather then so not the best time to read the high & low circuit pressures.

 

This week first drive after confinement it was not cooling but the fans were running, no fault codes and 4.7 bar IIRC static pressure at 28°c, introducing only a very small amount of gas had cooler air running from the vents and it did not take much weight at all out of the bottle for the high & low side guages to be reading where they should and for the evaporator to drop the air from 28°c down to 6°c.

 

I was really surprised to see that a relatively small loss of refrigerant was enough to stop cooling yet keep the system running.

Edited 22 May, 20206 yr by J.R.

Love having air con but just seems so complicated. Wish someone would invent a portable one you could just plug in. 

Currently having a nightmare trying to get air con on wifes Renault Mégane working. Changed condenser and dryer last year ,gassed up , but 1yr later not working again. Found though that running bypass wires direct from battery to compressor kicks system in so that's the plan.

Well done on your success tho.

Only a short lived success but there is enough in the 13kg bottle to carry on like this for a very long time while I find the real problem.

So how often do you have to top up? I'm curious as to the the cost of maybe just topping up when needs and living with that to maybe the more expensive option of changing a component.

I cant really say at present, I made some mistakes in the initial fill, there may be some air in there, the last fill may not have been enough due to the low temperatures, the car has not been driven for a couple of months.

 

All the time that the pressure is above the threshold for the pump to work its cheaper for me to top up then lose the gas thats inside it to pressurise it with air to test for leaks, I'm hoping they will show up when I have time to check every inch of pipework, maybe now the car is being used the leak rate may reduce or stop.

 

Before buying my guages then the vacuum pump, then the R134a cylinder I was in your position with a system fault that was not causing a leak, each time I would replace the control valve I would lose the charge and have to pay for it to be recharged but then when it didnt work the barstewards would suck it all out again and still make me pay.

 

Its only worthwhile for me to be refilling at present because having invested in the gas its money already spent and the top ups are taking only a small amount, much less than a full vacuum down and recharge by weight which is what I really should do but wont do all the time I suspect there may be a leak.

I've toyed with the idea of buying a 12V heater fan to help load up the chiller in a typical Northern UK Summer's day, last time I checked my cars with the manifold set on was only 15C and I felt that was as good as the weather was going to be until next Summer!

J.R.  I'd be interested how long you get out of your top ups in the end if you don't mind. I did read somewhere that some of the diy cans contain a sealant that seal minor leaks so maybe you'll be lucky in that regard. 

Considering air con has been around in American cars since the 1950's I think , surely it wasn't so complicated in those days. 

Edited 23 May, 20206 yr by Cheapas

Hi Cheapas. Sorry, first time back online since my first reply.

 

Can you keep me up to date with how the air-con is going?  I was having this issue too and thought of trying a re-gas. How much did F1 charge for this service, if you don't mind me asking? I have checked Kwik-Fit, who charge £60 and if its not less then 10% cooler, you don't pay, apparently. 

 

I also would like to ask you, referring to under the bonnet, on the drivers side of the car, where the suspension mount is, there is a sort of set of electronic wiring/plug/gubbins, bracketed to the top mount.  Could you tell me, are yours exposed or do they have a kind of cover, say a plastic panel, similar to what is on the battery?

 

I have always thought they look like they should have a cover and not be open to the elements, so to speak, as mine are. Thanks in advance for any insight you can give me there.

Hi mrgf. Had it gassed up by Formula One on Friday. Cost was £60. They took just under an hour and I could see the car in the workshop area so presume they did leak/ pressure test and not just slapped some gas in. Felt the difference immediately and the flashing display on the climatronic has disappeared. Car is now ice cold.

Not sure if Kwick Fit do the same but guvnor at F1 said they'd refund me if it lost pressure within first couple of weeks. Again that was verbal, so not sure if they'd actually honour it or maybe if they're franchised depends on site policy. This was at Ramsgate branch. 

I see your location is East London, lived in Ilford/Barking for 40 years so we may have driven past each other over the years!

Just checked under the bonnet , there are 4 block connectors on a  bracket on the top mount with no protection.

The previous owner spent a small fortune at Skoda maintaining the car, so presume it didn't have a cover fitted.

 

If they took an hour then they will have vacuumed it down and left it on test for 20 mins which hopefully would show if there was a leak, a pressure test with azote would be better though, so you should be OK for a good while.

 

They lose nothing other than time doing the vacuum down test as they can recycle your refrigerant, without investing in another really expensive bit of kit which will never pay for itself I lose the whole residual charge hence why for the moment I am topping up, I did a vacuum test when I fitted the new condensor and all was well but when I screwed up the refilling the pump hydraulically locked momentarily so could have been damaged and may be leaking.

Hi JR. That's the point tho, time is money for them so for them to take that time is hopefully reassuring. They had a car b4 me and one straight after for air con service. Their boss said they were flat out with air con , hampered tho by staff on furlough.

Some establishments may have cut corners to gain more revenue .

How do you do a vaccumn test at home?

You need a guage set and a vacuum pump, the first is a justifiable expense rather than paying a garage to (mis)diagnose, the latter is an indulgence, if you use it on a charged system then you lose the refrigerant and create your own personal hole in the ozone layer so its not just the cost of the pump.

 

To test you pull a vacuum and lock it off, if the system has no leaks then in theory the guages should still read -1 bar after an hour, to me its not conclusive as the system will be under pressure not vacuum in use and of a much higher magnitude.

Thanks for the explanation, think I get it. What's it like price wise in France compared to UK for re-gas? Do they do similar no fix no fee deals as here?

Norauto was €60, every spring most of them do a deal at €45, I just got fed up with the incompetence, insouciance and lies, fed up with being given an on line appointment to find they knew nothing about it, getting texts to remind me only to turn up and find they decided to close for lunch, turning up to find they had no gas, told it would take 2 hours and seeing the car not move in that whole time & then they say they found they had no gas, removing the full charge that I had in the system and saying that it was empty and there was a terminal leak, being flustered when asked to say where the leak was, after all they were charging me for a leak test & diagnosis while stealing the refrigerant, being told it was leaking everywhere,my reply "be precise!" their response "inside, outside everywhere"

 

Does that explain why I prefer to be autonomous here?

Love the word insouciance ! There's a chap who writes for Car Mechanics magazine. Lives in France, Brittany area I think. He has 2 VW's. Most of the repairs he writes about seem to be done on his visits to the UK. Indeed one of them was for an air con leak on his VW transporter, the repair started in France but was sorted at a specialist in Kent. 

On the plus side think of the miles of great roads you have with no hold ups.

Car driven only twice since returning for the confinement, both times for hospital consultations, the roads were safe for bikes for the first time ever but now everyone but me (no money) are back driving I keep to the chemin rurals as much as possible.

 

Still plenty of plus sides, having to be autonomous is one of them for me!

Have to confess I had to look up the meaning of the word 'autonomous' . Do you mean the cost of living in France is cheaper so giving you more freedom of lifestyle?

I meant to express autarcie but thought autonomy would be better understood than autarkie, self sufficent if you like.

 

You are either autonomous and dont depend on professionals or you get ripped off, the plus side for me of being obliged to buy expensive kit and constantly learn new skills is that I get a kick out of it and hate being ripped off and lied to by people that cannot appreciate that there are people out their with intelligence, knowledge and an interest in how things work.

That reminded me of am old joke of a young woman going for a service. The guy says to her, "So, you know nothing about cars and engines? Well, the do-hicky had come away from the fingumybob, causing the wizzle-twizzle to break, which I fixed for you and the bill will be £800, plus VAT"!

23 hours ago, Cheapas said:

Hi mrgf. Had it gassed up by Formula One on Friday. Cost was £60. They took just under an hour and I could see the car in the workshop area so presume they did leak/ pressure test and not just slapped some gas in. Felt the difference immediately and the flashing display on the climatronic has disappeared. Car is now ice cold.

Not sure if Kwick Fit do the same but guvnor at F1 said they'd refund me if it lost pressure within first couple of weeks. Again that was verbal, so not sure if they'd actually honour it or maybe if they're franchised depends on site policy. This was at Ramsgate branch. 

I see your location is East London, lived in Ilford/Barking for 40 years so we may have driven past each other over the years!

Just checked under the bonnet , there are 4 block connectors on a  bracket on the top mount with no protection.

The previous owner spent a small fortune at Skoda maintaining the car, so presume it didn't have a cover fitted.

 

Thanks for that reply. I might just take a look at my local F1... I think there is one at Bow flyover, if memory serves!

 

As for driving the same streets, almost certain. I took many students to both Barking and Goodmayes test centres over the last decade or so. Along with practice in bothe areas.