So long story short I believe I have a leak on my a/c pipe by the back of the headlights

 

It went into Skoda who said the leak was at the joint where the pipe joins behind coolant tank (thin pipe goes to thicker one) back in 2023 at some point

 

I was adamant I saw the leak (ended in a hospital visit) on the thin pipe by headlight, had two dealers look at it and said it wasn’t leaking, but if I put my finger at the bottom of the pipe it’s oily and smells a bit like refrigerant, so I’m convinced I have a leak there

 

Anywau it’s been fine for ages (probably a year at least) getting nice cold air, today I got in my car and had condensation and put the blower onto the windscreen and took a while to go

 

I lifted the bonnet to check the fans and neither are spinning, so question is when a/c is activated should one of the fans be spinning all the time? To me it should be

 

Outside temp is 5oC at the moment which I believe means a/c should be running and fan spinning.

 

I’ve got a horrible feeling all the refrigerant has gone so a/c won’t kick in because it’s effectively empty, I suppose if I had vcds I could see the coolant grams or at least an error?

 

thanks

Edited 6 January, 20251 yr by Danoid

@Danoid - In short yes. I advise taking the car to an automotive A/C specialist and not a Skoda main stealer!

So I’m a bit clueless but had to look again and it was spinning, I also turned it down to LO from 23 and set it to max for windscreen

 

I think the car is getting a bit dictator like.

 

I’ll ignore it for now as I don’t want the stress again and hopefully when things heat up in a few months it’s still cold inside and fan spinning.

 

Still convinced I have a really really slow leak though because of the pipe being oily and tape around headlight cables looks damp but could be from when previous issues.

 

Does VCDS show refrigerant weight? Hopefully getting vcds soon and would be  great if it did, I suppose worst case it’ll say if there’s low refrigerant when the high pressure sensor notices

It will show system pressure, static in your case, the high side pressure in a functioning system.

 

It will also show compressor shut down code, one of which is for low system pressure.

 

It sounds like a slow leak whether ot be where you think, the Skoda dealer or elsewhere, if the system pressure has been lost then get someone to evacuate the remainder and do a vacuum test, if this does not reveal the leak then a nitrogen pressure test or if it was at atmospheric pressure then there is nothing really to lose by doing a compressed air test.

10 minutes ago, Danoid said:

Does VCDS show refrigerant weight?

Not that I know of. The normal procedure is to extract and weigh the refrigerant in the system.

Leak tests often omit the obvious - leaks from the fill valves, one of which is on the thin pipe you mentioned so could be the very problem you see.

I have had both low and high pressure valves leaking on my Mk3 vRS, new valve inserts sorted this out, but you need empty system to do this, mine was kaput and empty also for for other reasons (seized/leaking compressor), if the system is still full of refrigerant you need to take it to a workshop where they can extract refrigerant first, then change valve inserts.

There exist tools to change valve inserts without emptying refrigerant, but I did not have good experience with these. HTH