Automotive Air Conditioning Information Forum

PromiseRing wrote: Sun Jul 06, 2025 8:46 pm

JohnHere wrote: Sun Jul 06, 2025 8:25 pm

PromiseRing wrote: Sat Jun 28, 2025 5:17 pm Without also swapping the serpentine style condenser for a parallel flow, i would be sacrificing quite a bit of capacity and efficiency from what I’ve read.

Not necessarily.

For what it's worth, until recently, I owned a 1994 Toyota Camry V6 Wagon, bought new, with a factory R-134a system (first year for any Toyota, from what I understand) that had a serpentine condenser and a R/D with a sight glass. This car regularly recorded center vent temperatures in the high 30's, even on 95-degree days in the humid South.

Impressive, but I imagine is was sized accordingly!

It's not about the type of condenser, is it removing the heat load? Heck, you can use an original tube & fin if the heat load is being removed.

JohnHere wrote: Sun Jul 06, 2025 10:11 pm Your condenser might be appropriately sized as well.

In my car, I believe that Toyota used a serpentine condenser and R/D left over from their R-12 vehicles, and they cooled just fine for more than 29 years using R-134a.

Yeah in my experience a lot of the Toyota cars had rather large condensers (and radiators for that matter, too!). Seemingly way oversized for the amount of power my 5SFE makes This Nissan seems to be a bit on the smaller side, at least visually. I have plenty of 134a for the future but were going to give it one more shot with R12 and a new TXV.

On that subject, it looks like I’m going to have to make a 134a TXV work. It’ll feed the evap R12 just fine, the only problem is that it physically doesn’t fit. I don’t have the parts in front of me but if i remember right the 134a TXV had a smaller threaded end on the suction side.

Is there any reasonable way to adapt this to the existing lines or am i best off trying to find the AC lines from a 134a car?

This is getting fun!

PromiseRing wrote: Wed Jul 09, 2025 4:43 pm On that subject, it looks like I’m going to have to make a 134a TXV work. It’ll feed the evap R12 just fine, the only problem is that it physically doesn’t fit. I don’t have the parts in front of me but if i remember right the 134a TXV had a smaller threaded end on the suction side.
Is there any reasonable way to adapt this to the existing lines or am i best off trying to find the AC lines from a 134a car?

Might be worth a call to Cold Hose in Ocala, Florida, to see whether they can suggest a solution or even custom-fabricate an adapter for you.