Automotive Air Conditioning Information Forum

I put a compressor on a 92 Ford van about 4 years ago.
It’s came back twice out of refrigerant. The van is only driven about once a month. The only dye I see is a light dusting around the clutch and drive plate. It held vacuum at 310 microns for a couple hours this morning. I’m going to pressure test it with nitrogen tomorrow. Owner doesn’t really want to put out the money for a new compressor. He asked me to try stop leak in it, which I’m not a fan of. Anyone have any suggestions?

Dgreen wrote:I put a compressor on a 92 Ford van about 4 years ago.
It’s came back twice out of refrigerant. The van is only driven about once a month. The only dye I see is a light dusting around the clutch and drive plate. It held vacuum at 310 microns for a couple hours this morning. I’m going to pressure test it with nitrogen tomorrow. Owner doesn’t really want to put out the money for a new compressor. He asked me to try stop leak in it, which I’m not a fan of. Anyone have any suggestions?

Look for leakage at the service valve caps, good caps are important.

As to sealers: I could never recommend trying any - if these really worked, and did not contaminate a system forever - every mechanic would be using them !!! Most mechanics have equipment to check for sealers, and will refuse to service anything that contains sealers.

I pressurized the system with a little refrigerant then ran the pressure up just above 110 psi with nitrogen last night. This morning it’s just below 110 psi. Used a liquid leak detector, think it’s called Birddog, and didn’t find any bubbles. Electronic detector not making any noise around the ports either. I think system pressure should fluctuate a little with the nitrogen added. I’ll let it sit a little longer and see what happens.