Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Troubleshooting A/C only cold when driving, barely cool at idle

When I am driving on the highway or something, the A/C is pretty cold, not real cold like i'd like it to be. When I am driving around town, stop and go and all that, the A/C never really gets cold, just feels like the fan is blowing cool air, even when on max. It also seems to take forever to get even remotely cold now, do I just need to recharge or is this a compressor problem? Oh, and when I'm idling an the A/C is on, I notice this most during my late night stops to Taco Bell, some sort of fan comes on like every 10-20 seconds and like drains the car of power, like the lights will dim inside and it's quite loud, at first I though the car was over-heating, but Ford said it's not over-heating, the A/C "just does that". Any tips for either of my problems? Thanks!

Welcome to the group if someone hasn't said so yet!

The newer style 134a versus r12 is no comparision... R12 cools much better but is no more. My old mustang still runs the r12 stuff and works great.

I have had my coutour do as you subscribe... A year ago they just recharged it... This week they put in a new compressor as I think the old one was leaking or not compressing as it should.

Sounds like your short cycling caused by low freon levels. Would also explain it not working well... So both of your problems are related to the same issue... low freon levels. Hope this helps.

Good luck,

VG

Yep, frequent cycling of the fan means low pressure in the coolant lines (lower than should be anyways). Buy a can of R134a at AutoZone/etc and fill it up yourself. There's instructions on the can. Just make sure you wear eye protection and fill on the correct side (low pressure side, I think?) You also might need more than 1 can if it's really low. Our A/C can hold 27 ounces and each can is 12-16 ounces. If you think the A/C is leaking coolant, you might get the combo R134a with sealant and/or dye. I had this problem until I recharged about a month ago. It's fine now even though I had a significant leak somewhere. (fingers crossed)

Sounds like it could be your condenser fan not working. When you get going the movement of air through the condenser is much greater than the fan can push.