AirCon plays crucial role in your car for both safety and comforts, and here how you prevent leak in AC system. Since there are components, but first thing first to spot the leak is to inspect fluid level or air condition refrigerant is low in the AC system.
What symptoms to inspect:
- There should be oil stains or moisture around AC system or pipes. The AC compressor, condenser and related pipes should be dry and clean.
- If you start feeling AC system doesn’t give you the cold feeling that you used to, it is a sign of something wrong. Low refrigerant levels weaken AC performance.
- When it makes hissing noise, which comes from a vacuum leak in the engine. It indicates that refrigerant is leaking.
- Hot air is easy to identify in the cabin when AC system refrigerant is leaking.
- There would be a strange smell coming from the air vents. So it is time to visit your favorite garage, if you start smelling a pungent or musty smell from the air vents when you turn on AC.
How to spot the leak from AC system:
- The obvious way to find out is to take a look at the compressor, condenser and refrigerant pipes because you would see a PEG or refrigerant oil residue and it is easy to track.
- Another efficient way to confirm if and where your AC system is leaking from is to perform the UV dye AC leak detector test on the air conditioning system. To use this method, get UV light and shine it into the AC. Freons are usually mixed with UV dye that will illuminate if they spot a black light.
- You see any traces of dye around any air conditioning components, it could mean you have refrigerant leaks in that area. Much like the soapy water method, the AC leak dye UV light method does not detect leaks on the evaporator and front compressor seals.
- Spray soapy water on the AC components is the easy to spot the suspected areas. Get a bottle of water and mix it with detergent. Then gently put it in a spraying can and spray through the suspected areas while the AC is on. You will see bubbles if the soapy water gets to ruptured, damaged, or leaking areas. Keeping in mind that this way doesn’t detect leak on the AC evaporator and front compressor seal.
These methods might need help from professional:
1. Perform AC pressure test because it can gauge the pressure level and it have to be specific ranges base on car brands.
2. If visual inspection, soapy water, and UV dye test prove abortive, use a sniffer device. The sniffer device is designed to quickly find the chemical particles of freon. This means that this device will detect air conditioner refrigerant leaks anywhere around the system. In any case, you have to clean the AC system components before using this device as dirt and debris will prevent it from working effectively.
3. AC leak can be scanned by an electronic leak detector. The electronic leak detector can detect the presence of halogen gasses. If the scanning is positive, it could mean you have a leak somewhere in the system.
Solving AC leak problem car be a nightmare; however, you don’t want to try it at home to let expert to repair your AC system after trying above steps.
Car A/C Leaks are hard to find and it is unlike transmission fluid, brake fluid, and engine oil, car air conditioner refrigerant is a colorless fluid that cycles through liquid and gaseous states within the system. It rarely leaves any visible streaks and trails because of its unique properties, which is why they are hard to find without an experience.
Now, how much does it cost:
The car air conditioner may leak in multiple locations and you will need to replace all faulty components. That said, the precise amount of finding and fixing the AC leak largely depends on the affected part, the ease of accessing it, and the cost of replacing it.
However, on average, car AC leak repair costs between 35 and 500 dollars. This means you should expect to spend between 100 dollars to 1,600 dollars, depending on the faulty component.