I have an 06 with 232,000. I was driving back home last week on a hot day and I noticed that the volume of air coming out of the a/c had gone down to about nothing. Doesn't matter what speed I put it on. I pulled over, pulled the cabin filter cleaned it and set back off. It seemed to be better for a while and then the same thing. Got home late that night, went out next morning and set off, all is well. I make frequent stops during the day for work, so all is well all day long. It was about an 1 1/2 hour drive home and about an hour into it same thing, no volume of air. Next morning, all is well. The fan seems to be working on all speeds, just no air, and only after it has been running for an hour. Shut it off for a while and everything is OK. Wth! Has anybody ever experienced anything like this.
Is the problem: 1) that the correct volume of air is coming out of the vents, but the air is not cold, or 2) that air volume out of the vents is lower than it should be given the fan speed selection If 1) the refrigerant level may be slightly low due to a leak in the system. If 2) the fan motor is probably becoming intermittent. You would need to replace the motor to solve that problem.
Thanks for the reply Patrick. Its #2. How does the motor become intermittent? Does it build up resistance the longer it runs? that seems to be the easiest fix. Hot and humid here in Florida this time of year, got to have it. Thanks again.
Yes, a DC motor has contacts which provide electrical power to the rotor windings. As the rotor spins that causes the contacts to wear. The electrical conducting surfaces may develop a coat of dirt and/or corrosion which prevent good transfer of electrical power. All of this causes the motor to fail after providing many hours of service.
Ok just to be clear, the fan is working but there is "no air" or just no cool air? If it's the latter then an overheating inverter will explain all of your observations.
What is happening is, and I am sorry for not being able to describe it simply. In the morning when I start out the fan works as normal, after about an hour of running the volume of air being delivered decreases to the level of the low setting. I can turn the fan up to Hi and can obviously hear the fan increase speed, but no more air comes out of the vent. What air is coming out of the vent is cold, as it should be, but the volume of air is not enough to cool the cabin. When I make frequent stops during the day, everything seems to work fine. It is just after constant operation for at least an hour that this happens.
OK, that sounded stupid, so I will try again. There is fluid in the reservoir, it's at the low mark but it is circulating when "Ready". If the inverter is overheating how would that cause my symptom?
Buy a gallon of Toyota Super Long Life Coolant, and fill the reservoir to the top mark. If the inverter overheats then it will not provide power to the AC compressor. However that doesn't seem to be your car's problem. If the fan noise is at an appropriate level for the Hi fan speed position and yet the volume of air does not increase, the problem may be that the air is not being fully routed to the dashboard vents, but rather to the floor at least partially. What position do you have the vents set to? If they are not set to the dashboard vent position, try that. If they are set to the correct position, it could be that the motor that moves the vent position is not working properly.
I'll take a guess and say you might have lost some of your refrigerant charge. And now the evaporator is icing up from hot and humid Florida. It could be stepper motors somewhere in the HVAC system affecting air flow. But it sounds more like ice buildup is restricting flow. You can try an experiment. The next time the airflow is restricted, go to the MFD Climate screen and toggle the A/C off with the fan continuing to blow. If after a couple of minutes the airflow increases, then I would suspect the above to be true. Then have your refrigerant level professionally checked and get any necessary repairs.
It wont power the aircon compressor if the inverter is overheated. Like I said, it only explains it *if* there's still plenty of air flow but it's just not cold. I was a bit unclear of about that point.
It wasn't you, I got the "Former, Later" backwards. Weatherguy seems to think that the evaporator coils might be freezing up due to low refrigerant. Gonna try his experiment on my way south today. Gday.
You were right Weather guy, a little low on refrigerant and I had the temp turned down to 72. Just overworking it I guess. On my trip down I turned the temp up to 76 and all was well. Thanks.
Just to close this thread, Weather Guy was right. low on refrigerant and setting the thermo too low. All is well
Just a good guesser sometimes. The other troubling matter now is where did the refrigerant leak from? It will continue to leak until repaired. That would not leave me with a good feeling.
