2005 Prius Air Conditioning issues

Change your cabin air filter

SM-N900P ?

 

My Sienna had a problem similar to what you're describing. The passenger side is colder than driver's side. The problem is the air not being sufficient, clogged by a dirty cabin filter. To fix this problem, my mechanic put in a new filter and circulated the AC, running it on high for 10 minutes with all windows open......and for some reason, he was revving the car to about 2500 rpm while doing this.

 

Find another Toyota dealer to work on your air conditioning system.

The reason is simple: the Sienna air conditioner compressor is belt-driven via the engine crankshaft pulley, so the engine needs to be turning at a reasonable speed for the compressor to operate at a high performance level...

 

My 2005 Prius is doing the SAME THING you describe on the Sienna. Warmer on the driver side, cooler on the passenger side until there is no cool air at all. Did your fix (replacing filter) work for any length of time?

 

C Jakel - How much did the repair cost you? Or did you fix it yourself?

I also have a 2005 Prius with a little over 100K miles on it and the A/C has started to blow warm air. The problem started in June; I took it to a Toyota dealer and they evac'd and recharged the A/C system with freon and dye and found nothing wrong. It ran fine for 2 months after that.

The problem resurfaced last week so I took it back to the dealer yesterday. This time they said the A/C compressor was broken and estimated $1100 for the fix.

I took it to another authorized dealer for a second opinion and they're saying it's actually the evaporator. They're saying they'll have to take apart the dash to fix and that it will be a major repair - est. is $1500.

I don't have a problem with the cost of these repairs but don't have confidence in any of the diagnoses at this point. Any advice/suggestions for getting to the bottom of this? Also, can anyone offer any insight as to what might cause these A/C issues? My family has always driven cars into the 150K+ mile range over 10+ years and we've never had these kinds of major A/C problems.

Thanks much!

 

I had the same issue of the AC getting weaker as the ambient temperature increased, so it would work alright on warm days, but just wouldn't cut it on hot days. Recently it's just been barely cooling and blowing cooler from the passenger side. I think the explanation for this is simply the flow of refrigerant cooling the evaporator more on the side that sends air to the passenger side. Kind of how the radiator is hotter at the inlet and cooler at the outlet. In the case of the evaporator it's giving up all it's "cold" as soon as it enters and isn't able to cool the whole evaporator.
I put gauges on and the low side was around 20psi, when it should be closer to 30psi. I added R-134a until the low side pressure was just over 30psi. High side was just over 150psi. This produced nice cold air!
So clearly there's a leak since refrigerant doesn't wear out. Hopefully it's a very slow leak and I may be good for another year, but we'll see. At some point I'll put the sniffer to it and see what that finds.
Hope this helps someone.