Peckster

Not sure what he did, but for $150 all in I doubt he changed the compressor.

The dye and sealant he used was Wurth.

KLR

Thanks for the encouragement guys. I was really ready to set this one aside until spring out of total frustration. Instead, I called around Friday morning and found an A/C only shop that would see me this morning to do some more sniffing/looking. This place was a total hole in the wall -- the inside of the shop looked like a cave and the workbenches were in utter dissarray. Hovever, the A/C guy was awesome. I showed him around the car and he and I spent about an hour looking around with his sniffer. $40 later, I found my leak. Am I ever glad that I paid to have it charged up again and sought this guy out!! If you are anywhere near metro NYC, call Ron at County Auto Air Conditioning (914- 668-2388) in Mount Vernon, NY. Totally nice guy, totally competent, has the right equipment, ridiculously inexpensive.

The leak appears to be coming from the new compressor itself. We jacked up the left side of the car and sniffed the plate where the lines attach to the compressor. The sniffer would signal a bit right at the fittings for the lines, but sticking the sniffer between the two lines (right above the plate that the fittings are on) and back about 1" set the thing off big time. This is, of course, mixed news. On the one hand, it's awesome to have found it, it's great that it's not back behind the dash, and your encouragement and my $40 just saved me from spending $400 on a wild goose chase replacing lines and the condensor. The bad news is that I believe that the compressor warranty was only 1 year, and it has now been in the car for 14 months. However, given the paper trail that I have on this (I've spent about $440 now searching for this leak, recharging the system 3 times, etc. since immediately after it was installed), I intend to pursue this VERY aggressively to get a free replacement compressor. I'm still out a sickening amount of money (and time and aggrevation) for labor to do this twice, find the leak, etc., but hopefully I can cap my loss at a mere few hundred more dollars to get to the end of the tunnel.

A couple of lessons learned:

1. UV dye-based leak detection sucks for small leaks like this. A good sniffer is much better
2. This is far from rocket science -- a guy with the right tool (a sensitive and specific sniffer) can do this under your supervision in a very reasonable amount of time
3. I'm not sure what the implication is for the reliability of rebuilt Denso compressors. This wasn't a $200 e-bay score -- it was several hundred dollars and I assume came from Porsche. We'll see what the original installer has to say about where he got it and how to pursue a warranty claim, but he runs a very well known shop and took superb care of my car before I moved it up here to NYC. I can't imagine that he installed some piece of cr@p from a no-name rebuilder -- he certainly never has done anything like that before.

Tom R.

Guys,
I changed the freon system to 134 on my red S2. we had a leak at the canister by the headlight and replaced that along with a few O rings.

That was the spring of 01 and it blew real cold until it was stolen in sept 03. i hate humidity! it worked great. in fact i think the 944 with the 134 was colder than the new GTO!

Charlie

If it is where the fittings are it could be as simple as an O-ring. I would take both hoses off and replace the O-rings.

AndyK

I'm going to Powertech on Monday. They're converting to R134, and doing the dye leak stop from Wurths, after doing a vacuum test on the system. I WILL have a cold car for the remainder of the hot weather! Not to mention the defrosting power of AC on those rainey cold October nights!

AndyK

Well, turns out my "rebuilt" compressor is leaking badly. Long story short, it would cost me over $900 to have the compressor replaced and converted to R134, with labor and parts.

I will not spend another $1000 on this car, so the car wont have working air conditioning.

I'm reaching the "I've HAD it" point pretty quickly!

Peckster

Too bad. Who rebuilt it, and how long ago?

Charlie

Andy,
I had an 86 944 several years ago that I put 3 rebuilt comprssors on in 3 months. Finally I bought a conversion kit for about $300 and converted to a Sanden. No more trouble and good cool air. A couple of years later my 88 had the Nippondenzo go bad and I immediately went with another Sanden kit.

Each time on the 86 I would flush the system and put on a new receiver/dryer for each rebuilt compressor.

Last week I was discussing my Audi compressor with a VW/Audi/Porsche parts guy that has been in the parts business for years and is a very knowledgeable mechanic. I mentioned putting a used compressor on the Audi and he stated his choice would put a used and not a rebuilt, that the quality of a lot of rebuilds was not good. I then told him about my 86 944 experience with the 3 compressors in 3 months and he said he was not surprised.

I highly suspect that a lot of the rebuilds are done very poorly. I'm sure some rebuilders do it right, but how do you know which ones? Some may have had good luck with rebuilds but I haven't.

KLR

Andy -- Call the guy at griffiths.com. I've spoken to him a couple of times in the past week, and he's very helpful. Even if your compressor is cooked, his entire kit only costs $600 and is eminently installable by a do-it yourselfer. Don't give up!! Hell, you could be me. At least your first go round didn't cost a grand, even if the second one does.

AndyK

The Powertech guys say they get rebuilt compressors from Porsche, and for $450, they work great. Plus another $270 to evac the system, and convert to R134, plus labor to install the compressor ($100) = $850, assuming the rest of the system works fine. Makes me wanna lean towards a NEW Sanden...no rebuilds to worry about. Not this year!

Damn Charlie...3 in 3 months? I would have gone insane!!