I just pulled the a/c compresser off my car, took it apart, replaced all the seals, and put it all back together. I was rather impressed, there is really no noticeable wear.

That was cool. It was leaking like a old sock. Now to get it vacuumed and see if it'll hold a charge.

Anybody want to see what the inside of an a/c compresser looks like?

 

Pics, please!

 

All right. I finaly got photos.

I am not yet a rennlist member, so I stuck them up on a geocities site.

http://www.geocities.com/viribusunits/

The Compressor photos start on:

http://www.geocities.com/viribusunits/Comperssor1.html

I don't have any really good photos of the frount seal assymbly. Thats the really cool part of hte compressor, IMHO, but it's also REALLY hard to photograph.

Oh, BTW, I'm a little drunk right now, and I can't get the spell checker to work. So please innore the awful spelling. (I assume it's awful, I can't tell.)

 

Cool. Any pitfalls in the disassembly? Did you get the replacement seals as a kit, or one at a time?

 

My compressor is not a standard unit. I belive it's Griffiths unit, but I don't know. It came with the car, and doesn't match anything in the WSMs. However, it worked really well before that seal blew up. The really weird part is that the rest of the griffiths kit was not on the car. They send the compressor with a conversion kit to R-134a. The car was still set up for R-12.

There were no pit falls to disassymbly. It's pretty straight foward, just gotta undue alought of allen bolts. It's kinda put to gether in a backward mannor, so there are no less than 20 allen bolts* in the thing. Also, there are no less than 9 rubber o-rings, and 3 snap rings. The snap rings were a real pain as I can't find my pair of snap ring plyers.

I bought the rubber o-rings at a bearing supply place. There is no kit for this compressor, so I just matched o-rings. O-rings are pretty standard items.

I think they're called hex bolts in the rest of the world? Anyways, it's the bolts you use the hexigonal key to turn.

 

'Hex bolt' is shorthand for a "hex head bolt". This is a bolt with an external hexagonal head on top of it.

The item you are referencing is generally referred to in catalogs that sell fasteners as a "cap screw", or sometimes a "socket bolt" or even a "hex socket bolt" or "hex cap screw or bolt".

Greg

 

Thank you.

I've always heard it called an Allen bolt. Don't ask me why. That and an Allen Wrench is the hex key thing.

Also the adjustable type wrench I've always heard called a cresent wrench, which is apperently diffrent in the rest of the world.

 

VU,

'Allen bolt' does kinda work (this is different than 'hex bolt') , but I don't think its the currently 'preferred' nomenclature. Sort of lke the whole "ft/lbs" v. "lbs/ft".

Many tools have different names in English/English v. USA/English. Spanner, torch, etc, etc. Then there's BSP and Whitworth, but I digress.

Greg