Recharging Your Car’s AC in 6 Steps

5. Inspection & Diagnostics

Before recharging your vehicle's air conditioning unit, technicians must first make sure there are no major leaks that will make recharging the unit fruitless. This might involve a simple visual inspection or a more involved dye test. The system must also be compatible with modern refrigerants. Olders vehicles may require a retrofit to work with the chemical refrigerants that are available today. Technicians will also comb through the entire system to ensure all the components, from the compressor to the drier and the blower motor are all in good working condition

4. Adding Refrigerant to Your Vehicle's AC System

The prominent summer display of DIY car AC recharge 'kits' at your local franchise auto parts chain would have you believe that charging your car's AC system is as simple as a few steps, but that's not typically what we've found to be the case. In fact, much of the AC repair work we get in our Chevrolet dealership service center is from customers who have taken a swing at the DIY AC recharge option. Usually, it's because they've added too much refrigerant and caused damage somewhere in the system. This could be a blown O-ring or something more significant like a ruined AC compressor.

Some DIY car AC recharge kits come with a cheap plastic pressure gauge as part of the refrigerant can. Unfortunately, this will only tell you one of the two pressures you need to know in order to properly charge a car AC system. Ultimately, it's just best to leave this car project to the experts who really know their stuff.

3. Disperse Refrigerant

The type of refrigerant that air conditioning systems once used was found to be so harmful to the environment that it's no longer available. Fortunately, advanced chemical engineering has brought us safer alternatives, but that doesn't mean that today's air conditioning refrigerants can just be released into the environment. It's why certified shops like our service center at Capitol Chevrolet are equipped with special equipment and containers that capture AC refrigerant and prevent it from causing health and ecological problems.

2. Precise Pressures

We mentioned above that properly charging an AC system means maintaining two precise pressures. Well, actually there are three pressures involved because the ambient atmospheric pressure, which varies by altitude, is also important. AC systems work through the expansion and contraction of the refrigerant, and that means high and low side pressures to contend with. If either is off just a little, the system won't work. Too much pressure, as we noted, can cause real problems and too little means the system just won't work.

1. It's Best To Leave Car AC Repair To The Experts

As you can see, air conditioning systems are wildly complex marvels of engineering that must be dealt with in very specific ways. This is one of those car projects that even seasoned weekend mechanics often prefer to just leave to the experts. If there's a leak in the AC system that you didn't catch, the new refrigerant is just going to leak back out into the environment. Not only is that unsafe for you and all those around you, the money you spent on that DIY kit is essentially wasted, too. Stay safe while avoiding the cost and hassle of DIY car AC recharging. Simply let the experts at an authorized service center like ours take care of your car's AC system so you can go back to chilling out on your daily commute.