My A/C always comes out very cold, it never cycles on and off. I can push the heat lever to the right to shut it off, but even if I move it to the right a small amount and it shuts off, it won't come back on. Shouldn't there be a thermostat somewhere to keep the temp. constant? It seems to me another Grenada I had had a sensor wire that ran inside the dash near the a/c outlets. Is this how the temperature is controlled? If so where would this wire be? Thanks for your help.
Rich
"Rich" writes in article dated 13 Jul 2005
21:19:03 -0700:If it never cycled off, it would ice up after a few minutes on a humid day; then it wouldn't be so cold any more (unti lit got a chance to thaw).
It's sometimes hard to tell when the compressor is cycling off unless you look under the hood at the AC clutch. When it's engaged, the whole thing spins. When it's off, the outside spins but the center doesn't.
Some luxury cars have actual thermostats in the environmental controls, but normally the hot-cold lever just controls how fast your radiator coolant is sent through the heater core. The air blows over the heater core before it gets to you, so the faster the hot coolant is flowing, the more the air is heated.
It sounds like the Granada has an additional switch designed to save gas by cutting off the AC when the lever is not all the way to the left. I guess you're meant to turn the fan to a lower setting if you get too cold.
In most cars, what happens when you move the lever right and leave the AC on is that you are cooling the air with the AC and then heating it up with the heater core. It can be nice because you end up with low humidity air.
On American cars, the defrost setting also activates the AC. In defrost, the switch is probably disabled, so you might try using defrost if the AC is too cold for you, then you can move the lever to hot if you want. You could probably bypass or disable the switch if you open up the dash, too.
Are there numbers (degrees F/C) on the heat/cold control? If not, I doubt there would be a sensor, except the one on the evaporator to prevent icing-up.
-- spud_demon -at- thundermaker.net The above may not (yet) represent the opinions of my employer.
Thanks so much for your explanation of things. It helps me understand the system. As a matter of fact when it's raining out, it does ice up the A/C. It only ices up in that high humidity situation and using the 'vent' setting will de-ice it quickly.
I think I'll just have to use a lower fan speed setting to control the a/c.
Rich
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