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Hyundai-Tech : Do i have a blowoff Relief Valve on my a/c system (2002 SantaFe) ???

So, I was in heavy traffic yesterday with a lot of stop n go...and all of a sudden I see a huge cloud of Freon being discharge from the hood area. It lasted for about 5-10 seconds...then afterward I had some cooling but grea tly diminished. The condenser coil was clean as a whistle cause I hose it down every spring. The radiator fans work fine. No overheating taking pl ace. So, I carefully recharged it being careful not to allow any air into the system...and the outlet temp was around 42 f. Later on, the same t hing occurred and it was only 78 f. out.

Is there a relief valve ? Where did the Freon discharge come from most li kely ? I don't see any problems in the tubing . There is some oil right around the compressor however, but if it came from there, how come I didn' t loose all of the Freon ?

Thanks.

Reply to
ilbebauck
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The relief valve is on the compressor. It's designed to allow the refriger ant to escape if the pressure gets too high. The purpose is to prevent dam age to more expensive components from the excessive pressure. Once the pre ssure gets low enough, the valve will shut again.

There are a couple plausible scenarios:

  1. The valve is defective and opens at too low a pressure.
  2. There is a problem with your a/c system (such as condensor fans not pro perly operating or an overcharged system) causing the pressure to become ex cessive.
Reply to
hyundaitech

a sudden I see a huge cloud of Freon being discharge from the hood area. It lasted for about 5-10 seconds...then afterward I had some cooling but gr eatly diminished. The condenser coil was clean as a whistle cause I hose it down every spring. The radiator fans work fine. No overheating taking place. So, I carefully recharged it being careful not to allow any air in to the system...and the outlet temp was around 42 f. Later on, the same thing occurred and it was only 78 f. out.

likely ? I don't see any problems in the tubing . There is some oil rig ht around the compressor however, but if it came from there, how come I did n't loose all of the Freon ?

Excellent. Thanks. Can the relief valve be replaced if it is found to be d efective, or, must you replace the entire Compressor in such a case ?

Reply to
ilbebauck

a sudden I see a huge cloud of Freon being discharge from the hood area. It lasted for about 5-10 seconds...then afterward I had some cooling but gr eatly diminished. The condenser coil was clean as a whistle cause I hose it down every spring. The radiator fans work fine. No overheating taking place. So, I carefully recharged it being careful not to allow any air in to the system...and the outlet temp was around 42 f. Later on, the same thing occurred and it was only 78 f. out.

likely ? I don't see any problems in the tubing . There is some oil rig ht around the compressor however, but if it came from there, how come I did n't loose all of the Freon ?

For those who are following this thread, I have an update. Upon close exami nation , I have discovered that the passenger side electric radiator/conde nser fan was not coming up to full speed ; I would say it was turning at ro ughly half the normal speed . The other fan was working right. So, ill be giving this defective fan some attention .

Reply to
ilbebauck

replying to ilbebauck, Mightyquinn wrote: Did you ever find out if the relief valve was replaceable? I'm running into the same problem

Reply to
Mightyquinn

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