Well, my wife finally got our 03 OBW into the dealer to get the AC looked at. Turns out there was no refrigerant in the system; it was totally dry. They leak-tested it twice and there are no leaks evident. They can't figure out what happened to the refrigerant, and SOA doesn't want to cover it as a warranty item if there are no leaks (actually, they told the dealer our car was probably hit in the front, which it was not).
Any ideas how the refrigerant could have vanished into thin air?
They didn't find the leak.
Wait a couple of weeks and see what happens.
You have a leak. I had a similar problem this spring with my 1998 Forester. When they first installed the refrigerant with the dye, nothing showed up, but when I went back a few weeks later for an oil change, it showed up as a leak in the condenser.
George Adams
"All good fishermen stay young until they die, for fishing is the only dream of youth that doth not grow stale with age." ---- J.W Muller
How did they leak test it?? Running under pressure?? Do the dye test as George suggested. My Jeep went through a similar situation and the leak was so small it was a month of hot weather AC running before the leak was discovered. My Jeep had 68,000 miles on it and the factory (nice people) were getting occasional evaporator leaks so they extended the warranty to
The dealer did get SOA to cover it under warranty, so that's good. I'm not sure how they tested it, but they did add the dye and told us to keep an eye on it and to bring it back in if the AC blows hot again.
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