Air Con

j0nathon2

Hi,

My Air Con in my 2007 Astra was working until one day it just stopped. When it did work, there was a noise, the idle would go up and you could feel a lack of power in the steering and acceleration (I assumed this was normal as it's only a 1.4).

Now nothing happens, there is no noise/power/idle change, and there is certainly no cooling, all that happens is the little light comes on to indicate it's turned on. I have left it "on" to see if it kicks in at any point and it hasn't.

Do you think thus could just be a case of a re-gas or a fault with the whole system such as the condenser?

forgotmyname

A regas may work. But if it lost all its gas suddenly dont expect it to last long.

jimmo

I am definitely no expert but my wife has a 61 plate1.4 Meriva and using the air-con makes no perceptible difference to its performance and the air-con is not noisy.

The same applies the 3 previous Astra 1.6s she had over the previous 9 years.

A regas might work but I fear you had a problem with the air-con when it was working and if you don’t address that you won‘t achieve a lasting result.

Strider590

Before you do anything, try changing the vent settings.
I'm pretty sure my Vectra refuses to turn the AC on in certain positions (where the designers have decided you shouldn't be using AC). It does the same with recirculate setting as well, certain vent configs won't allow it to turn on.

OddballJamie

Strider590 wrote: »

Before you do anything, try changing the vent settings.
I'm pretty sure my Vectra refuses to turn the AC on in certain positions (where the designers have decided you shouldn't be using AC). It does the same with recirculate setting as well, certain vent configs won't allow it to turn on.

My Astra does that too, from memory it stops you recirculating with aircon on the screen.

Strider590

OddballJamie wrote: »

My Astra does that too, from memory it stops you recirculating with aircon on the screen.

Yeah, I can't remember the exact settings, but it's easy to see how the aircon could just appear to stop working if this was the case.

kevin0410

check the fuses, including any that might be located near the battery. If a fuse for the fans has blown or is corroded the air con won't work.

check the wiring to the air con compressor. If it looks secure, disconnect the plug and use a multi meter to check if it's getting power when air con is switched on. If it is getting power,(which i suspect it won't, as you're not getting the rising engine speed when air con is switched on) the problem almost certainly is with the clutch inside the compressor.

the air con wil not switch on if there is insufficient refrigerant gas in the system.