btanchors

Greetings,

I have a friend of mine, who is a mechanic at a local Honda dealership. I have him do normal maintenance I'm not willing to do myself, like Brake jobs, etc.

I took it in this weekend to have the brakes done. He looked the vehicle over, and says the Air conditioning compressor is leaking oil. The A/C works beautifully, it's been working well, even with the recent heat wave.

I do not know much about Automotive A/C. What are my options if the seal is indeed leaking oil? Can the seal be replaced? Does the entire compressor need to be replaced? If so, this is something I might just have the Lexus dealer do. How bad will this be? The friend at Honda indicated this could be quite expensive, and was suggesting we could postpone until the spring, since the weather is starting to cool off.
If the compressor needs replacing, what are we talking about here, expense wise, assuming a Lexus dealer does the work? $1,000? $2000? $3000?

I bought the car new in July 2003 and it now has 116,000 miles on it.

badblackgs

iTrader: (1)

coming from a master certified technician, don't let anyone talk you into a complete a/c job if the a/c is working fine and its just developed a front seal leak. have the system evacuated, replace the compressor, pull a vacuum for atleast 20 minutes,and recharge the system. the only time complete system replacement is required is when the compressor came apart internally and has sent metal shavings throughout the system. then the repairs are justified. It wouldn't hurt to have the dessicant bag in the condenser replaced since its job is the absorb moisture in the system. thats not a biggie and is very cheap. good luck. post back with the end result.