Air conditioning and R134a

[Ken Greenlaw <mercury@sprintmail.com>]

Three words: don't do it.

R-134a is a product of a lot of research by General Motors that resulted in a refrigirant that requires a higher operating pressure and doesn't cool as well as R-12.  Besides being incompatible with the O-rings and oil in your system, it just won't work as well.  If you thought your system was marginal in its efficacy before and didn't like the way the A/C killed your engine's performance, wait until you try R-134a.

The good news is that there is a viable replacement for R-12 called FrigC, or FR-12.  It's actually 10% better at cooling your system than R-12 is, won't trash the ozone layer, and won't kill your seals.  You need to use synthetic oil, but that's it.  Besides working better and costing less, it also works at about 40% the pressure of R-12, meaning it wears your system less and doesn't kill performance so much.  The only problem is that though it's distributed by Pennzoil (it's actually made by Intermagnetics General Corporation) it's not widely available from installers.  I had to drive miles to find someone to put it in my Alfa Romeo, and I'm not entirely sure he knew what he was doing.  FrigC is a combination of tetrafluoroethane, chlorotetrafluoroethane and butane.

But the stuff does work, works well, isn't flammable (god forbid any of you have tried mixing R-22 and propane...) and offers more than one good reason to switch.  Try www.frigc.com and you'll get Pennzoil's page trumpeting its virtues.

-Ken

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