My 83 TD's AC quite working suddenly. Has a pretty major leak somewhere and unfortunately I had just cleaned the underside of the motor with high pressure water so any dye/ester oil would have been washed away. This was a few days after I changed out the turbo oil return tube o-rings and seals that were leaking oil.

About 4 months ago my indy installed a rebuilt "four seasons" compressor and new dryer. AC was working great since then. He has a feeling it is either the crappy compressor or manifold hoses. I have not seen any oil on any hoses except for the just replaced return line from the power steering which was weeping on the AC hose right under it. All cleaned up now.

Has anyone had any experience with the evaporator or concenser going south on their MB. The evaporator seems to be the worst since it is (a) expensive and (b) hard to get at/out.

I'm taking tomorrow off to work with my indy on resolving this problem. It would seem to be the last thing to do to my TD to be "perfect" since I just got all the vacuum door locks fixed.

Daisy (300TD-T) needs your help.

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Mike Holbrook
1983 MB 300TD-T (aka -- Daisy)
Spring Valley, CA

You are new here so you may not have had a chance to discover our excellant ' search' feature... there is a little ' button' in the line at the top of the page...
Check out " four seasons"... often spelled ' four siezens" or something like that.... and you should read all the ac cleaning threads you can find....
also check out Aircondion.com with its forum...
There is a LOT of stuff already written on the subjects you have mentioned...
Did you do a complete flush when that four seasons was installed ? Did you put a new REciever Dryer on at that time? Are you running 134a or R12 ? Are we discussing the ' pancake ' style compressor ? Do you have an inline filter just upstream of the compressor ?
These are some of the things you need to investigate and consider...

Of course with a leak it may have stopped just due to the low pressure switch working correctly and taking the electricity away from the AC clutch...

Yes, I did look into the search for A/C and air conditioner etc. I found out quite a bit of information there.

I do have an 134 conversion and it was converted before I bought the car. The A/C was working fine when the compressor was removed but the bearing was quite noisy and I was worried about that. The replacement compressor was the four seasons (brand/rebuild company) and it was installed with a new dryer at my indy with a pretty knowledgable MB tech. That tech has now moved to another city and the owner/senior tech is who I am dealing with. I don't believe there is an in-line filter other than the dryer. The hoses all are factory crimped hoses. The system was not flushed as it was not open to atmosphere for any prolonged period of time.

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Mike Holbrook
1983 MB 300TD-T (aka -- Daisy)
Spring Valley, CA

ok,,, but something must be wrong for it to only last that long...
IE.... oil not getting to that bearing that went out...or trash in the system..
Since you are not likely the original owner you have little way of knowing if something gave way at some point in the past and left residue in the system... so it would be good to flush it ... just consider it ' insurance'...
Since the Reciever Dryer IS a potential source of TRASH into the system ( the dessicant) ... it would be cheap and good policy to put an inline filter just before the compressor....
The manuals state their case as " if the system has a major leak it is considered compromised" ... which I know makes little sense given it is all under pressure until completely empty... but anyway... they suggest flushing as good procedure for longivity...

Actually, I'm not convinced that the compressor is the culpret because it is so recently installed. But, there is a leak and we have to try to find that. Additionally, it appears that R4 compressors should not be rebuilt but purchased new. The tech is going to send it back and upgrade to new in any case. He knows what he is doing so hopefully, with me there to tear into things and help, we can get this done quickly and with a minimum of pain.

In San Diego, it generally doesn't get that hot but I am really used to having a working AC and don't like anything on my Panzer to not work properly. The car is a real cream puff even at 214k and I intend to keep it that way.

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Mike Holbrook
1983 MB 300TD-T (aka -- Daisy)
Spring Valley, CA

I was not trying to indicate the problem THIS TIME is the compressor... as I said... the low refrigerant condition will stop everything...
But the length of time the other compressor lasted may indicate a problem existed ( dirt or wrong oil or something) when the last compressor was installed...
Yes, rebuilding of those compressors is usually NOT recommended...