air conditioning compressor

[sigjam]

Does any body other than me have a noisy air conditioning compressor on their Versa? Mine is so loud it is driving me crazy. and my dealer does not want to do anything about it because it is still functioning!

[Ever Victorious]

The V has a somewhat noisier compressor than some other cars, but one thing you can do to test is go to the dealer and have them fire up another V, and turn on its AC. The noise levels should be similar between the two cars. If it's not, that's an indicator that your compressor may be going out... and your dealer, if they know it's dying, should want to replace your compressor BEFORE it fails and causes an inconvenience to their customer.

[Infarction]

My Versa has 1300 miles on it and in that time the compressor has gotten progressively louder. I plan to point it out when I get my first service done.

Another odd thing that I've noticed is that the V seems to behave differently at different times with the AC on: sometimes the car seems to have lost a ton of power and other times it's just as punchy as with the AC off. It's as if the compressor is presenting a different load at different times, but I'm not familiar with the internals of AC compressors, so I can't begin to imagine what kind of failure would cause that. I guess it could also be my clutch foot that's inconsistent

[Ever Victorious]

Actually, I don't think it's your imagination. I've noticed the AC compressor seems to "back off" a bit as far as parasitic drag at higher rpms, and oddly enough it also gets colder at that point.

I think they should take a page from themselves. They already made the power steering an electric pump, they should just make the A/C an electric driven accessory as well, and compensate with a more powerful alternator. That would probably help keep things more consistent.

[BBISHOPPCM]

EV, I love the idea of an electrically driven AC compressor, but wouldn't that create a huge draw on the alternator, and thus, the engine, therefore no benefits would be gained? I often thought of installing a household A/C in my old Nissan pickup (Larry the Cable Guy-style), but to the best of my knowledge, no alternator upgrade would be powerful enough to drive a 12vdc AC compressor. I could be wrong on this one (and probably am).

[Ever Victorious]

Well, a household air conditioner draws far more power than an automotive one, since it has to cool a considerably larger area. So obviously a household one would not work.

But IIRC, the Prius has an electric A/C system, and it can function when the gas motor is off as a result.

In the sense of a normal gas engine, you would just need to use the appropriate sized alternator. Granted, the new alternator would itself cause more drain. The question then becomes, however, does it generate MORE drain than the A/C system would, or less?