I have looked and looked, but haven't run into this particular problem in the forum. Sorry if it's a repeat question!

We have a 2000 Durango with the 5.9. About a month ago, the air started blowing hot, haven't had the cash or time to deal with it, so just drove with the windows rolled down. We are taking a longish drive this weekend, so took it in to have it recharged. The shop (not dealer) charged $150, but no cold air, cooler than it was, but not cold. Did they not put in enough freon, or is there another problem? Supposedly they added the freon with the die, but they said they couldn't find a leak. We ran a blacklight over it when we got home, but didn't see anything either. I would assume that if they HAD fully recharged it, for it to not be blowing cold already would mean a leak large enough to see easily?

Anyone have any thoughts/suggestions? Thanks!

 

How long have you had your D? I know that from what is said about the a/c on the forum and from personal experience that the a/c isn't very cold at all. I have seen some freon in autozone that is advertised to be like 25% colder or something so you may want to see if you can try that. It is very easy to recharge your system you just have to hook the bottle up and put the freon in it's basically the same as putting air in your tires as far as ease of use.

 

As mean Green stated, it's easy to do, but it is just as easy to blow up your A/C if you do not follow the instructions on charging your A/C. Just make sure you read the equipment correctly and do not add more than what the system is design for. Overfilling can just be as bad as not having enough. You can blow the compressor seals and then you are out a compressor. Also, be very careful about filling the system with the freon can upside down. I am sure you seen alot of techs do this but they know what they are doing. Compressors cannot compress liquid. Techs carefully moderate the flow of liquid freon into the system so it will not mess up the compressor valves.

 

Good call Ken

 

Mine never started blowing warm air but I did notice it was not as cold as it should be (It never gets really cold, but you know what I mean) SO I went down and bought a freon at checker (closest to the house) cost about 28 bucks because I got it with a gage that comes off and you can use on other cotaners. but when I hooked it up it said I had tuns of pressure but still wasnt cold so I didn't put any thing in.. I asked my bro about it and so he thought about letting out some air to bing the pressure down so we did that and we lowerd it tell it was in the (green i think) on the gage then filled it up to the (blue which is full) and I felt the differance.. It still isn't way way cold but colder then before .....

 

Have you ever noticed how small the condensors are on the Durango's? Has anyone
seen a bigger condensor available? The stock ones are much smaller than GM truck
condensors. And seem like they would not disapate enough heat, and cause the high
side to run to high, thus in hot hot weather not get the low side low enough. I haven't
hooked my A/C to a gauge set to watch the readings , just thinking out loud.

 

They are smaller (the whole AC unit is smaller) than they should be because they were designed for the Dakota. There is a lot less cooling space in the cab of a pickup verses our Ds. DC didn't think of that and went right in with the Dak AC stuffs. With that said, yes I have read about aftermarket items available that you can replace items of the system to make the AC better overall. Sila I think was one manufacturer and there are others. Search on the web for Durango and AC problems and see what comes back. Certainly there will be forum discussions with solutions posted.

Also, I read about a hot-weather solution ( A Saudi Arabian Durango owner posted this info and it is always hot there) that involves neoprene wrapping of all of the AC lines under the hood, and then wrapping that neoprene wrapping again with the heat shield aluminum tape. That is supposedly the defact-o standard thing they do over there to all the AC lines on trucks and SUVs that have under cooling issues like we do on the D. Supposedly works like a champ.

HTH,

IndyDurango

 

I have a 2000 durango and lost the a/c about 1.5 years ago. I tested it at home with dye but could not detect anything so I took it to a friend of the family that owns a commercial truck refrigeration business. They refilled the lines w/ freon, then used a sniffer to detect the leak. At first we could not detect the leak but ended up finding it up under the cab and dash which resulted in a bad evaporator. The leak was so bad that as soon as the freon was shut off the air coming out started to warm up and within 5 mins it was very warm. From what I have heard from others is they have had a problem with the early durango's evaporators going bad. In fact the replacement evaportor from dodge has changed, they now use a heavier evaporator and a slightly larger box.