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Oh hey, a dedicated A/C thread!  I've been trying to isolate an issue with my 99 Jeep XJ's AC for months if not years now. tl;dr - I think there's a leak somewhere but damned if I can find it. I am fairly convinced it's the evap core but I want to be absolutely sure before I start tearing it all up. So this spring/summer I tried to refill the system since it was low, just to get an idea of where I was. Got cold air, but it started blowing warm again after 1-2 weeks. Refilled the system with added UV dye, got a sniffer tool, checked everything I could for leaks. I didn't see any dye spots aside from a tiny bit around the bolts that join the lines to the compressor, but the sniffer didn't go off there. I cleaned that off and ran for another day and the dye didn't reappear there, so I think that was just a fluke from me being messy. The only place I haven't visually inspected yet is, of course, the evaporator core, which is behind the dashboard. I tried using the sniffer tool in the cabin and in the vents but I couldn't get a solid reading even with the sensitivity all the way up. It definitely reacts to r134a but it also seems to get set off by the air moving, so jamming it down the vent makes it go off regardless!  I caught water from the evap drain with a paper towel and checked that for dye... Nothing there. The sniffer didn't detect anything from the water either. However, there is a metal piece right below the drain that has a couple holes in it. After I ran the AC and drove around for a bit, the sniffer would trigger if I put it into that hollow metal space. I know r134a is heavier than air, so maybe there's a chance it was leaking out from the drain and collecting in that space? I don't know if there's a drain in the bottom of that space anywhere. Here's a pic of that area I'm talking about (not my Jeep, someone else's, it looks 99% identical). The red part is the metal piece. The purple shows two plastic plugs that are not in place on my XJ, so water and air can get in there. 
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Aug 10, 2023 20:52
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| # ¿ May 9, 2024 11:31 |
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Motronic posted:Sounds like you know exactly where the leak is and just need to bite the bullet, pull the cabin fan and get a black light and/or endoscope up in there to confirm that last 1% before you enter sucktown pulling your dash. Ooh, I didn't even think about pulling out the cabin fan and checking that way, nice! I wouldn't mind getting an endoscope for my toolbox. Any recommendations on decent ones?
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Aug 10, 2023 22:48
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Motronic posted:This is the one I currently use: Perfect, thanks! Adding that to the shopping list. Reviews indicate it also works in Linux via VLC so I'm set there as well. 
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Aug 10, 2023 22:56
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