I drive a 94 chevy cavalier RS with a 2.2 Inline 4 Engine

I've had this problem for a while with my car for a while and I've just been avoiding it but there's a mettalic sound under the hood that gets worse when i raised RPM's. It sounds like a bearing's going bad. After talking to some people and examining it myself I figure out that it might be something with the AC compressor...I think the clutch is going out on it.

I see that there are AC Compressors on ebay but I don't know what to do. I'm not certified to work on AC systems so I can't do it myself. Should I buy the part and give it to a mechanic to do the rest or what? I just don't want to put a whole lot into this car :2cents: and I wonder if they can just take it out and put something else where it was. I don't even use the AC

First, pull the serpentine belt off and make sure the sound goes away. Then, if it does, spin all the pulleys by hand to be sure that it is the A/C compressor that is making the noise. There can be more than one bad pulley, so spin them all just to be sure. Give them a good wiggle too, sometimes a pulley will get loose even before it gets noisy.

I think that most of the A/C compressors on e-bay are used or cheaply "remanufactured". One of my friends bought one and I installed it for him, so far (only 4 months) it's good. You don't have to be certified to work on an A/C system. The sticker under the hood that says "this system to be serviced by qualified personnel only" or whatever is just for the manufacturers liability. You need to take it to a shop and have the refrigerant sucked out, and take it back to have it recharged, but you can do everything in between yourself.

There are many A/C bypass pulleys that bolt on in place of the A/C compressor to maintain the factory belt and routing. Some engines don't need one, you can just go with a shorter belt. I believe you can do this on the 2.2, but I'm not sure. Check your routing before you try this, many times the shorter rerouted belt will rub on something.