03 A/C compressor relief valve

[Inman Lanier]

My A/C stopped cooling the other day. It has ~65K miles and has worked fine. I charged it and immediately noticed a good sized amount of R-134 coming out of the compressor relief valve.
Has anyone seen this before? Was yours a defective valve, or you had system blockage? If blockage, where was it? Can you replace the relief valve or is it a rupture disk?
Thanks,

[Jeffcarl]

Buy a new one. Mitsubishi part # MN177247. I have the same issue. A Mits mechanic gave me the bulletin and said this part is now avail, didn't used to be avail as a replaceable part. It seems to be a problem. Warranty bulletin Says "Repair on a customer complaint basis only."

[Inman Lanier]

Thanks - I had finally found a dealer not too lazy to look up the part, yes it's been replaced. Sounds like a design defect - springs shouldn't fail like that.

[DadsAuto]

Wow! What a relief. Someone who has the same problem at almost the same time. I also have a 2003 Galant 2.4 L in which I drive with the AC on 95 percent of the time (I live in S Florida). It was in the 70's the other day so I said what the heck, lets open the sunroof and open the windows and give the AC a day off. SOB!! I give the AC a day off and it thanks me by not working the next day. I drove for no more than 4 miles and I started to smell chemical fumes through the vent then I saw little puffs of white smoke coming from my hood... then the vents stop blowing cold air.

It's such a pisser because I have an extended mfg warranty up to 48K miles and my odometer just posted 49.5K miles. So I bought one of those AC charger gun kits along with a UV dye indicator and UV sunglass and UV pen (60 bucks all together). I put in the dye and nothing. SOB! I figure the dye isn't circulating since most of the C134 has sprayed out. So I decided to go ahead and charge the system and in charging it maybe I can spot the leak. Aha! I spotted the leak! It wasn't in the hoses but it was right on the compressor. WTF! I didn't even know what a relief valve was till I read this post but I'm sure that's what was spraying. A hexagonal bolt with a circular stupid looking thing inside it. And that little F'er was spraying R134 all over the place.

So here's where I'm at. I can't find the part online. How did you ask for it with the dealer? I hear that sometimes they won't sell those kinds of parts for greedy reasons. How much did you buy it for? Can you give me the name of the dealership? Maybe I can just mail order it from them. Once you replaced the relief valve, how did you recharge the system? Did you vacuum it before recharging? Did you bring it to an AC place to have it charged? I read some posts that it may work without vacuuming the system but it could lead to other problems later.

I appreciate your help!!! Dad's Auto

[DadsAuto]

Jeff and Inman - You guys rock!

Thanks for your help. I've written to you both but I'm going to write on the post so someone else can benefit.

As a recap, my AC has been working just fine on my 2003 Galant 2.4L with 49K miles. I pretty much drive with my AC on all the time. A few days ago, it was nice so Ioutside, I decided to drive the day without AC. The next day, I drove less than 4 miles and I smelled some chemical fumes and saw a slight puff of white smoke coming from the hood. Then the AC stopped blowing cold air. I opened the hood and it was a little smokey. Basically the R134 refridgerant was spraying onto the engine causing the smoke and there was a thin film of oil from the AC system on some of the hoses.

At first I didn't know what was going on. I went home did some research on the web and then went to Advanced Auto Parts and bought a AC recharge gun kit, UV dye and UV light pen. It came to $60 bucks. I went home injected the Dye and nothing happened. I didn't see any leaks. So I decided to charge the system and upon doing so, all the dye started to spray right out of the AC compressor. It was coming out of the AC compressor relief valve (it's the little hexagonal bolt with a hole in it, on the topside of the compressor). Keep in mind that I was constantly checking my the pressure gauge to make sure I wasn't over charging.

I did some more research on the web... and that's when I came across Jeff and Inman with the same problem. Then I did some more research and noticed that Chrysler Sebrings were having the same problem (Sebrings use the same Mits Engine.) For the Galants this issue seemed to be applicable to the 99-03 2.4 L models. Then I went to the mitsubishisucks.com site and it's noted in the the service bulletin that the high pressure ac compressor relief valve should be replaced or fixed.

So... I went to two Mits dealers and located the ac compressor relief valve part number MN177247. I bought mine for $7.50 which included a brass and non-brass valve. That's two diffent valves. I wanted to replace the valve and charge the system myself but I knew it would be trouble if I didn't fully evacuate / vacuum the ac system. So like and idiot I go to the dealership thinking they would be nice (like an abusive relationship). First, the service rep at the Coconut Creek Mits, FL dealership was rude and quick to write up a ticket. Second, he wouldn't listen to what I had to say at all - extremely unprofessional and rude. Third, he wanted to pull his weight by impressing me by telling me the AC system is complicated (oh really?) and that he's worked there for 2 years (oh that's like a long time right?). Lastly, he wanted to charge me $89 for diagnosing the problem in which I just told him what the problem is and what I want done. Nope. He wanted $89 plus additional for dye to detect any leaks even though there's friggn green glowin dye coming from the compressor relief valve. And why would he want to charge additional for the dye? WTF. Isn't $89 enough to cover the dye? Greedy. In some cases there's some validation to his diagnosis charge but in this situation the guy wasn't listening and it was a sin for him to open the hood. So guess what? I said fine... do the diagnostic like an idiot. I went to the lounge and after sitting there for 5 minutes annoyed I walked out and asked for my car and left. I'm not going to deal with someone who isn't professional and obviously going to try to take me to the cleaners. I've heard and read too many horror stories regarding dealers ripping off and gouging customers.

So I decided to go to a small Japanese specialist shop in Boca Raton. I talked to the owner and he listened to exactly what I had to say without judgement. I asked if he could install the valve, flush the system, vacuum and recharge the ac system. He was like "Sure let's do it. Along with some good stories of ac problems and dealerships." From the moment I talked with this guy, I could tell he knew what he was talking about since he was familiar with malfunctioning relief valves. He quoted $200 and if for whatever reason there's addtional problems or he can't fix it, he'd let me know asap. If I decided to walk away if there's additional problems, he wasn't going to charge me except for any shop materials used. Cool with me.

I left the car at the shop and 3 hours later I got a call. It's done. Come and pick it up. I went to pick the car up. The bill was $212 w/ tax. I think that was very fair considering they did the following: Evacuated the ac system, replaced the relief valve on the compressor, flushed the whole system, vaccuumed and recharged the complete system and cleaned all of the hoses and ac components that got sprayed by the defective valve.

In summary, had I just let the dealership do whatever they wanted, I bet I would have had a $800 hole in my pocket and leave the car overnight. But to awesome forums like this, the web, and people willing to share and help, we are going to put out those businesses that think short term. I went the distance here in trying to explain my whole incident to help someone else out. As for most of us, I believe we are willing to pay for quality professional work but on the same token we don't want to get screwed either.

Nicholas