MACS Service Reports - 2016 - OCT1

Total Vehicle Climate and Thermal ManagementTM

October 2016

By Paul Weissler, MACS Senior Technical Correspondent

MISSING A/C STICKER
answer from engineering, which may not have released the final
spec, even though it's available somewhere. You might think
(actually hope) that later in the model year or whenever the information is readily available for the decal, that it also would be
released for on-line service information. Doesn't seem to happen.
The ugly fact is that the car makers don't want to invest a lot of
time in their service information systems - they never have, and
with today's increased complexity, they often feel they're invest

techauthority.com

It's been a long-time irritant for us: the under-hood A/C decal
is missing and you have to recharge the system. So you go to
your aftermarket service information system and it says something like "Check under-hood decal." Next, you ask a friend
who has a subscription to the OE website, and he finds the same
listing (FIG. 1). What now?
So you call another friend who has another aftermarket
system and he comes up with a specification. What's going
on here?
The simple answer is that the first aftermarket system simply
checked the OE system and repeated what it said. Normally
that's what all leading aftermarket information systems will do,
unless it gets a specific call and request from a subscriber. Then it
may go a step further.
What is that step? If the request comes in early in the model's
life, the aftermarket provider may call a local dealer with a car
in the shop and make the simple check. More likely: if the aftermarket provider knows that the next year's model is just a carryover (by checking other specs, such as body size and powertrain
details) he'll look at the following year's service information to
see if it has a spec, furnish that information to the technician, and
typically that spec will make its way into the aftermarket provider's information for the model year with the missing data.
The reason a spec may be missing: some possibilities are: 1)
whoever is entering the service information may query engineering and doesn't get an answer; 2) the spec isn't available at
the moment and whoever has to enter the info in service information doesn't have time to wait; 3) he gets a "check the decal"

Figure 1: OE techinfo website for Fiat Chrysler shows this: 2004-2005
Durango service information simply says to check the underhood label.
No specification if it's missing. But notice that it's in the HB platform
series.

ALSO INSIDE THIS ISSUE:

"Combi-Coolers" ................................................................................................................................................................................ 2
"Remote Air Conditioning System" ............................................................................................................................................... 4
So Simple To Fix, Except... .............................................................................................................................................................. 6
Another Case With A Familiar System, But A Totally Different Cause ................................................................................. 6
Once Again: The Problem With Another Cause ......................................................................................................................... 7
On The Other Hand ............................................................................................................................................................................ 7
However, We Heard Nothing About... ............................................................................................................................................ 7
By The Way: Infrared Temperature Sensors .............................................................................................................................. 8
We All Do Not-So-Bright Things ..................................................................................................................................................... 8
MACS Service Reports is the official technical publication of the
Mobile Air Conditioning Society Worldwide, Inc., P.O. Box 88,
Lansdale, PA 19446. The material published in MACS Service
Reports expresses the views of the contributors and not necessarily that of MACS. Every attempt has been made to ensure

October 2016

the accuracy of the content of MACS Service Reports. MACS,
however, will not be responsible for the accuracy of the information published nor will MACS Worldwide be liable in any way for
injury, labor, parts or other expenses resulting from the use of
information appearing in MACS Service Reports.

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of MACS Service Reports - 2016