Air Con issues
 

My air con is no longer cooling the air and the air coming through has become noticeably more humid ( I live in a high humidity envionment). Prior to this happening, for a few months I had vapour coming through the left air vents. No smell and at least the air was still cool then. I was told at the time this was normal in high humidity environments.

When I switch on the air con in AUTO mode the fan speed goes to 3/4 of full speed and simply stays there with the air coming through not particularly cold. The other thing I've noticed in association with this is that the green light on the AUTO switch remains on. Before I distinctly remember being able to select this mode off and armed.

Does anyone have any ideas about what is at fault, could it be the AC control panel or is it something related to the AC system itself - a leak perhaps?

Also I have spoken to a mechanic about it and he reckons that it could possibly be expensive to fix, depending on the problem, not because of parts but because of labour as for certain faults the whole dash has to be removed to get to the offending parts. Does this sound reasonable?

Many thanks for any help you can give.

FWIW, My AC wasn't very cold and the interior fan was running very fast. So into the shop; AC refrigerant was removed, measured and refilled. The X5 only holds 1lb of refrigerant so it doesn't take much to make it not work correctly. My bill was $105.

we had cool air on drivers side and warm on passenger. dual zone unit, indie told us that it was heater (water) valve. he fixed it, didn't touch a/c system, and it works great!

guys, my problem is that from time to time the AC only cools the left side (driver side) and the other side (right and rear) just blow air not cold at all, 1st i went to the mechanical and he refilled the gaz, and life was perfect, after few months (now) the problem came back! could someone advice what is the problem? how to fix it :)
oh one more thing, i noticed that when the fan speed is low then all zones cools (or maybe i feel so)

just keep refilling it, it seems to work in the short term...

If you refilled the A/C circuit and the problem came back after some time you obviously have a leak somewhere. If the passenger side A/C starts being less effective it is a first sign of low refrigerant. A garage or an A/C shop will be able to trace the circuit and find the leak. They should check if there is no leak at the low or high pressure A/C valves as I have seen several X5 with leaking valves including mine.

unless, of course, it is not the real problem in the first place.

have the circuit traced, then come back for more help

I experienced the same problem:
- mist coming from vent
- drivers side cooler air, passenger side warmer air (regardless of center vent mixture control)
- higher fan speed on auto (presumably because the passenger side is heating and the driver side is cooling)... I believe this to be an ancillary side effect
- on two different days (in the past 4 months), the fan would make a lot of noise, but not actually blow significant air. I replaced the FSR this morning... I believe this issue is separate from the rest, so I'm hoping the new FSR resolves it. PS -thanks to this forum for the FSR DIY... took me about 20minutes to do, and I am not extremely technical.
- no smells/odors

NEXT STEPS:
- I am torn between "recharging the AC" vs. "replacing the Heater Valve"
- I figure the $$ spent to diagnose it would be better spent just replacing the two components listed above.
- tried "tapping" the heater valves physically with a wrench - no luck.

Any thoughts?

how hard did you hit the heater valves? you need to really wack them if they are not working. try a 10 lb hammer and really thump it.

then again, you could just trust my indie who says it is a common problem...

About as hard as you'd pound a picture hangar into sheetrock... I was afraid to hit the AC? lines located just above it...

I will probably just R&R the heater valve...

Thanks.