Slick, if I had realized sooner I was getting the chinese stuff at probably the dealer price, yes, I would have checked into that. I could have gotten chinese off of eBay for under $30, but the wife was on me to just get it done! I'm just hoping maybe I got "good chinese". It's still working right now, so at least maybe I have solved the mystery of what the problem was. That was the biggest part of the battle. I guess at least I didn't pay a dealer or another shop $300 or $400 to play around with it. If it goes out again, I will definitely check with the contact you named -- thanks!

Paul, I think you are on the right track with looking at the FSR as the culprit. So far, seems to have fixed mine (fingers crossed).

BTW -- I am something of a soldering expert. So, I will rip the potting compound out of the old one, do a little forensic investigation on it, and see if I can resolder it to make a spare. Maybe I'll see some improvements I can make to it. If so, I'll report here.

Even better. Let us know how it goes. I bet you will figure it out.

Hi X5cat! I was just wondering about the part that you replaced and caused
your auxiliary fan to work. However I' having the same problem too,
where my A/C work intermittenly specially when stoping at red lights/traffic
I wanted to know exactly at which part you're refering to?
It is the one pictured below located upfront just above the radiator?

Please let me know before ending-up to buy expensive aux fan for nothing

X5 Cat replaced the FSR. Final Stage Resistor. This unit fails, and causes erratic blower motor functions.

mysweetx5, yours sounds like you need to have an AC specialist add refrigerant. Go to an AC shop, and let them test your system, and add Freon.

Also, everyone, please add your car info into your sig. Like mine for example. Helps the people replying identify your car on the fly. Thanks.

No slickGT1, it's not like I don't have freon in the system, it just blowing
regular hot air specially when stop or after sitting at the sun light for so long, and it seems not pushing enough cold air to cool off the cabine.
Otherwise any temperature from: 80 to 88 degree outside, I'm ok
N'less it goes up from: 94 to 103 degree up.

sweet, what is the refrigerant pressure? it still seems that the system is not fully charged.

On the issue when the AC still works when the ignition is off - try to disconnect the battery for about 20 minutes (it takes 16 minutes for all the modules to "die off" and lose the short-term memory). It seems that IMHA (or IHKA?) needs to be reset. If this doesn't help, then carry on with other troubleshooting techniques

No sweet, you are not reading what I am saying. I did not say you don't have freon, I said you are most likely low. Thus, the freon cannot move enough heat to cool when standing still.

Go to an AC shop. Pay the person some money. Then come back and tell us thank you.

slick, ну ты жестко с парнем!!! хахаха... так ему, поделом...

Second time in a week, I give advice, second time someone tells me no, it is not the case. The other one was the tail light guy. You finally spoon fed him the process and now he gets it. And that is his second post on the issue.