I'm in the process of restoring my 70 L46 coupe. It's an original A/C car and all of the pieces are there, though nothing worked including the fan. I've gotten to the point I need to decide what to do with it. From reading other posts here, some have rebuilt the original unit, and some have gone with Vintage Air or other aftermarket. I didn't really see any need to go A/M, until I read a couple of posts here that said it's as expensive or more expensive to rebuild the stock system. Is that true? They didn't go into detail though. Is that if it is sent off, or just the parts to do it yourself? I can't imagine it costs 2K for parts. But, A/C is about the only part of a car I've never replaced or rebuilt. Frankly, I don't even really understand how they work. Outside of flushing and charging, which I'll have a shop do, are there any special skills or tools required to rebuild it?

What are my options? The Vintage Air is $1500. Keeping it original is not that important to me and I have lots of storage, so I'll definitely keep the original parts in case someone ever wants to put it back stock. I like it because it does away with the big box in the engine bay (see, I don't even know what that is). Plus I assume it's lighter. Only thing I don't like is losing the stock look of the controls, but I guess I can live with that. And I read it's more efficient, though some say a properly functioning stock system still outperforms it. I live in North Texas so it gets very hot and humid in the summer. If I lived in a more temperate climate, I'd probably just leave it off, but not around here.

 

If you are pretty handy with tools and enjoy doing that kind of work, I would suggest that you keep MOST of the original A/C system intact -- IF some of the more expensive pieces of the stock A/C system are still viable: such as the evaporator coil, the condenser unit, and the A/C-heater controls. The evaporator and condenser just need to be sealed well when vacuumed down. They should not leak ANY with a test of several hours (once the vacuum reading stabilizes). If so, you can just do a conversion to a modern Sanden compressor and 134a refrigerant by purchasing a much less expensive conversion kit, like offered by Custom Auto Air. Half the cost of a V/A system, comes complete with all brackets and hardware for YOUR model/year car, and will operate just exactly like the stock system worked (same controls, etc).

What's not to like?

 

Well, I do kind of like the idea of gaining the space in the engine bay.

I'll have to check out the evaporator and condenser. The system is out of the car, can I just use a MightyVac to test them, or is it more involved?

 

You need to suck it down close to complete vacuum...so that you can test it properly. If you have an auto A/C shop or a heating/cooling place near you, you could ask if they could check them for you. Likely not much cost to do that. Then you would know what your options are.

 

I'm sure there are several around here. Thanks.