Problem:
My daughter's 87 240 has no AC and she's complaining, but with a 3.8 average going into her senior year I decided she deserves some cool. By the way she tells me at least once a week that she loves her 240!

Diagnosis:
AC has not worked for 3 yrs or so. It had some charge but not enough to let the compressor start. I put in a small amount of R12, enough to get compressor running but guages show no compressor suction or pressure at all. Released some freon and ran in a bit of oil and all of sudden I had suction and pressure but only for a short time. So my diagnosis is intermittant/bad compressor. Perhaps a sticky reed valve.

Plan:
Got AC certification to purchase freon and have found a cheap legal source for R12. Have acquired a vacume pump scavenged and adapted from an old water cooler compressor. Now I am ready to remove the compressor and have a quick look at it's internals and see if something simple can be fixed (perhaps wishfull thinking). Will then purchase new compressor if necessary, VOV if available for this model, receiver/drier and reassemble. I plan to stick with good old R12.

Question:
While the compressor is out is there a way to keep the power steering going? IPD bypass kit for this purpose is only good up to 1984. It appears the power steering pulley and the crank pulley would align with a longer belt of the correct length. Anyone done this and do you know what length belt to purchase or how to measure without trying out various sizes in the auto parts store parking lot.

Any comments, criticisms, suggestions etc on the plan are welcome.



--
David Hunter