A/C Picture & info request

[clhyer]

Evening,
The Moultrie, Ga. fall car show & swap meet will be in a couple weeks. I was thinking about going down and purchasing an aftermarket a/c system. I would really like to see some pictures of any systems that y'all might have installed. Different companies, what was your experience, good or bad points, would you purchase the same system if you could do it over?

Mine will be going in a '72 Duster. It was an a/c car although nothing remains of the system. I also have a '75 Duster parts car with a complete system. My goal for the car is to have a nice looking, daily driver. A/C is a must...
Thanks,
C

 

[nephlyte]

My friend got an aftermarket system from classic auto air. It was supposed to be "designed" for a 69 GTO. "Designed for" was a loose term over at classic air auto. If The GTO was a round hole, they sent us an oval peg.

But no worries, just shave off a little here and there and it fits right in. That was our experience. We put about 4 solid afternoons into the project. We are fairly experienced with cars. It also only involved the usual garage tools, i don't think that we needed any special tools of any sort.

A few tips:

Mountings and tube cutting is final. TAPE the whole system together before you crush, cut, drill, or weld anything.

Take your fittings to a trusted shop to crush them. The gas is under extreme pressure and leaks are common if you don't get it crushed from the best. We had several leak issues after the whole thing was done.

Get a shitload of washers and spacers to mount the compressor and compressor mounting bracket. When the bolt the bracket together, it will NOT line up to the other pulleys on your car.

Also, sometimes the pre angled fittings they send you are not exactly correct. Hammer them gently when altering them. Nothing makes you angrier than completing the whole project then breaking one of these things.

Umm, get a punching bag. You will be getting mad.

All in all, now that i've done it once, i would buy this system again. Mainly because i know there is no way they can tailor a system to YOUR car, but they did a decent job of it. And now that i know whats up, i could easily avoid some of the rookie mistakes i made.