Whats this noise?

[ThirdgenTa]

It happens sometimes and goes away and then comes back. I'm thinking it's a pulley but I thought once they go bad that they keep making the noise. Could it be my belt? It kinda sounds like metal on metal.

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[Turbocharged400sbc]

sounds like the beginnings of compressor pulley/bearing failure with that lovely tingy sound of the clutch plate dragging against it

shuts up when you put on the ac right?

 

[slowchevy]

That's the air conditioning compressor clutch beginning to fail. Mine sounded the exact same way. Luckily, they are cheap (low 200s) for a good one. The bad part is when I recharged my system, the line on the firewall decided to go bye bye. I had tim from chitown (primhatch) do the install / recharge.

 

[ThirdgenTa]

That sounds about right.. Was hoping it would be something a little cheaper. A/C runs ice cold still. Do I need to replace this pretty soon or will it cause damage?
AC Delco one fine?

 

[Turbocharged400sbc]

That sounds about right.. Was hoping it would be something a little cheaper. A/C runs ice cold still. Do I need to replace this pretty soon or will it cause damage?
AC Delco one fine?

it can be cheaper but a little more of a pain, right now its not too bad, if you bought a new clutch/pulley/bearing assembly you can get it swapped out without discharging the ac refrigerant

you have to remove the belt, 13mm shaft nut, use a special external thread puller that tightens into the clutch hub and you crank down the center bolt to pull off the clutch, once its off you yank off an external snapring and the pulley/bearing come right off and as long as the bearing wasnt worn enough to destroy the electromagnet its just slapping the new parts back on. clutch can be half the cost of a comp or better and mostly you can rent the puller tools

if you leave it as is it will get louder but you can bend away the clutch cover to negate it as the bearing wears. you have at least a month to maybe 6months before it gets bad enough that even your radio wont drown it out.

if your car has well over 100k then it may be smarter to just get a new compressor as the shaft seals do eventually leak on em and the r134a will leak out.

 

[slowchevy]

^ is exactly why I went the route of a new compressor, I was at 160~ on it. Rockauto is where I got mine.

 

[BrianG]

God damn, James knows EVERYTHING!

 

[Turbocharged400sbc]

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