AC compressor dying an early death?

[joaks]

My AC has been not particularly cold lately and now is making a noise (but gets cold when it is noisy!). From the inside of the car the noise sounds like a slipping belt but when I look under the hood the noise does not sound like a belt. Sounds more like a bad bearing perhaps (??). A quick google search tells me that it is most likely a compressor going bad but this compressor is about 3 years old. Is it really plausible for a compressor to go out so soon??

EDIT: as early as yesterday the noise was different. Sounded almost like a supercharger "whine." Before that, no noise and mediocre cooling.

 

[default]

OEM or reman?

 

[antiqueshell]

Anything is possible. Did the shop that repaired the system add the correct amount and type of oil? If not that could drastically reduce the life of a compressor. Most folks only think about the amount of refrigerant in the system and forget about the critical part of refrigerant OIL and just as important the TYPE of oil it calls for.

 

[joaks]

I did read something about the oil. I would assume it got the new oil. It originally had the old refrigerant (R12?) but should have the new refrigerant also. My understanding was you cannot use old oil in a new system but did not find anything about new oil in an oil system.
I don't know if it was a reman or not. The shop at a terrible time finding the correct part. It was not performed at a Subaru shop so I suspect not a new OEM compressor.

 

[antiqueshell]

There are TWO types of oil for R134a systems as well. I wonder which one your system calls for?

 

[zzyzzx]

Originally Posted By: antiqueshell
There are TWO types of oil for R134a systems as well. I wonder which one your system calls for?


There is more than two. Off the top of my head:

PAG46
PAG100
PAG150

And those are just for the 5 cars that I maintain.

 

[artificialist]

Originally Posted By: antiqueshell
There are TWO types of oil for R134a systems as well. I wonder which one your system calls for?

Typically OEM systems use PAG oil that come in various viscosities, some with detection dye and some without it.

Retrofitted systems usually have POE oils.