A/C won't hold freon..
 

2000 Trans Am. My A/C leaks the freon out in about the course of a month. i havent had chance to go over it with the sniffer yet but i was wondering if theres a common place these cars leak from before i start looking for a leak. also does anyone make any kind of leak stopper for A/C systems? if so is it worth using and if so where can i get some? thanks!

They leak everywhere.

Get a can of refrigerant with die in it.

I am replacing a line tomorrow. Its the line that attaches to the back of the compressor and goes to the evaporator up top and it also attaches to the condensor. Its one long line, one piece. Its leaking at one of the couplings that are a piece of metal crimped to the rubber part of the line.

I did the die thing yesterday to confirm it. $25.00 on ebay for the line. Check ebay for whatever you need. Trans Am Creations probably has it.

One place to check is buy the headers where the A/C line runs. I had this problem, when the engine would torque over the header would bump the line and over time put a pin hole in it. I bought a new line, bent it out of the way and never had another issue.

Leak stopper is ideal for a vehicle you are trying to sell and intend to screw the person into thinking the AC system is in solid working order. It's on a long list of neat little things you can do to make an otherwise failed automotive system pass muster for a few days to a few weeks.

Now that I said that I'm sure there will be people chiming in saying it works great and they have used it for years.

Just wondering, what color is freon?

best way to find an A/C leak is to look at the couplings an look for traces of oil. Oh an btw its not "freon" Freon or r12 was phased out years ago, its R134A now so don't get that confused an try to charge your car with R12.

Yeah, yeah...what color is it? lol

R-134a is invisible... its a gas/liquid. R-12 is still used, just not in cars.

Ahh ok. Finding a leak would be hard then, unless it has the dye.

yes i'm aware of this. i'm EPA certified. i just was too lazy to type out R134A. but thanks i guess i'll do like ya'll said and put some dye in it.

anyone know off the top of your head how many ounces of oil the system holds?

Crap, I don't remember. . . 1.5 or 3(I think).

I use a sniffer to find leaks. . . .

But, I think die and a black light is more efficient. . . . Fill it with some die and refrigerant and go @ it with a black light. . . . . Finding/fixing AC leaks sucks.

Just go get a small bottle of stop leak. Not 134a with stop leak. Get an individual bottle of stop leak.

Today I decided to try to stop my leak before changing that bitch of a line.

I put in a 3 oz. bottle of "interdynamics" EZ Chill stop leak. It has red dye in it. ($7.99) It also has its own push-on coupler, so you don't need to buy a hose. You just push it on and it goes into the system.

Then I bought a bigger bottle of 134a ($15.99) that also had its own type of stop leak and oil treatment mixed in. It also had its own line to attach and a lever you can pull to put as much of that bottle in that you want. What you don't use you save for later.

I drove it around for 30 minutes with the air on, blasting ice cold. I stopped to check it a few times and then finally when I got home. Absolutely nothing was leaking.

So we'll see what happens.