s211 AirCon Condensor

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KevanM

New Member
Joined
Apr 19, 2013
Messages
6
Car
Mercedes E220 AvantGarde
Had an incident with Bambi who shredded by grill and managed to puncture my aircon condenser.

Lots of aftermarket version available but how easy are they to swap?

Happy to spend a day doing it but how tricky is it? Do I need any special tools?

All help gratefully received.

Thanks

k
 
While it's illegal to vent the gas, as it's punctured I assume it's already completely vented.

The issue you'll have is that you can't regas it yourself. Once the new one is fitted, using those cans from halfords will only pressurise the system, but it'll still have air in it. You'd have to take it to a garage who'll pull a vacuum on the system which both checks for leaks and also makes sure there's no air/moisture in the system when it then fills with gas/oil.
 
Agree with above. You can swap it yourself. Make sure nothing enters the pipes, especially moisture. Tape the ends up as soon as they are removed. I would also replace the drier assembly. Then take it to get it charged with refrigerant. Tell the ac engineer which components you have swapped and they will add a quantity of oil accordingly.
 
How old is the car? It can be a whole world of pain if one of the unions strips its thread when you try to remove it...

If it's an old car, whereabouts are you? I know an ace aircon man in Maidenhead.
 
Yes, grill punctured so all vented.

It's 2007. Maidenhead would work - working a lot in Reading.
 
He's a (mostly) one-man-band operation called Vanchilla (he does mostly van refrigeration units/systems, hence the name). Nothing is too much trouble, and I formed the opinion that he really knows what he's doing. One of the alloy female hose union nuts on my W210 had picked up and partially stripped the internal thread, and he had fabricated a tool to rethread it. It worked, too. I was impressed.
 

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