Ok so my wife has a 2010 Honda Civic. It was making a terrible noise from the AC compressor bearings being blown out. I got a new compressor and installed it. I did not have it evacuated. I just unhooked the lines and let it leak out, then put the new one on and hooked everything back up. I took it today to get recharged and had them charge it. It works....but not very well as compared to before. The tech called me back and said that he sees I just replaced it, and asked if I replaced the evaporator or drier. I did not. Should I have done this? He said that's why it wasnt getting very cold.

I read online that wrong freon levels can cause this as well, or a clogged line.

just looking for anything to try or test before i have to dive back into this and order more parts that I don't have money for.

 

The compressor didn't shed any metal through the system, right? A red flag for this is if the oil looked black/gray or kind of shimmered with metallic flakes. And are your condenser fins clean? If you left the system open long enough then yeah, it could have accumulated enough moisture to do that, but it should show with higher than normal pressures on a gauge.

Does it just not cool in general, or only in certain situations? A number of things could be happening at this point, but that A/C shop should be able to figure it out with a set of manifold gauges and a service manual.