New member, hoping for some info, any help greatly appreciated.

A little background. I am a retired mechanic, worked 30 years at new car dealers ( I don't recommend this road in life to anybody) so I do have a lot of experience working on cars. My question is parts sourcing related.

My son picked up a 91 Civic hatchback. We have been working on this thing, lowered it, coil overs and adjustable control arms, roll the rears, fix all the gremlins, etc. AC has been open for years, so we replaced everything, condenser, evaporator, expansion valve, dryer, compressor, pressure switch, & complete flush of the lines. It's a Matsushida compressor, and the only thing available seems to be the 4 Seasons rebuild. Stuck with R12, 5oz mineral based oil, says 33oz refrigerant, pulled a vacuum first. Compressor was clattering from start up, pressures were erratic, didn't last 2 minutes and BOOOOOOOSH, huge gush of refrigerant blowing oil everywhere out of the compressor. My question is, should I even try another Poor Seasons? Are they known junk? Are there any other options for a compressor? Maybe switch the mount and hoses to a Sanden type? Retrofit another type compressor to the car? I just don't want to waste any more time installing junk.

 

Looking through some of the posts here, it looks like I can can put a later compressor, parallel flow condenser, and crimp ends from different vehicles on new hose to utilize the Sanden TRS090 compressor for a more reliable system.

 

I'm late here but yes upgrade to the TRS090 - more reliable, more readily available, cheaper, etc. Kudos to you for the initial R12 attempt though but sucks you lost all that refrigerant. I have a 50 lb tank of R12 I'm hoarding just for my old R12 vehicles.

Yes Four Seasons rebuilds are garbage. I would always go with a new construction Chinese clone over any rebuilt compressor.

 

We went to the local pull it yourself yard and found the compressor bracket & suction fitting from an EG, and the discharge fitting off a 97 CRV. PF condenser is 60 bucks shipped, TRS090 can be had new for $150 or so. I see there is a new TR70 clone, but it is $300, and it would seem Four Seasons sells one for $400, butI have read that is not a great design to begin with. I think this is definitely the way to go. I will come back and post the results when it is done.