Spurshot

Just my experience with being part of a number of class actions over my lifetime... these are the "pyramid schemes" of the legal profession, imo. The way they work is a lawyer finds a large number of people that feel wronged, of which even a fraction of that group collectively could amount to an extremely large amount of compensation. The defendant has to have huge financial resources for these schemes to be worthwhile to the lawyers. The lawyers advertise/inform or count on others like this forum to do the advertising for them, because direct advertising isn't always legal in all states. The "class" has to get big enough to become a formidable financial threat to the corporate defendant. Once the critical mass of a threat is achieved by enough people joining the class action, the lawyers of the defendant have to settle to avoid huge financial risk of going to court. The plaintiff lawyer is happy to settle even for small fractions of huge total class damages because he gets something like 1/3 rd of the total. The class gets the rest, divided up. It almost always means the lawyer makes a huge payday for a case he never intended to go to trial for and individuals of the class action get a pittance of their actual losses. I've received a number of tiny checks over the years to support this. Btw, these often take many years to settle. Your truck will probably be hauling lawnmowers by the time you get your "settlement". My experience suggests a final dispersed settlement for individuals will be closer to $10 than $1000. But I could be wrong. It's a fact that this type of product liability has driven the consumer costs higher. I don't join class actions anymore.

Hopefully your ac is working great now? I don't think I'd join one of these class suits over $1k. GM will settle for a fraction of the class costs and most of that will go to the slimey lawyers. You'll get a check for almost enough for dinner for two at the local family feed trough. The lawyers don't have to even work on much other than filings and will cut a fat hog and make enough for that new corporate jet they've been wanting. It's a crooked racket. I choose to not participate in these kind of lawyer enriching scams.

Put a hydra-vac on it. You'll need a hydraulic pump and replace the vacuum brake booster with a hydraulic booster from a 2500-3500. You'll get 40-50% more brake pressures from the same peddle effort, but more engine clutter. No free lunches.

There may have been an issue with the compressor, because they superseded the original part. I bought the latest version recently.

Evidently, they cut it a bit closer than they could tolerate.lol

If you are going to spend $1800, look into King shocks. The ride and control work for me.

If you get a chance to see one, please post a picture of how they changed how the dryer tube is attached. That was where the failures were occurring. Just not enough braze joint area for the mass.

You got your use out of the truck AC system through the warranty period. Now the warranty is up. You wouldn't expect a manufacturer to warranty a design flaw in a computer once it's past its warranty. Same with the truck. I would go with the aftermarket condenser instead of waiting. The mechanic is generalizing. He has no way to know.

The trick to the air box is to remove the thing as a whole unit. Take the hose clamp and MAF electrical connector off, grab the snorkel and yank up sharply. Literally takes a minute or so to remove or replace. There are 3 or 4 pointed spikes on the bottom that just press into rubber grommets.

Do the black CA plates have a repetitive annual fee?

I understand both of you. I've had jobs that I didn't care for. But enjoy my current job. It's interesting, I help other coworkers and our airline customers daily. Very gratifying. It's not physical, so I can continue to do it for a long time and it pays very well. I did many things I wanted to do when I was young. Now, I'm in my earning years and even have a rewarding job. I'm very fortunate. And, to me, I feel more financial resources are more freedom to do things I want to do. My curse is: I want, I want, I want. It really sucks sometimes. My wife is the same age as I and is burnt out of her engineering job and wants to retire soon. I think she's earned it. She has put in long hours at work for decades. But her patience with work has run thin. Our combined or individual finances are both in great shape and I know she's a modest spender.

Jeff, Sorry to hear you're in a pickle. I can appreciate your situation as I get near retirement and consider all that can happen. At just over 60, I could retire, since my wife and I are fortunate to have done very well. But, it seems like I spend a lot and worry that I'll have to change my ways a bit to retire now. So, I keep working. Best regards.

It's not a precise science. Put 2 oz in for a new condenser and you'll be fine. Another 1.5 oz for new lines. The orifice is in the block where the lines attach at the firewall.

Justin has a lot of insight and experience and as in recent posts, is on the trail. My thought is to put it in neutral vs in gear while coasting down. The TC shouldn't come into play in neuchie

Very odd it's at such a low speed. Check hubs for play. Tires for true running. Steering for tie rod play.

During braking? Or even when coasting down?

Congrats on the successful replacement and servicing. About the trans fluid. I probably didn't lose but maybe a few ounces, pulling it out and draining it twice. Frankly, it was so little, I didn't check it. Probably should, now that you mention it.

As Daryl pointed out, the rise in pressure can be from moisture. But it can also be from air in the oil. If the system is at ambient pressure, air molecules wedge into the oil until it becomes saturated. You can't see the air, but it's there. When you pull a vacuum on the oil, the air want to come out. The oil will appear to boil, releasing the air. We used to degas oil we used under vacuum in the nuc biz. We had a big diameter pot like container with a flange and o ring and we put a thick clear acrylic top on it. We vacuumed it down. It would boil for hours. When it stopped boiling it was free of air. System operating pressures vary widely due to condenser air flow temps. You can google R134a pressure tables. You should put a big fan in front of the condenser to make it a more correct test. A big window fan works fine. R134a is very reactive to temperatures. In fact, I do my charging with the aid of hot water in a pot. As the system is filled, it slows to accepting more freon. I put the can in the hot water for a few seconds at a time, checking weight of the can as I go. Pressure in the canjumps dramatically when dipped in hot water and you have to be careful not to over pressure the can.

Sorry to hear that. I didn't encounter any problems. In fact I did remove it, check it and reinstalled the bad one when I couldn't locate one, just so I could drive the truck. Once I got a condenser I had to do it all again. Did you charge the system yet?

Gary, good to hear from you. And over on the "electronic truck" forum too! LOL Yeah gotta keep wifey happy. We took my truck up to Paso Robles back in April or May with the AC inop. Even with only 80f highs, she gave me the evil eye. Fixing any problem and even maintenance is gratifying. I just did the front brakes on the Camaro. I don't do my wife's car maintenance. She has a mechanic she trusts. In rare cases I'll work on her cars. It's not just about saving money, its therapy for me. When it gets to where I don't get that feeling of satisfaction, I'll pay for it to be done.

One thing that should be checked with the tires is their roundness. I believe there is a spec for it. If the tire is out of round, no balance job can fix it.

If you can't handle a little banter about a topic, you'll be frustrated here. We don't hold members to strict on-topic discussion, just civility. Yes, I do know of some aftermarket offerings. A co-worker wanted to install one in his Camaro. I spent a few hours looking around the net. There's more than a few out there that have done this to their cars. I don't personally know their security or installation difficulty. So, I'll not comment on them. He looked further into it and decided against it. Google it and you'll get more than this thread will bear. .

How timely. Right this minute, I'm sitting here in a parking lot, in my wife's Ford Flex without the key fob and no way to either start the vehicle or roll up the windows and lock it to go into the building she's in. This is the third time in 3 years that she has separated from the car with the keys while I drove off. The last time I ended up blocking the Costco gas lane with it when she got out in front of the store and I went to the gas lanes. Push button ignition...too many failure scenarios for me vs the "convenience". There's a few people that can probably tell you how convenient it is blocking the Costco gas lane with a line of a dozen cars behind

$1400 sounds pretty high. But AC work seems to be very high compared to other service. That's the main reason I bought all the equipment to service AC myself about 10 years ago. The cost of the gauges, vac pump, and other miscellaneous tools is way less than many places bill you to re-charge a system. It hasn't been all roses though. I've had my share of learning mistakes where I've replaced parts that didn't need it. This latest work on my K2 is an example. I chased the leak based on internet chatter about the lines. I bought all new lines, then noted that the compressor had been superseded due to problems I was seeing on the net too. So, I thought it may be the compressor. I even vacuum checked the condenser and evaporator with an isolation plate I made. They both vacuum checked fine. That's why I thought it was something other than the condenser and evaporator. Only after I had changed the lines and compressor and it didn't hold a charge for more than a few days did I re-check the evaporator and condenser with my adapter, using high pressure instead of vacuum. That revealed the condenser leak. So, I've spent more on parts than I needed to. Probably $500 more this time around. Still with the $500 for the new compressor and lines, plus the $240 I paid for the condenser, I'm sitting pretty well inside the going rates for a condenser replacement, plus I have an almost completely new, latest configuration, system, except for the evaporator. Of course, I spent a bunch of time working on it. No free lunches...I guess.

I would have thought the 15s, 16s, or 17s would have corrected some of these customer reported nuisance items. You have to admit, the damn chime gets your attention and more often than not, gets you to put on the belt.