kishy's 1985 Country Squire

[gadget73]

probably set for R134a pressures, usually the low switch gets tweaked downward with that.

bad memory on the O ring, I was thinking it went up inside but on the port makes more sense. I just remember there was one in that system somewhere.

if the evap is bad, maybe consider swapping it over to a spring lock type and changing the hoses. I think it would force a condenser swap too, the liquid line would be spring lock at both ends. Drier also has to change. The compressor manifold was threaded on the FS6 until they swapped it for whatever they call the later one.

[kishy]

Yeah, I believe this was probably converted to a hydrocarbon refrigerant previously, and as I'm coming to understand, you have to overcharge the crap out of the system to get the switch to stay engaged, so reducing the set point is the much smarter option. It did not have 134A conversion fittings on it when I got it. It also didn't have an AC belt at all IIRC.

Confirming, the evaporator core is bad. It leaks into the interior of the car. This has been verified with a sniffer. The brand of HC12A I have is pine scented for leak detection which is how I picked up on it to begin with, and my combustible gas detector picked up very small concentrations in the foot wells, moreso on the passenger side, and higher concentration sticking it up into the floor vents. No readings anywhere under the hood, at any connection point, or around the compressor or condenser.

In order to reduce waste, unpleasantness, and hazards, I vacuumed down a recovery tank I have, and used it to suck out the contents of the system. Of course, doing this with only vacuum means I didn't really get all that much of it, but it dropped the pressure enough that the leak should be basically a non-issue until I sort it out properly.

Evaporators for the 85- threaded connections basically don't exist anywhere in 2025. RockAuto does still list it as out of stock, and I did recently have an availability alert set on them which I did get a notification from, but I didn't buy one because I didn't think I'd need it, and they went out of stock again. Hopefully they turn up again.

Converting to the newer setup is probably smarter but I believe it's correct that it will force swapping the condenser. I'm sort of invested in hoses and O-ring kits for the earlier system so if I can get my hands on a matching evaporator I'll do that. If that looks impossible and I get impatient, I'll swap to the newer stuff.

Did notice an oil puddle in a new place. The compressor is leaking oil, seemingly from the front, unclear if it's running down from behind the clutch or if it's the gasket under the front part of the compressor body. Can't really make any sense of how it's leaking oil but not refrigerant, but either way I'll need to pull it from the car again and figure out what's up with it. It was an old stock reman bought from someone on eBay so there is no warranty, but for anything short of a cracked housing it should be DIY-repairable since the body just bolts together.

[gadget73]

more likely the seal than the end gasket. Not a whole lot going on with that seal, its a ceramic face type, and the body just has an O ring where it goes into the front plate.

but yeah its not hard to take it apart. Seal kits can be had and they aren't real expensive. Officially it calls for a tool to change the shaft seal, but I was able to push the thing out and a new one in with my thumb.

[kishy]

I found a driveshaft for my Ranger project, in Sarnia, ON, which is about a 1.5-2 hour drive from me staying in Canada - up to a half hour shorter cutting through USA. I took advantage of some really nice weather and my day off for Good Friday, and went on a little drive, choosing the Canadian path as it's not actually a route I've driven before. The wagon was the selected vehicle for this trip. Aside from some dashboard squeaks and what I suspect may be the death of the cassette deck (was using a Bluetooth cassette adapter), the car did well and it was a pleasant drive.

Sarnia harbour has been home to MV Jiimaan for the last several years. Jiimaan is the ferry that serviced Pelee Island alongside 1959-built Pelee Islander, from Jiimaan's construction in 1992 until about 2021, when it was laid up in Sarnia due to (depending on who you ask) a variety of mechanical and structural concerns. As freshwater-going commercial vessels go, that is a short service life, and as best I can tell, the only way to manage something this severely is by letting the Ontario provincial government be in charge of it. Which is exactly who bears responsibility for keeping ferry service operating here.

Jiimaan was the ferry that brought the wagon back from the island with me in 2017, and I am fairly sure the two (car and boat) have not been together since, as the wagon's trips to the island since have been on 2018-built Pelee Islander II. PI2 was supposed to replace PI(1) but somehow, in practice, it has actually replaced Jiimaan.





Also pleased to report that thanks to some eBay saved search efforts, I tracked down two NOS evaporators of the threaded connection type, so AC is a realistic goal for this one this year. Converting to the spring-lock quick connectors is an entirely doable thing, but there's a bit of a "sunk cost" problem: swapping all the rest of the parts to achieve it gets pricey, and in the case of me and my parts-hoarding tendencies, I'd be creating a situation where parts I've purchased would no longer fit the vehicle.

[gadget73]

I ended up with a thread connection evaporator that fits my Continental after buying it by mistake for my previous Mark VII. Also had that antenna mast for the same reason. Thats really why I bought it, I had two parts with no valid use. The obvious solution was to buy a car thats a giant pain in the ass to get parts for rather than wasting that $100

I'm not using that as reason to buy an 89 Towncar though. Somewhere I have an NOS rear trunk edge trim that is apparently unique to '89 and I didn't realize that until I bought it.

[kishy]

Buying vehicles to match the parts would be a dangerous proposition at this point.



It's evaporator time. Removal wasn't really bad at all. Disconnect heater core, disconnect and move some harness connections, disconnect some AC lines, undo a few fasteners and it just sorta comes out.





Oil staining on the evaporator validates my previous conclusion that the evaporator is leaky. The new-old-stock Four Seasons evaporator is just about an exact match and I have no concerns about how it will fit.







I discovered pretty severe firewall rust at one of the fasteners for the evaporator housing, so I wire brushed it down to clean metal and put some paint on it. There are holes through to the interior which I'll likely just use some sort of silicone to close up, once the paint dries. I will do another coat before things get put back together. This appears to have resulted from AC condensation so I will see what I can do to enhance how the HVAC system drains. It looks like the designed-in drain system isn't actually at the lowest point, and that's why this happened.





Additionally, a couple of the lower housing fasteners are rusted away to nothing, so I'll have to figure out something for those. The blower resistor has a dead speed so I'm going to poke around with that as well, since it's far easier to get at it with the housing removed from the car.

[WagonMan]

I suppose its a good idea to take the whole assembly out to clean it, but when I change out an evaporator I just take off the right half. WagonMan

[kishy]

I am quite certain that removal of the whole thing was easier than removal of just half, because the fasteners had no heads anymore holding the two halves together.

Finding a way to destroy the plastic around the heater core connections would also make it easier as there'd be no reason to open the cooling system, but the hoses themselves would be somewhat in the way.

[gadget73]

The stock drain system is a bit lacking. It also drips onto the frame which I believe is why they tend to rot on that side. It also leaves just enough water in there to get a musty smell going on. Mmm, I love the smell of Legionnaire's in the morning.

[kishy]

Between some rain, trying to get another coat of paint on the rust, and needing to let the foam dry after I hosed off the housing, it took a couple days to get the evaporator project wrapped up.

I added a drain hole to the front area of the evaporator housing, so if the car is leaning forwards (it does have rake), water can still get out. I also removed a tiny plastic tab that was making the rear designed-in drain be somewhat less effective. The frame is in good shape and has previously been oil sprayed so I don't think some moisture is going to hurt it yet - but I'll keep an eye on it and if it gets ugly I'll do something about it.

There are two drains from factory. There is a drain closer to the fender which serves to let rain water out from the part of the plenum that intakes outside air, and there is a drain at the back of the evaporator housing where it touches the firewall. The first one is the one that could allow water to wander into the interior; the second one is pretty much entirely isolated to the outside of the firewall.

My attempts to make the blower resistor work better were a failure and I ended up losing low speed in the process. I have no idea what's wrong with it but the terminals are crusty and I found a NOS Ford one on eBay for about 12 bucks as I recall, so that's on its way, and in the meantime I do have high speed.

I reassembled the car, added some oil to make up for what was in the evaporator, and pulled a vacuum on it. It held vacuum for 12 hours or so, I threw some refrigerant-like product in it, and tweaked the low pressure switch a bit to trip off at a lower pressure. The system cools so I'm going to call that done enough to leave alone for the moment.

I've also reduced the curb idle speed to approximately correct at 570ish RPM in gear, and adjusted the cold idle so it falls off a little bit quicker.

Next priorities on this one are going to be fixing the latest iteration of the dashboard squeak, reducing the amount of rain water that enters the car from various spots, and improving the sound system.