fitting air conditioning
Discussion
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"The only reason for air con on a TVR is that it is also used to cool the fuel before befor going into the engine and this helps give the engine a slight bit more welly as well as stopping fuel vapourisation..."
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Great news, Steve! Does that mean I can reach for my air con dial at 6250 revs to enter hyperspace? Always a handy track day tip...
Chris (4.0 HC with air con overdrive)
ps but will the second edition bible cover air-con?
quote:Hmmm, methinks this is just the air-con industry making a benefit out of something they can't easily change. As well as cool air (what punters are paying for), air-con also drys the air out - occasionally a good thing, eg if your windows are steamed up, but personally, I would rather it didn't, as this tends to give me a sore throat (and I'm not the only one).
No Craig, a fundamental mistake. Air conditioning is more than just cold air. Yes of course the air from the vents will be cooler when you are driving the a/c system but you won't have the correct envoironment.
So yes, the industry can try & tell me that this feature is a benefit & call it "conditioned", but I just see this as a necessary evil along with having cool air. I don't believe I am making a fundamental mistake - from my point of view having a/c on with the roof down gives me more of a "correct" environment than with the roof on
Please enlighten me if air-conditioning does more than cool, de-humidify & (possibly) filter the air - all of which can be done with the roof off.
waiting to be corrected....
Craig
quote:I can't complain about the A/C on my Chim (yet!). Maybe the Griff you sat in did need the system regassing. The heating system also suffers from a badly set/difficult to adjust heater control valve. On my car, I can only get warmish air i.e. on coolest setting without turning A/C on.
Is the TVR A/C any good? I have sat in a couple of griff with AC supposed fitted and it only gave a slightly warm air flow (comapared to the usually very warm on cool setting)
Could be they both needed regassing
On a day where it's not too sunny and temp around the 20°C mark, with the lid on, the temp inside the car is too warm for me. If the A/C then comes on it gets pretty cold (I don't know what temp the air gets chilled too, but I'd guess that it comes out the vents below 15° if not closer to 10° - the gear stick gets very cold!!!).
Yesterday, sinful I know, but I had the lid on when it was sunny and air temp outside was 25° plus. With A/C on, temp was nice and cool. Just needed tweaking every so often (the only way to change to temp is by turning fan up/down/on/off or open/close vents). Haven't tried lid off AND A/C on yet.
MC
quote:
Hmmm, methinks this is just the air-con industry making a benefit out of something they can't easily change. As well as cool air (what punters are paying for), air-con also drys the air out - occasionally a good thing, eg if your windows are steamed up, but personally, I would rather it didn't, as this tends to give me a sore throat (and I'm not the only one).
So yes, the industry can try & tell me that this feature is a benefit & call it "conditioned", but I just see this as a necessary evil along with having cool air. I don't believe I am making a fundamental mistake - from my point of view having a/c on with the roof down gives me more of a "correct" environment than with the roof on
Please enlighten me if air-conditioning does more than cool, de-humidify & (possibly) filter the air - all of which can be done with the roof off.
waiting to be corrected....
Craig
Craig - I'm with you on this one, tho having been flung round Knockhill in your 4.5 last year, must say I didn't have time to notice whether air con was on or off.
I will say one thing - when it's on it's too effective on the passenger side and not effective enuff on my side. Thus Christine gets thoroughly conditioned while Chris remains sadly out of condition. 
Reached across to get some papers on the passenger seat today (at 70 mph) and it was frickin freezin over there, but still tropical 
on my 'ram-air' vent side. Guess that's why they put the central vents in in 96 (?) Hey-ho...suggestions? cheers, Chris
quote:Hi Chris, lurker no more I see.....
Craig - I'm with you on this one, tho having been flung round Knockhill in your 4.5 last year, must say I didn't have time to notice whether air con was on or off.
cheers, Chris
Not sure about your car, but to get anything meaningful to come out of the right hand vents, I had to duct tape all of the pipe joins behind the steering column.
cheers,
Craig
if it's anything like the Chimaera arrangement, the air vent plumbing is a series of pipes like vacuum cleaner hoses held together (or not) with duct tape. If the tape is missing, air pours out the gaps where the bits of pipe are shoved into each other and nothing makes it out the end.
quote:
quote:Hmmm, methinks this is just the air-con industry making a benefit out of something they can't easily change.
No Craig, a fundamental mistake. Air conditioning is more than just cold air.
Please enlighten me if air-conditioning does more than cool, de-humidify & (possibly) filter the air - all of which can be done with the roof off.
waiting to be corrected....
Craig
You are correct on all points here Craig.
It's still a crap system on TVR's though.......
Roar on.
quote:Not especially. Engine temp on Monday stayed around the 85°C mark.
I do not have a/c on my Griff 500 but do the cooling fans come on when the A/C is on?
Were you thinking about increased power from engine, required to operate A/C compressor, resulting in additional engine bay heat load?
MC
quote:
I do not have a/c on my Griff 500 but do the cooling fans come on when the A/C is on?
It depends how the requirement is sensed. Usually the condenser (in front of the rad) will require fan assisted cooling as soon as air-con is demanded. There will be pressure/temp sensors in the circuit which usually cycle the compressor but fans remain on.
Roar on.
Its just that on every car i have had they either have the cooling fans on when air con is on or, have a sensor on the condensor rad so as to turn the fans on if it gets too warm. Could this be why TVR A/C is not quite so good!!or does the condensor have a sensor? The two stage cooling system using series/parrallel configuration was invented by Dr Porsche but used by a German train co for A/C condensor cooling using 1000v dc motors!
As far as more grunt when the engine is kept cooler, absolutely.Also keeps the inner wing cooler so the air coming out of the vents is not so "hot".
Of course the heater valve should be checked first, very simple test. Turn to cold, start car from cold, feel the temp from the blower and when the engine temp is up to normal, see if the blower air is still cold. If you keep testing then the blower temp will rise as the inner wing temp rises.
David
>> Edited by david beer on Wednesday 14th August 18:48
>> Edited by david beer on Wednesday 14th August 18:51
As far as more grunt when the engine is kept cooler, absolutely.Also keeps the inner wing cooler so the air coming out of the vents is not so "hot".
Of course the heater valve should be checked first, very simple test. Turn to cold, start car from cold, feel the temp from the blower and when the engine temp is up to normal, see if the blower air is still cold. If you keep testing then the blower temp will rise as the inner wing temp rises.
David
>> Edited by david beer on Wednesday 14th August 18:48
>> Edited by david beer on Wednesday 14th August 18:51
quote:
if it's anything like the Chimaera arrangement, the air vent plumbing is a series of pipes like vacuum cleaner hoses held together (or not) with duct tape. If the tape is missing, air pours out the gaps where the bits of pipe are shoved into each other and nothing makes it out the end.
Thanks ATG and Craig - looks like a concensus on duct tape, then (do Blackpool own shares in the stuff I wonder...I feel a 'duct tape' thread coming on). I'll give it a whirl this weekend and see if I can't level things up a bit.
My 95 4L Chimaera (Cayman Islands licence plate number "TVR V8" for those interested in such matters!)has what TVR amusingly calls factory a/c. As much as I love my car, it's not much at midday in a place where the average year round temp is about 95 degrees fahrenheit. So I have been in touch with the nice people at TVR Malaysia who have just this week despatched all the bits they say I need to convert my current crap system into one which should work in our blast furnace environment. The kit includes a 2 fan blower, extra ducting and 4 larger sized vents. As soon as the parts arrive and I summon up the nerve to rip out the dash (which may take a while - I still haven't installed the aluminum dash I bought 2 years ago), I'll let you all know how things work out!!
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