Hi, just wondered if I could get a 2nd opinion, much appreciated and thanks in advance.

Went to a mk1.5 ford galaxy today, basically same car as the seat and VW sharan.

Vacuumed it for an hour, so no air in system.

This model had 2nd evaporator because of the pipes running under the car.

Compressor kicked in fine, fan works fine.

Condenser visually looks to be in good condition.


However, it was exhibiting overcharged pressures. 220psi on high side, and around 70 psi on low side.

Compared to previous same model car for another customer which was, 25psi and 132psi.

It seemed like it was overcharged, so I tried recovering some refrigerant dropping it right down to 500g, but it mad no difference.

With hardly any cooling from front vents. Rear pipes had some condensation and felt cold on the suction line.

At first I thought it could be a stuck expansion valve, but stuck closed would cause high, high side pressures and low suction pressures.

And if stuck open then the high pressures wouldn't be so high either.

So then I measured the in high temp high pressure vapour pipe where it goes into condenser because its scalding hot, came out at almost 40 degrees, then measured liquid pipe from condenser and temp was around the same, which it shouldn't be... Was using a laser thermometer.

So does it sound like a blocked condenser? Or maybe internally it's ruptured and so instead of condensing into liquid the high temp vapour is bridging accross and coming out as a vapour.

Fan is working so its only thing I can think of.

Now removed the gas until I can fix it.
Thanks.