Close to 98 degrees here today and spent the day in the garage working on this some more...because why not?!?!
Pulled and tested the blower control module for giggles and grins, it has continuity. Jumped pins and tested the blower motor itself, it runs fine also. Just at this point trying to rule out the easier stuff and move on to the harder items.
After reconnecting the car batt, I started up the car - while the a/c clutch was its unhappy self (hung up a bit w/horrible noise, but finally got going), I noted again the blower motor ran fine and then used the climate control to turn the temp down from what seems to be its default 75 degrees to 60 and put the fan speed up from what seems to be its default 0 to 10...and the a/c started to work/blew through the vents.
However, turning off the car and restarting, the a/c did not work again...nothing blowing from vents either but blower motor was indeed running just fine. It seems every time the car is restarted, the head unit defaults to auto - 75 degree temp setting with the fan speed on 0, and on the restart the outside temp is again showing really odd numbers (such as 127 degrees). Putting it back to 60 degrees and 10 fan speed via the head unit does not initiate the a/c to blow through the vents again.
It seems as though disconnecting the batt cleared some codes and I got a/c blowing through my vents, but I don't get anything at all on restarts. I've tried pulling diagnostic directly from the C68 head unit but that has yielded 0. Perhaps my head unit rebuild wasn't done correctly? Also have read something about 'blend doors sticking' but not sure about how that aspect works/need to investigate that a bit more...?
That, in addition to troubleshooting/testing the a/c clutch assembly for the hang-up/sound issue...not sure which component is actually bad (clutch/bearing/coil). It seems like either one or more of those parts is creating a parasitic draw on the power steering, making it difficult to turn when a/c is set to on (whereas the steering wheel turns just fine when climate control is off). The compressor itself is happy (when a/c is set to on, the lines are perfectly cold).
Has anyone ever (successfully) just replaced the entire clutch hub without disconnecting lines/discharging the freon/keeping the compressor on the car? If so, any tips/tricks? Or what new cuss words will I need to learn?
Any sage/'been-there' advice, please feel free to share.
