Air Conditioner noise

[bigbot]

Hey everyone,

I did a search but was not able to find anything related to my issue. When I am in park or idle at a red light/stop sign/traffic and the air conditioner is on, I am getting a noise like brake squealing. I know it must be the air coniditioner because if I turn it off the noise stops, if I turn it back on the noise comes back.

This issue only happens when the car is at a full stop, the minute I start moving it stops.

Any ideas? My boss says this in not an uncommon problem and it could just possibly be the belt?

Thanks,

[Donutz]

Someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but my assumption is that it is something more serious than a belt given your description. If it were just the belt it should continue to squeal with the ac on or off. I think if it was the bearing that allows the ac pulley to spin when the ac is off it would continue to squeal with the ac off. I think you either have a bad bearing deeper in the ac unit or a roasted ac clutch. My advice to you is do not run your ac until you confirm the cause. A guy on m3f had his ac unit catch on fire because the bearing or clutch seized up on it.

Good luck. Let us know what happens.

[bigbot]

Thanks will not use it till I get it looked at.

A/C still works fine, just squeals when I am at a stop. Did the other owner's a/c still work when it caught fire?

[shu5892001]

My A/C has noise too, but only when I turn the fan up, I feel like the air is blowing something, like a whistle. The noise is on when car is moving and stopped

[bigbot]

No whistle, sounds like brake squeal. metal on metal

[Donutz]

Here's some info from m3f. I can't see the vid in the first post (could be filters at work), but the second (or third) post is the link the to thread I referred to above.

http://www.mazda3forums.com/index.php?topic=159070.0

[bigbot]

Thanks, can't view the vid at work either. Will have to wait until I get home. I did read though that he was having noises while the AC was off as well.

I'll know more once I view the vid though.

thanks for the info again,

[bigbot]

Just watched the video from the mazda3 forum link Jason provided and thankfully I can say, the noise my A/C is making is no where near as bad as that. The sound is not even similar. I had my wife start the car and turn the A/C on while I had the hood up to listen for the squeal. The squeal appears to be coming from the engine belt, mind you I have no clue where the A/C compressor is located. Does this sound right? I am going to try some spray onto the belt tomorrow to see if it solves the problem. Is there any pics onto what a worn belt would look like? Mine looks ok, but then again I know very little about cars.

Thanks