Ran my ‘09 TCH thru a hi-pressure brushless car wash last Saturday and upon leaving, the A/C immediately became "weak" - the air was indeed blowing cool, but was of greatly diminished volume and speed.

ECO was off, I tried AUTO and manual operation with the A/C light on. Nothing seemed to increase the volume/speed of air although the fan did sound like it was "trying."

Drove home, picked up the wife for our fully loaded 2.5 hour trip to the DE beaches and hoping that this was a temporary situation, made our nearby preplanned quick "family visit." Got back in the car and it was still malfunctioning so I called the service dept. The rep told me to turn the temp UP and see what happened. The air did become warm but still no change in air volume or speed. She was stymied (she thought maybe the compressor belt was slipping but it was blowing COLD air) and had never heard anything like this before. She offered to make an appointment for the TCH first thing Monday.

We decided to go back home and switch to the RX400h but as we drove, it seemed to be getting gradually better. Decided to take a chance and press on. After about 20 miles or so, the A/C was obviously returning to normal operation.

All in all, it took well over an hour and 25 miles of driving for it to work properly again.

Any thoughts on this?

 

First, don't believe that service advisor! There is NO belt driving the compressor on the TCH! It is driven electricaly.

It is a possibility that something was forced into the air intake (blocking the air flow) by the high pressure wash. Some leaves, or a random piece of paper, that eventually worked its way out. Only thing that comes to mind right now.

One more thought...Did you try increasing the fan speed, and did fan speed indicator show a lower speed...on the LCD display?

 

Yeah, I thought about that later, but didn't know for sure whether the design of the A/C compressor uses an internal/direct drive motor or not. She just mentioned a slipping belt, I assumed she meant on the compressor.

 

Any chance your cabin air filter got wet? I recall reading somewhere to put your climate control in recirc mode and turn it off when going through a car wash as to reduce the chance of water being sucked in. Don't know if this is true, though, but I do it anyway as it takes just seconds.

 

That does make since. You may want to pull out the filter and have a look at it. You may be able to tell if it has water damage.

 

Excellent thought! Along the same lines I was thinking... some obstruction took place during the high pressure wash event. Having a wet filter sure would slow/limit the airflow...as it dried out, the airflow would return to normal.

 

Another thought... The flapper doors the re-route air flow from vent to floor and to the defrost ducts are typically vacuum actuated by way of a diaphragm and actuator rod. (not entirely sure if the Camry works this way) The high pressure might have buggered those doors up a bit by collapsing a diaphragm. That too would return to normal once it popped back out to original shape.

When you lost airflow to the vents, did you check if it was coming out elsewhere, like the floor or defrost duct?

 

Pretty sure I did NOT have it in RECIRC mode during the wash. Never occurred to me but sounds like a good "better safe than sorry" practice and only requires a simple button push.

Regarding airflow from specific vents, I can't say if it was redirected elsewhere. All I can say is that the interior temp was barely being handled by HVAC system. If cooled air had been sent to the floor at a high volume, we probably would have noticed.

Thanks for all the ideas - that's why I posted and also as a heads-up for anyone else who might have experienced this. Trouble is, now when I'm too lazy or busy to actually hand wash the TCH, I'll have to choose between a regular car wash potentially scratching the paint with the typical spinning brush system or risking another episode like this.

 

Maybe the evaporator coils iced up. Figure that during the car wash you're in a 100% humidity environment with the air full of tiny droplets of water.

 

I would second the idea of the wet cabin air filter.

When I disassembled the dash to install the satellite radio, I discovered the cabin air filter due to the pollen / blossoms on it. I had seen the same stuff on the exterior of the car and wondered how the same stuff had gotten inside. Closer examination led me to discover the filter.

I'll inform my wife and kid about making sure that it's in RECIRC mode when it gets run through th carwash.