AC Leak Topic is solved

[Wiltonian]

My 1994 850 wagon AC has a leak. The recharge lasted about a month.
The daler quoted me $1700 for the repair. I now have taken it to Firestone and am waiting for their quote. Feedback on what would be a fair price to repair a leaky AC on this car would be appreciated.

[850Family]

We just addressed an a/c problem in our '96 850 Wagon... the diagnosis was a bad evaporator and our first estimate was in the $2,000 range. We didn't want to spend the money, and suffered for a long time. Then a friend recommended an independent Volvo shop that fixed his leak with a product called "Stop Leak." They only charged us $130 for the stop leak and to recharge the system. We were happy for about three months, until the system failed again. We called around and found an a/c specialist that also diagnosed the problem as a bad evaporator with an estimate of $1,300. He was very concerned about the "Stop Leak" and it's negative effect on the whole a/c system, specifically the compressor. He's been in the business for 30 years, and has run the Stop Leak salesman out the door on several occasions. So, I've got conflicting information... a friend who used stop leak about three years ago with good success, our own personal experience, and the views of a professional who's been doing a/c for 30 years. (Each of us motivated by money in one way or another.) The evaporator job is mostly labor related (only about $300 in parts), as the dash must be removed to get to the evaporator. Ultimately we were happy with the new evaporator. Don't know if you've got the same problem, but thought our experience might help a bit.

[matthew1]

Look at the economics too. Not saying this "fits" you, but if you do recharges yourself at $20-30 per, and you need not 12 but say 6 a year depending on where you live, $1300 will buy you many years of air conditioning.