I should have mentioned: I am going to my friends work tomorrow to rebuild my calipers and bleed the brakes and balance the tires- so yes I will have access to the refrigerant evac and fill machine.

But I don't have a clue where to find the orifice tube.

 

It is just before the evaporator core.

 

Nice! Thank you Mr. Kovalsky. But now you have me concerned about getting the wrong part-what do you recommend specifically for looking it up and getting the right part and where to get it?

I've never bought parts for air conditioning before. Should I just go to advance or AutoZone? Or is this a situation where a Ford dealer part would be best?

 

I kind off miss my meat locker, been driving the 73 Econoline, none of that fancy stuff like AC, power steering/brakes, has the manual drums on it, but less parts means it keeps going without bleeding me dry. Just wait till your vacuum canister starts failing, AC goes to default, thats defroster in the front, and heat in the rear, yep, heater in the rear, and this fiasco is all because of a $4 part, but requires either $1700 dealer repair, have to remove the entire front system to access it, of a creative owner to relocate the lines and install a vacuum canister in an accessible location.

 

Both are very do-able.

 

Hey, he asked for hop-ups....he never said no grinding or cutting.

 

I don't know if they know the right one or not. I used an AC parts house. They only sold AC parts. They also had a listing for the right part for every AC system. You can try the parts stores, they may have the right one.

 

The hood is a fiberglass type material, I'd not cut one, it crumbles, or at least mine does, you cant bolt or screw to it, the bug deflector I had bought was glued and screwed, the surface had been thoroughly cleaned prior, it came loose, I used larger screws, deeper threads, acetone cleaned and secured, it came loose, I later put inserts in it, it came loose, so I threw it away, I'd look for a metal hood before considering moding.

 

My '02 has a plastic hood. I love it--the van is white and given the amount of paint chips it has, I am truly glad that I don't have a ton of rusty spots. Or worse yet, rust in the front seam.... The alum hoods on Explorers had problems with bubbling paint as well (I was looking at used ones a while back).

George