Mine is pretty clean and doesn't look clogged at all

 

I'm speaking of the Evaporator on the firewall not the condenser in front of the radiator. I only know about an 06 - to visually check the Evaporator the inner fender well has to come out and you must split the fiberglass case on the firewall. But the high side on the A/C gauge set should be pretty high if the Evaporator was plugged or partially plugged. Again you would have to live/drive in pretty dusty conditions for this to happen. The PO of my truck was a farmer and was always driving through his fields for this to happen. If the high side is within specs you should be OK at the evaporator end of it. The chances of your Evaporator being plugged is probably pretty slim I just wanted to throw this out there because the PO's mechanic had a difficult time with the truck. A friend of the mechanic was a Ford tech and pointed him in the right direction.

 

I'm no expert by any means on a/c systems, but I was going to ask if you had a can of freon to the system. If you over charge the system, it will still blow cold at lower temperatures, and not cool as good at higher temps.

 

i haven't recharged or even checked the a/c system to see if it needs it yet.

HearseDriver, i will check the evaporator today, thanks for the clarification! i'm not the best with stuff under the hood, but if someone points me in the right direction, i usually can do whatever it is.

 

If everything checks out in the AC system, and you think you need more airflow. I would just add a switch to turn the fan on manually. That will draw plenty of air. I have not done it, but many people have.

To turn on the fan with a switch:
Add a switch to the dark blue wire in the fan connector at the top of the fan shroud. This connector is a five wire connector and the dark blue wire receives a GROUND connection from the PCM when it decides that the fan needs to be turned on. After turning on the switch to send GROUND to the dark blue wire, the viscous fan clutch heats up (it will take 20-50 seconds or so to fully heat up) and the fan will engage and run with a lot of sound!. After turning off the switch, the viscous fan clutch will still be hot, so it takes a minute or so for the fan to slow back down. Again, the dark blue wire is for ground only, not 12 volts! Also, the heater in the clutch draws about 1.25 amps or so. You can use a 16 gauge wire and a small toggle switch. Just make sure you do not cut the blue wire such that the PCM can't ground it when it wants to

 

That's the one I used

You can use any brand as long as it's for a 1997 7.3l

 

Cool! I'll probably do this soon

 

Looks like I'm not far behind you, my fan clutch is giving me the "I'm going out" warning signs.

 

I just finished a 2800 mile road trip and a couple things I noticed with the BPD/7.3 fan clutch...comparing to last summer with a similar trip. Truck was loaded down with a full bed of stuff, not towing.
Mileage fell about 1-2mpg crossing the desert at 100+ deg temps. Fan was on a lot in the desert but truck stayed cool (mostly on to where you could hear it but not roaring), engine never got above 210 degs even climbing grades usually it was 190-195 ish. And the A/C blew plenty cold!
When the outside temps were lower than 90 degs I never heard the fan and mileage seemed normal. Overall very happy with the fan!! Fan is aggressive! But if you tow or live in a hot climate you will love it.

 

One of the things those of us in the warmer climates can do is replace the vacuum operated heater valve with a manual one. My 7.3 didn't even have a heater line shut off OEM, so I put a manual one in line. I open it in the fall and close it in the spring. The AC will really cool when it's closed.


As an fyi, I've heard that the lack of coolant flow through the heater core will shorten it's life. I don't know how true this is. I put the valve handle in a 95% closed position, which may or may not fully close off the line, depending on how accurate the valve is (I didn't know about the heater core myth until after I'd installed the valve). My truck is 17 yrs old and has almost 350k miles. I've replaced the heater core once in that time. Seems reasonable to me that there is not an issue, but my mind feels better by leaving it cracked open.

 

can you elaborate on the manual heater line shut off valve? is that the valve i posted in my first post and then shortly after found out my truck already has one stock? replacing that with a manual one is better for us?

anything to help lol. for a day or 2 it seemed fine (temps were around 50F, low 40s sometimes in the evenings, etc. but yesterday it was above 60F at the same exterior temps as the prior day when it was under 50F. so i'm not sure if replacing that with a manual one will help keep it more consistent?