[updated:LAST EDITED ON 16-Dec-02 AT 11:00 AM (EST)]99 F150 89k miles.

When my AC Compressor kicks on and starts spinning, you can hear a metal-metal squeek sound coming from it. The ac works great! The sound is mainly heard in the winter months.

I can silence the sound by 1 drop of 3 in 1 oil on it. hhehehe

Any suggestions?

 

The clutch is shimmed out from the pulley face by thin washers on the shaft immediately behind the clutch hub. If yours has worn (preventing it from hitting the pulley hard enough NOT to slip), then you might get some more life out of it by removing a shim or 2 so it can engage as hard as it did when it was new.

Before starting, look carefully at the size of the gap between the clutch disk and the face of the pulley. Pull the nut off the shaft in the center of the clutch and pull the clutch off the shaft. There's a tiny square key (~3/16 x 3/16 x 3/4") that fits in a groove of the clutch hub and in the shaft, so pull slowly and watch for the key to fall out. It's better if it stays in the clutch because it has to come off the shaft for you to get the shims off. Use a dental-type pick ($3/set of 4 @ WalMart) to pull the shims off and remove about as much as the gap you first looked at.

Test-fit the clutch back onto the shaft with the remainder of the shims in place and install the nut temporarily. Start the engine and see if the clutch drags the pulley. If it does, you need to add shims until it doesn't. If it doesn't drag, you can try to remove some more, but it's probably not necessary.

Once you're satisfied with the new gap, remove the clutch and reinstall the key with the clutch - THIS IS THE HARDEST PART, but it helps if you can get the shaft notch close to 12:00. The nut should be torqued to about 10lb-ft.

If the pulley or clutch mating surfaces are heavily galled or blued, you might as well replace the whole clutch/pulley/magnet set, but you'll still have to set the shims when you install the new parts.