I refuse to drive a vehicle without working A/C, but like many others, I ran into the issue that replacement condensers for FJ62s just aren't made anymore. Unfortunately in my area (Northeast U.S.), all of the remaining condensers still out there seem to be junk. I tried 4 different 62 series condensers sourced locally, and each one had leaks in multiple spots, as well as a ton of the fins detached from the tubes. I tried repairing some of them, but it was a waste of time.
So I determined I needed to find a condenser from something else and make it work. After a couple of weekends of visiting junkyards with a measuring tape, I discovered that a 01-04 Tacoma condenser is slightly smaller than the OE FJ62 condenser, and has inlet/outlet ports in similar locations to the original. The '02 Tacoma OE condenser is a "serpentine" style like the original FJ62 condenser, but the aftermarket makes modern parallel-flow micro-channel retrofit condensers, and they're dirt cheap. While the condenser is *slightly* smaller, my assumption is that the higher fin density, higher tube density, and being parallel-flow will make up for it.
If you choose to embark on this project, you need to be aware that there are many different styles of aftermarket condensers available for 01-04 Tacomas. This is the style I went with (found them available on ebay):
I went with this style, because it all of the brackets are metal, and it has the widest core. Note how the ports are in the same "plane" as the collector tubes. Many of the aftermarket condensers have the ports offset, with a narrower core, as seen below:
Does it matter? I don't know, but I was trying to maximize the amount of heat rejection area given the new condenser is bit shorter than the original. Anyways, physically adapting the Tacoma condenser to the FJ62 was pretty straight forward. I started by cutting the top mounts off the new condenser as they interfered with the top radiator support. I then removed the original steel side pieces off my original condenser, and started sizing everything up in the vehicle. With a bit of cutting, grinding, bending and welding I was able to adapt my original condenser side mounts to the new condenser. If you didn't have a welder and really wanted to be a hack, the Tacoma condenser fits close enough into the original brackets that you could probably make it work with just some tin-snips and zip-ties.
The next issue are the connection ports. They are unfortunately both different compared to the FJ62. You have two options here:
The hot-gas line from the compressor (the left hose) wasn't too bad either. I ended up buying a new compressor > condenser hose for the Tacoma and modified it. It turns out if you chop the original compressor fitting off the original condenser, it fits perfectly over the tubing that comes with the Tacoma compressor > condenser hose. So I cut off most of the tubing on one end of the hose, and welded the original FJ62 condenser fitting to the stub of metal sticking out of the hose. I'm not 100% satisfied (you can see it's sorta goofy, and I ziptied a piece of rubber to stop it from rubbing against itself.
So I determined I needed to find a condenser from something else and make it work. After a couple of weekends of visiting junkyards with a measuring tape, I discovered that a 01-04 Tacoma condenser is slightly smaller than the OE FJ62 condenser, and has inlet/outlet ports in similar locations to the original. The '02 Tacoma OE condenser is a "serpentine" style like the original FJ62 condenser, but the aftermarket makes modern parallel-flow micro-channel retrofit condensers, and they're dirt cheap. While the condenser is *slightly* smaller, my assumption is that the higher fin density, higher tube density, and being parallel-flow will make up for it.
If you choose to embark on this project, you need to be aware that there are many different styles of aftermarket condensers available for 01-04 Tacomas. This is the style I went with (found them available on ebay):
I went with this style, because it all of the brackets are metal, and it has the widest core. Note how the ports are in the same "plane" as the collector tubes. Many of the aftermarket condensers have the ports offset, with a narrower core, as seen below:
Does it matter? I don't know, but I was trying to maximize the amount of heat rejection area given the new condenser is bit shorter than the original. Anyways, physically adapting the Tacoma condenser to the FJ62 was pretty straight forward. I started by cutting the top mounts off the new condenser as they interfered with the top radiator support. I then removed the original steel side pieces off my original condenser, and started sizing everything up in the vehicle. With a bit of cutting, grinding, bending and welding I was able to adapt my original condenser side mounts to the new condenser. If you didn't have a welder and really wanted to be a hack, the Tacoma condenser fits close enough into the original brackets that you could probably make it work with just some tin-snips and zip-ties.
The next issue are the connection ports. They are unfortunately both different compared to the FJ62. You have two options here:
- Have custom hoses made: The condenser-to-receiver hose could definitely be made easy enough, however the compressor-to-condenser hose is a different story. The compressor uses a weird size custom fitting, so you'd have to have a new hose crimped onto that, and not all AC hose shops may be willing to do that.
- Adapt the condenser ports to your existing hoses. This is the option I opted for, as I have a TIG welder. You could also quite easily do this if you have a good torch and and buy some aluminum brazing rods + flux (don't buy the aluminum "solder" from home depot, it's garbage)
The hot-gas line from the compressor (the left hose) wasn't too bad either. I ended up buying a new compressor > condenser hose for the Tacoma and modified it. It turns out if you chop the original compressor fitting off the original condenser, it fits perfectly over the tubing that comes with the Tacoma compressor > condenser hose. So I cut off most of the tubing on one end of the hose, and welded the original FJ62 condenser fitting to the stub of metal sticking out of the hose. I'm not 100% satisfied (you can see it's sorta goofy, and I ziptied a piece of rubber to stop it from rubbing against itself.