Air Conditioner stops producing cold air after idling for long periods in hot weather (1 Viewer)

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If I let my LX 470 idle in park for 10+ minutes, the air conditioner will stop cooling. It will still blow air, but it won't cool. The vehicle won't produce cold air again until I start driving it. Once driven approximately 50-100 feet, it'll produce cold air again. Also, if I rev the engine while the vehicle is in park, it won't produce cold air. I have to actually drive the vehicle to get it to start producing cold air again. Is this normal and if not, any ideas on what's wrong?
 
Check the condenser fan in front of the radiator, behind the grill. Sounds like it’s not working.
 
It doesn't sound too unusual to me.


If you're not moving enough air through the condenser, the AC is not going to work very efficiently (if at all).

Or

If your coolant temperature gets too high, the compressor clutch will be disengaged, disabling the AC, until the coolant temperature drops:

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Properly service your coolant system, see if that helps.
Don't forget to clean the radiator fins:

Although the cooling system is very capable of running AC while idling. Keep in mind, prolonged idling is hard on the very expensive CATs.
 
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That is not normal at all. You have a problem somewhere with your engine cooling system. My guess would be radiator but certainly could be other cooling components like fan clutch, T stat, dirty condenser, etc.

First thing I would do is make sure the condenser and radiator are squeaky clean between the fins. ALSO, make sure the area between the condenser and radiator is squeaky clean free of grass and debris. Hard to get to but gotta make it happen.

While you’re standing there pondering the problem with the engine OFF, spin the engine fan by hand. It should have some resistance and not continue spinning freely. If it spins freely, you can either replace the silicone fluid inside the fan clutch or replace the clutch.
 
What year is your truck?

03+ trucks did not come with a factory aux fan that would help this exact issue. Earlier trucks had them from the factory. @LandCruiserPhil sells a kit to add it in yourself.

If your system is otherwise healthy, this is what you want. Confirm, as others have said, that your system is otherwise healthy first.
 
03+ trucks did not come with a factory aux fan that would help this exact issue.

The aux fan may help but isn’t needed, hence newer models not having them. This post edited to concur to make sure “system is otherwise healthy first” as said above.
 
The aux fan may help but isn’t needed, hence newer models not having them.

Can confirm. My system would remain cool even idling. In my case, I have my dog in the truck at idle very often while I run my errands, and wanted as much cooling power as possible for him. It does help it stay icy cold, as opposed to just regular cold.
 
@thex2 , how are your engine temperatures looking at idle? Have you watched the dash gauge or better yet, hooked up a monitoring device for accurate coolant temps?
 
Fan clutch. Just replaced this in my F-350 with the exact Same symptoms and it’s happily cooling now.
 
Yes, check the fan clutch. It should be a routing maintenance item. I replace mine at the second T-belt, just because they fail about 150-180k miles.
 
I had forgotten to tell my mechanic to troubleshoot this last time I had it serviced (2/22/21), so I was a bit delayed on responding here with an update. I told him about this issue yesterday and let him know the responses to this thread. It was the fan clutch, so he's replacing that. Thank you all for your help on this matter.
 

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