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not sure if this applies to yours but my 05 has the relay where i keep my left foot under the dash, i think i saw a video showing the location on Youtube
Your a/c relay location in your vehicle is under your hood. If you open your hood looking at the car driver side near the firewall you will see a box. it is next to your air filter assembly. Open that box your AC relay is in there. On the cover of the box Will show you the location of the relay. Just had the same problem with my car AC relay was not pop. Appeared to still be good. However put a new oe relay in an AC now works perfectly. Do not just go to AutoZone and get a relay. Our cars seem to like those relays and they end up not working well. I have a buddy who owns another Acura and he said to go oe on the relay. He had the same problem and went to AutoZone and picked up a relay kept popping them. As soon as he put the OE relay everything worked great. The symptoms prior to me replacing the relay in my car or intermittent AC operation. After a couple of days it did not work at all. Prior to a dying, meaning the relay The AC operation although intermittent. The AC was cold but it did work.
Thank You for the detailed information . The AC Clutch relay was right in the under hood fuse box where you explained. The diagram inside the fuse box cover shows the location of the AC relay with a snowflake symbol . I replaced with napa relay and it has yet to pop (2 wks ago).
I would have gone with the omron which is the stock relay. As I had said, my buddy bought a autozone relay and he kept popping the relay. Our cars seem to be happy with the stock omron relay. Glad to hear that I was able to help. If the 1 you bought pops again in the near future. Get to Honda and or Acura, both the same, although Honda dealers are generally cheaper. Get the stock relay. You should be all good then.
I had already acquired the napa part when I saw your reply. Normally I replace with OEM part however circumstances at the time made it necessary to procure the part on short notice. (relay caused key off parasitic battery drain(2 amp))
Caveat:I look to see if OEM part is manufactured in USA or Japan if not (ex: OEM canister purge solenoid is made in Mexico) I will go with my preference for USA or Japan part if available. Omron relay was USA manufacture
My 06 TL has 3 black omron relays under the hood. One was ac and the other was ac fan. Anyone know what the 3rd on is for (lower right hand)? AC was not working so I swapped it and got it working. Not sure what should not be working.
Battery drains at night and is completely dead. Do not have the HFL hooked up, so it must be the AC compressor clutch relay that causes the parasitic drain? 08 TL-S 115k miles
Pulled the AC compressor relay out of the fusebox and inspected it, looks fine to me. I guess they short out internally? I was having AC problems a couple days prior too. But then it worked fine....
Last edited by 4drturbo; Sep 22, 2020 at 03:28 AM.
It MIGHT be a AC clutch relay. You won't know unless you test.
The problem with relays is that their contacts can weld itself together, so relay is sending power to the clutch all the time. Sometimes touching / hitting the relay can dislodge the contacts and then you are left scratching your head.
From local TL guys they all say the HFL and the AC compressor relay can cause parasitic drain and from what I have read on here that seems to be the main problem these cars can have with parasitic draws. It was only $7. Will report back if that fixed the issue. I see there is an updated version from Acura. I might have to get that for piece of mind. https://acurazine.com/forums/1g-rdx-.../#post14545907
Old thread but bumping because it's one of the few with pictures that I was able to use to verify my AC clutch relay location. Big thanks to this forum!
Symptoms: AC was working perfectly until it stopped blowing cold air in the middle of a drive.
Diagnosing: I tried all the AC settings and found that the AC clutch wasn't activating. I verified the AC Clutch wasn't seized by spinning it with a screwdriver while the engine was off. It spun. So I figured if it can spin, it's just not getting the signal to spin. Easiest thing to try first was the AC clutch relay. Using this thread, I found the clutch relay, pulled it out, and jumped the two pins in the fuse box with the engine running.
Result: AC clutch started spinning. I ordered a couple of replacements of different brands from rockauto given they were so cheap. I'll try those out and if they don't work or don't last, I'll buy the OEM one. I just needed to get something fast and cheap to diagnose it further.
Will update this thread later in the week once I've got a new relay delivered and installed. I'll also include a picture of how to jump the pins to engage the AC clutch manually.
Pictures to help anyone with the same problem. Mine is an 07 so yours may vary.
Open the fuse box here:
Locate the AC clutch relay.
Pull it out. In my case the only sign it might have a problem is the green corrosion at the base of one of the prongs.
To test, start the car and bridge these two slots with a wire. Your AC clutch should kick on and start spinning. If it doesn't, the relay isn't your issue.
Plug new relay into the slot and enjoy cold AC again.
The short answer is its between the two green ones! Napa relay still functioning with no hiccups after 8 years (lucky) still have the acura /J35A8 been a good engine after 19 years.(125000 mi)
