Our 09 TL gets cold and fast. Per my infrared temp gauge it shows 18 degrees coming out of the vents. The coldest my 2012 will get is 41. I sweat in that car and it won't cool down! It seems to get warm and cold cycling sometimes. I talked to the dealer but havent shown them yet but they act like they don't believe me. Lol

Anyone else have this issue?

 

Yes. Have had it since delivery in May of last year. Also came out of a 2009 TL which had great AC. The 2012 AC is terrible. My dealer also says nothing is wrong. I've called client services and get the same. Very frustrated. Not everyone has the problem, but others definitely do. I started a thread last year in the main forum which has gotten a lot of discussion. Please keep us posted if you make any progress. Now that we are getting into summer, I will start hating this car again. It is my 5th TL and because of this may be my last. I have little hope of it getting fixed, but you are correct in noting something is definitely wrong and you and I are definitely experiencing the same problem.

 

I will let you know once I talked to the dealer. I also have a friend that runs his own shop that I may have him look at it with his machines too.

 

Those numbers seem off. 41° is about right for cool air leaving the evaporator. Typically it should be in the 40-45° range. Also I don't believe the 18° air in the 09 is right either. It is an air conditioner after all and not a freezer. Try using a dial thermometer guage and see what reading that gives you. I you take it to the dealer, I wouldn't mention the temperature readings you got because if you said it's only putting out 41 degree air then they would say ok that's nice, so what's the problem?

 

Okay, so measuring 41 degree's in the back of my air ducts on my 2012 and the 09 it said 18 degrees. We verified that at my buddy who is a mechanic. So he vacumned the system, and measured the Freon. It only had 14-15oz in it and it requires a min. of 17.8 to 19.6 max.

After him running it through again and charging it back up to 18 oz as that is the midway point. We checked again. This time it definitely felt colder. Measuring in the same area in the back of the vents, we got down to -3 degrees. YES negative in the very back. The right vent was down to mid 30s. By the time it reaches the opening on the air ducts it was in the 30 degree range.

I will let everyone know how it does when sitting in the heat baking in the 100 degree temps we are getting and see how quickly it cools. I will know pretty quick if it's working better.

I decided to have my buddy check it instead of the dealer because then we can have some answers to why this is happening to others most likely. The dealer will just keep saying it's fine.

 

Thanks for the update--Standing by.

 

102 degrees at work today when I got out to the car (per the dash), and drove off. Car cooled very fast, and got nice and comfortable inside. I did this twice as I had to make a 1.5 hour stop and it got pretty warm again inside. It cooled down and this time I set it to 68 just to see without manually doing it, and it dropped the cabin down quick. My normal thermometer read 130-140 that was sitting in the vent when I got in it.

This to me seemed to have fixed the issue!

 

so Freon is the problem? I will stop by a dealer and have them check.. my 2012 doesn't feel that cold in Houston weather..

 

Yep, if it's too much or too little it will cause it to not cool well. Half way between per my buddy is the best area for it to cool the coolest.

 

warranty = dealer.

 

90% of the time the dealer will not fix this as they will think it's cooling just fine.

 

2nd day, very cold. Took it out during lunch and it was freezing me!! Yes this fixed it! So if you have an issue and the dealer doesn't want to fix it, find a trusty mechanic with a good machine that can vacuum it out and see what was in it and put about 18 oz back in.

 

Stopped by dealer for a quick check. They said it's 44 for front vent, so nothing to fix
I do want the AC blow a little bit colder. In my gf's RX350 the AC is ice cold.

I will probably drive to your buddy in San Antonio for a quick freon check )

 

Yep, most dealers won't give it the time of day to check the freon level even though THEY SAY 44 is FINE when it isn't. It takes a long time to get down to 44 if it ever does imho than it should. Now after fixing it, in 100+ temps we are getting now, my car cools very fast.

Just PM me for his info when you are ready.

 

There are many things about Honda/Acura I have loved about them over my MANY years of owning them, but the AC continues to NOT be one of them, unfortunately...it just never gets as cold as fast in other cars I have dealt with...and I just had to have mine recharged too. Have they been good enough? Sure. Great? No.

Glad to hear that you seemed to have gotten the issue fixed, OP!

 

Hey guys- FINALLY! I'm not nuts! I had an 08 Type S and a 10 Lexus IS 250. Here in Houston, it's hot! My new 2012 SH_AWD Tech I bought last month seems the A/C doesn't get as cold as I think it should either. Thought it was just me. What should I do, add the freon or bring it in and have them check it? It IS a problem. SOmetimes it's so warm that I have to kick the fan up,then it seems to cool down better but a new car should be ice cold.

 

Freon. If you have a good dealer they will fix it. If not hope you know a mechanic.

 

I agree. The infrared thermal heat guns are fairly good at measuring surface temperatures (typically +/- 5%) depending on make & model. (IMO Fluke is best) By comparison they are very poor at reading the air temperature. I'm sorry, but an 18 deg. reading is highly suspect. Something in the high 30s to low 40s would be what I would expect and would consider normal.

By the way, the lower the fan speed, the colder the discharge air temperature will be. The level of freon charge has only a partial bearing on this equation. It's just as easy to overcharge a system as to have one that's undercharged. More is not better. If there is a proper amount of refrigerant in the system but it's not cooling well, then it could also be that the evaporator coil is dirty or your dampers are leaking causing the system to draw in outside air or even engine heat. A simple vacuum line leak or a bad vacuum check valve can also cause damper problems which in turn can cause A/C system problems.

 

Again reading inside the back of the dash vents is accurate and it read that low. Measured on the inside back wall of the vent tubing.

My car was new with less than 100 miles.