Did you use the correct flare wrench on your fan clutch? If you dont use the right wrench it can cause the ac system to stop working. Jk, and fyi my aisin fan clutch is keeping me at 190 on even the hottest days here in the midwest. Purchase on amazon a few months back.
You need to think through your repairs from start to finish before tackling. I dont weld exhaust, or mess with ac systems. Pull a motor, no sweat, but know your limits, too. This can save you a ton of money, time, and headaches.
DO NOT just let out some refrigerant and hope it fixes itself. Get it to the shop, let the expensive machine do the work. Thats a reasonable price, a cheap ac machine is 5-7k. You can buy one for 3500 but then accessories, shipping, refrigerant.
You know I had to re-read the part about the flare wrench before I saw the "Jk" and I almost shit myself laughing. Were you following my fan clutch debacle then, or was that just a happy coincidence that you said that as a joke?
I normally agree about knowing your limits and thinking things through, and I have a short list of things I (usually) don't mess with. It's tough to think through repairs from start to finish since sometimes shit just happens. It can also be subjective when determining the logical place to stop thinking these repairs through, and that can lead to just being too afraid to try. For example: overcharging my AC might lead to catastrophic failure of my entire AC system. Well, crap...do I just not even try it then, or risk it?
The caveat here is that it's not my daily, and I (usually) have the money to fix my mistakes. When it was my daily and I didn't have the money to mess around, I usually stuck to things I was really solid on and left the rest for qualified/warrantied mechanics. However, nowadays I know that going into any DIY repair, and while it might be frustrating at the moment, it's not the end of the world if it doesn't work out.
Plus, AC isn't critical for me, and yeah, I looked up how to drain an overcharged system and went for it. It's probably slightly undercharged now, but the AC blows cold again and that strange noise went away. I'm content with that for now, and if it leads to bigger issues, I'll deal with it when I can.
Happy to report the rear end seems quite a bit happier with the u-joints replaced. Oh, and I think they charged me a $50 diag fee for the rest since it was $240 all said and done and the quote for the u-joints was $180 something. Not a big deal though.
I'm a bit surprised that they took my rear drive shaft off and didn't mention the leak from the transfer case rear output shaft seal. I have a new seal I've been meaning to put on, but the leak just isn't that bad and 4WD operates fine still.
