A/C Compressor Locked Up, 2018 XLT 202A

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apex96

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Found out yesterday that the A/C compressor has locked up... I brought the vehicle in for service on Sunday evening to let it sit overnight as I wanted to meet the shop foreman and lead tech Monday morning and be there when they started it up. My initial concerns were a burning rubber/plastic smell in the engine bay recently, when I let it warm up in the mornings, and a strong sulfur smell out of the tailpipe. Tech quickly discovered the compressor is not engaging or disengaging when they cycled the A/C system on or off. They also wanted to check fuel trims as they suspected a partially stuck open injector may be causing the strong sulfur smell from the cats.

I got the call yesterday afternoon that the compressor is seized and the estimate was north of $3,000 due to the damage caused to the A/C system when it seized up. Thankfully I have a third party plan through first extended service corp. The plan will cover the costs and provide a rental, but the kicker is I have to take it to the dealership I purchased it from since I'm within their 40 mile radius... It is currently sitting at a local ford dealership I trust to work on my wife and I's vehicles. I'll eat the diagnostic costs from my local dealership and take it over to the selling dealership this week.

For those interested the current mileage is 49,100 and it is a ford CPO off lease vehicle. build date was 12/27/2017 and it has had the cam phasers replaced.

I'm curious to hear if others have heard of the A/C compressors going south on 4th Gen Expeditions or have had one go out themselves.
 
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apex96

apex96

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Quick update on the issue. Technician stated on the work order that the compressor failed internally and the estimate at initial dealership is $3,616 to complete all repair work. They provided a parts breakdown and labor time estimation for each.

I will be dropping it off the dealer where it was purchased later this week, so that the third part warranty will be honored, as it does cover such failures.

If the a/c compressor fails out of warranty, it’s incredibly expensive to have repaired…
 

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Soliyou

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They are basically changing the compressor and expansion valves. These should be around $600 if purchased online. The rest is just flushing that comes with pretty steep labor charges!

Ford has an old video describing the flushing procedure: https://youtu.be/dn6Q3SRyNTQ
 
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apex96

apex96

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The early 2018’s had a TSB for contamination in the AC system. Yours misses the build dates by only 6 days. One of the components replaced is the compressor.

See TSB below. https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/tsbs/2018/MC-10149783-9999.pdf
This TSB is extremely helpful! my window sticker has the 2017 date but ford has this vehicle marked as produced on 01/04/2018… it does fall within the TSB timeline… I will relay this information back to my local dealership.
 
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