air con removal

[cus]

hey guys, i've searched before you ask me too lol

right, i've removed the air con rad, all pipes etc, just the pump to go.
currently in my garage doing it all!

how many bolts hold in the pump?? i've took the belt off and got two bolts off on the driver side, but it still wont budge. any help (asap) would be much appreciated!

thanks

 

[cus]

done now

 

[dubz_wm]

How much of a pain was it mate to do? what would be your reason for removing it? mine comes on whenever it feels like so that would be mine lol

 

[olethalb]

yea did mine at the weekend aswell as relocating the battery, need a shorter belt before i take the pump off tho.

mine always used to come on on it's own too but tbh i've never been a fan of a/c and once i get the pump off i'll have lost a fair bit of weight too.

 

[cus]

well just wanted to get rid of the system.
minds of its own
never use it
weighs a fair bit

it took longer then it should of really... simply because i'm not the best mechanic in the world!
these are the steps that i took, may not be perfect, but it worked for me!
first off, get yourself a shorter alternator belt from a 1.8 20v NON turbo model (leon/golf)
front bumper off
both front lights out
crash bar off
i then unscrewed the aircon radiator and loosened the nossle behind it to release the gases. left it for half an hour before continuing.
unscrewed driver side of radiator off so that i could pull the aircon radiator down and off the car. snapped the pipe going to the passenger side of the aircon rad, so that it would come out.
once thats off, i followed all the pipes to the back of my engine, and removed them all. i had to snap a couple of get them all out though, but that didn't matter.
a couple of the pipes run under the water bottle, but mine was already removed prior to this anyway.
there is a spring loaded pulley above the alternator, i unscrewed this and took it off. 3 bolts hold it in. then i took the belt off
now for the pump.
there are two bolts holder the pump in place.. they are on the drive side, once can be reached from the top and one from underneath the car. i didn't have to jack mine up at all for this.
the top bolt wont come all the way out due to hitting the side of the engine bay, but dont worry. one this one done, i got a spanner between the pump and the alternator and firmly pushed it until it worked itself loose. pulled the pump out and that was done!

to get the spring loaded pulley back in i firstly put the new belt back on, and put the pulley on with only 1 of the 3 bolts. i get a spanner in to compress it, and put a tiny screwdriver in the hole to stop the pulley from moving (its on the side of the pulley,you'll see it)
this allowed me to put the other 2 bolts in. took the screwdriver out and the belt tightens up.
put my car back together and tested. all working!
the only thing you see from inside the car when you press the A/C button is the A/C will start flashing after a while on the display. thats it!

dont go blaming me if this guide is wrong, or if it breaks your car!! i used it, and it worked for me. other people will no doubt do it differently though!!!