So I live in Las Vegas, and just bought a 2006 4-door Automatic Honda Civic LX. Everything works well, except something I noticed is that when the car sits in the sun and gets hot (it's like 110 here), then I get in and use the air conditioning, it starts to cool down pretty quickly, unless I come to a stop (like at a stop sign or stop light) and then accelerate. For about 5-10 seconds while accelerating, the air that comes out of the vents is pretty much outside temperature air (which is pretty hot when it's 110). It even smells a little "exhausty" like the smell from an engine is coming in or something. After I've been driving it for awhile, you don't really notice that the air conditioner does this.

Has anyone else noticed this? The explanation that I've found so far is that the air conditioning shuts off for a little bit while you're accelerating to give it more power. I would just like to know that it's supposed to do this. Does the smell make sense too, like when the AC switches off while accelerating from a stop, it would make a little bit of a smell?

Also, do all cars do this, or just the Civic? I've never had a car in a place this hot, so I haven't had the chance to notice this with any other cars.

 

thats different, when i have my A/C on it never changes, it always stays the same..it takes a lot of power away from my car, but thats about it

..you should go back to the dealer and ask about it, and if it happens all the time, you could probably show him

 

Yea, definitely take it back to the dealer. It should blow cold a few seconds after you turn the AC on, and then get steadily colder as you drive, even in 110 heat. Occasionally I've seen a cloud of condensed water vapor (looks like cold white steam) come out of my AC vents if I've had the AC on, then turned it off, then turned it on again, but no bad smells and always cold, even stopped in traffic.

Does the engine temeperture needle move higher when you stop, and you have the AC on? Does hitting the "Max AC" button (which really just recirculates the already cold interior air of your car, instead of drawing fresh air in form outside) make any difference?

In a brand new Civic, it should just work, and work all the time. I even have to turn my temperature setting away from max after awhile.

(And yes, the AC does parasitically suck away quite a bit of horsepower and some MPGs, so think of the AC button as the "Reverse Turbo" button--when you punch it, you are going to go slower...but you SHOULD be COOL!)

 

Oh no, I was hoping it wasn't just my car. I bought it in LA, so it would be a 4 hour drive to get it back to the dealership. I guess I'll call them tomorrow and see what they think is wrong.

The engine temperature doesn't change at all, and whether it's in recirc or normal mode, it still does this. Anyone have any idea of why it could possibly be doing this? The car is just a little over a week old.

 

The A/C problem should be covered under manufacture's warranty, so you should be able to take it to any Honda dealer and they would fix it. If you have one close to your house it would be worth a shot to save the 4 hour drive.

 

My 06 AC cycles from 40 to 50 degrees at the vent(I put in a thermometer) while in town or on cruise at 70 mph. It has been back to the dealer two times now in 3000 miles. They say nothin is wrong. I have never had any car do this, not even a KIA.

Anyone else having this problem? Or had it fixed?

 

Mine is not as cold when it's a stop for a while, but doesn't have a smell from the engine.

My car is a 94 ex, so my compressor might be getting old and it's not working too well anymore.
I've refilled the freon and it doensn't improve much. It could also be the a/c filter that needs to be changed/cleaned, but I have no idea where that is located [&:] I've sprayed the condenser with water to wash of dust and whatever gets in there.
I guess the best solution for me would be just to bring it to a shop that fixes a/c.
I'm not going to do it this year. A few more months and it's not going to be as hot anymore

 

I've got an '06 EX sedan. The AC works just fine as long as I'm traveling down the road. Sitting in traffic, especially if the car has just been started and not had a chance to cool down yet, the air coming out of the vents isn't to my liking either. I put a thermometer in the vent and discovered that it was barely pulling 60 degrees while standing still. Once I got moving, it cooled down to 40 degree (on a 95 degree day) which is acceptable but when I caught the next red light, it was back up to 60. Makes me wonder how efficient the cooling fans behind the radiator are when the car's standing still. Now, once the car system has had a chance to cool down the interior, it'll hold temp just fine. All of this is on recirc of course.

I had an '04 S2000 that would do basically the same thing except that, even sitting still, it would cool down to 40 degrees (which was good) but then the system would cycle off, which is normal, and then stay off until the air warmed back up to 60 or so before cycling back on, which was not normal as far as I'm concerned. I brought it up to the dealer on several occations and always got the "it's normal" routine. Running the system in recirc mode helped and I learned to live with it but never felt it was right. The frustrating part was that the AC was working, just not like I thought it should.

I haven't said anything to them with my Civic yet. It actually does better than the S2000 did in that once it does get down to 40-45 degrees, it stays there. I don't expect my dealer to do anything with it at this point.

We'll see..........

Good luck,
Steve R.