Help! Car dies with air on (I searched for 1 hour)
 

Hi everyone.
My car is fine, runs well, I have no startup issues, no problems whatsoever, with the exception of this one: if I put the air conditioning on (which has only happened 2 times in the last month), the car simply dies. I try to restart, it starts right up immediately, with no problems. This leads me to believe that there must be some electrical problem.
This has happened both times I mentioned. While the first time it happened after about 10 minutes after cold startup, the second time it happened about 5 minutes later.
Unfortunately, I cannot tell you if I restarted with or without the air conditioning on, I was so freaked I don't remember. I am quite sure I did restart with the air off the second time.
This does not happen with the headlights on, or with the fans on and the air off.
Any suggestion would be great.

Remove all traces of air conditioning= Less weight, more power, simplify's the engine bay.

Typical noob fix. If you don't understand it or have the ability to fix it....get rid of it. 1 more pound of boost will more than compensate for the AC unit.

Now for the problem. You need to preform the steps outlined in the FSM for electrical load. If that doesn't solve the issue then your compressor on the AC unit may be going bad and putting excess load (when the clutch engages) on the engine.

I'll have a look, thanks.
As far as removing it...
I pretty much only drive it in the summer (live in Hamilton, Ontario).
I haven't used it more than those two times so far and I usually don't like having it on, however, I want to be sure (at least for now) to have it to find out if I really need it.
With a sunroof, I'll probably think about your suggestion...:)

Just wondering if this ever got ironed out? I've got the same problem at the moment.

You guys advice is full of S---. Who wants to drive a car in the hot summer without an air conditioner. There is a relay in the system that advances the idle when the air conditioner is turned on. This is probably the trouble, I know I have had this trouble.

Make sure your idle is at the correct rpm. In FC's its 750, if you go lower then the car dies from the load difference when the AC is switched on. The car idled fine at 500 rpm but couldn't handle AC being switched on.

I don't recommend increasing above factory recommendations because that just hides the problem. Please understand thats not what I'm suggesting.

It could be that the battery is (or going) bad. I had the same problem after my car sat for a long time, but then after running it a while the problem went away. Swap a new battery temporarily at least and see if that does it.

Otherwise it could be the alternator, most places will test that for free. Or the idle speed control (ISC) could be gummed up, which is not rare at all.

Do you have any mods? What kind of vacuum do you see @750rpms?

believe it or nor BENT AC lines cause idle problems when runing the AC.

I asked if this got fixed because I'm having the same problem. It's the a/c compressor coming online and then cutting off again. This recently happened after an a/c recharge and that's basically all I've got at the moment.

I believe it, like if you bend it at too extreme of an angle?

^^ yup.