Bump for the morning crowd!

Anyone have any ideas?

 

My bet would be a leak. Look at the compressor, see if it's turning itself lime-green. Or any of the lines, especially look at the high and low pressure caps. Freon is dyed lime-green to help find leaks.

This is what happened to my compressor that leaked--dealer I bought the car from had replaced it since it didn't work when they bought it. Unfortunately the replacement (in the photo) was bad. They replaced it again, the new one doesn't leak and works fine.

Compressor by mike_n_2014, on Flickr

 

Update. No noticeable green color on compressor or hoses. However, I did notice that the compressor was not cycling off at all and seemed to be radiating coolness inside the engine bay. Air from vents is basically hot. Very odd.

 

Update #2 :

Dealer had car all afternoon. Compressor working fine, but system had very little refrigerant so they spent 2 hours looking for a leak and couldn't find one. They suggested that maybe the car came from the factory low on refrigerant, but this sounds like BS to me. The ac was cold when I bought it 3 months ago so there must be a small leak somewhere. Maybe they just didn't look in the right places. Anyhow, they recharged the system, so if I am in the same position a few months from now, we will definitely know it's leaking from somewhere.

Anyone else experience something like this?

 

Did the dealer add dye to the refrigerant system? When a leak is suspected, they usually will add a dye along with the freon. The dye illuminates via a black light so you can see where it leaks from.

Did the dealer charge for the freon top off? When I had my Volvo, the dealer charged me $90 even though the car was well within the warranty period. The justification is that there was no obviously failed part.

From experience living in Phoenix for over 30 years, freon does leak out without any obviously signs for a leak. It's a very very very slow leak. So, one would expect a 5 or 8 year old car to need to be topped off. So your experience is quite unique.

 

Not sure about the dye. I will have to call them tomorrow to ask. No charge for the top off and they felt pretty horrible about the fact that I had to bring my brand new car into the shop for this. They even offered to spring for a rental car (provided there were no loaners available) if the work was going to take more than an afternoon.