82PininMD, I recently finished a total restoration of my 1980 Fiat Spider. During the rebuild, I acquired a NOS A/C kit that was supplied by Roosevelt Motors (Fiat's USA distributor) to dealers in the States. I just checked the documentation that came with the kit and there was no mention of the manufacturer of the A/C system itself - it was simply labeled as Fiat with scant reference to Roosevelt. I did quite a bit of research before starting the installation process as the printed instructions were mostly crap with bad original photos. Here's some of what I found out:
The A/C "kits" provided through Roosevelt came from more than one manufacturer and weren't supplied by the factory until perhaps the last couple years of Pininfarina production/distribution. I know that one of those A/C kit manufacturers was out of Texas somewhere. There were differences between the kits provided by different manufacturers and even differences based on the year of vehicle. I believe most differences were fairly minor.
To my knowledge, all the kits utilized the R12 refrigerant but could be upgraded to more modern refrigerant if desired by changing out some of the components. Hoses/connectors, condensers would be the main conversion components - may be others. I kept mine mostly stock from the kit and had a local shop test and fill the system with R12.
I've seen a couple different sets of instructions - I assume because they came from different manufacturers or were made in a different year. Mostly, the manufacturer's instructions are very similar. There are some steps that are difficult to understand without adequate pictures. Also, there was allegedly a template provided with the kit that I didn't get. This template specified exactly where to bore a hole through the body at the radiator support bulkhead. Would have been very handy, but I took my time, re-read the instructions 40 times and determined exactly where the hole needed to go. My biggest worry was around the sheet metal that needed to be removed forward of the radiator/behind the grille. This involved some fairly major surgery to remove the "splitter" that runs side-to-side in front of the radiator between the two grilles (upper and lower). The removal of the splitter allows room to install the condenser which is a snug fit.
The next major challenge for me was that I had bought a new shortblock from International Auto Parts before they went out of business. This was a brand-new block assy that came from Poland where that block was still in production. It was beautiful, but there were some differences in the casting where the A/C compressor attached. I had to modify the compressor bracket that was provided with the kit to fit the different bosses in the block. After that, it was on to the wiring. The kit came with those funky plastic/metal connectors that snap over an existing wire to tap into that circuit. I've always considered those to be a bad joke and given I was going to drive this car a LOT with loved ones, I decided to tap into the appropriate wires with more factory-like connectors. Simply figuring out the wiring took me a lot of time and in the process, I figured out how it was supposed to work and what each circuit was supposed to do. Again, the instructions were somewhat, um,
vague.
Lastly, the effort to install the cabin components (evaporator module, fan and ducting, switches) was a pain, but doable. The wiring and hoses were routed through the firewall using existing holes and new kit-provided gaskets, etc. I had sourced a new dashboard and had all new upholstery throughout, and it was a tight squeeze to get the A/C fan assembly and ducting in place, but it fit as designed. It took a couple tries to get the system filled and functioning, but the local shop did me well and it now works perfectly.
One last comment. On modern cars, when the A/C comes on, the idle advances to compensate for the added burden. Although the Fiat factory shop manual shows an idle advance system
for cars with A/C, there was no mention of it in the kit at all. When we first got it running correctly, it worked fine but would stall the engine at idle; OK if going down the road, just don't stop at an intersection... So, I followed the diagram for the A/C idle advance mechanism and kluged together a system to test if the electrovalve I had on hand would make it work. The kluge worked well, and I've recently refined the fittings to simplify and clean things up. Looks like it was meant to be. By the way, our car is fuel injected, so the plumbing is fairly straightforward.
AC Idle Step Up Electrovalve Diagram by
Bob Brown, on Flickr
