Interdynamics AFK-11CS Arctic Freeze Ultra Synthetic Recharging Kit with UV Dye and UV Light
Hello ladies and gentlemen! Today on RefrigerantHQ we will be doing another product review. Today’s featured product is the Interdynamics AFK-11CS Arctic Freeze AC recharge kit. Whew! Try saying that a few times fast. Anyways, these types of products are VERY common during the summer time. If you are reading this then I can imagine that it is the dead of summer, it’s ninety or one-hundred degrees outside and your car’s air conditioner is blowing warm air. It’s not getting cold at all. Is the Arctic Freeze product the right fit for you? Well, let’s dive in and take a look!
Before I get into what a product does and doesn’t offer I always like to spend a little bit of time looking at the company behind the product. I feel that a look, even if it’s a brief one, helps the consumer and myself understand what goes into the product. In this case the Interdynamics AFK-11CS Arctic Freeze is from the company called rechargeac.com.
This company is then owned by IDQ Incorporated out of Garland, Texas. The IDQ company has been in business for over forty years and through out all of those years they have been dedicated to providing do-it-yourself air conditioning products for the weekend warrior mechanic as well as the seasoned service technician. In fact I would feel comfortable saying that they have a VERY large market share when it comes to DIY air conditioning recharge kits. These guys know what they are doing.
Know Before You Buy
A lot of you may already know this but I would be amiss if I didn’t mention it. Before we get onto the Pros and Cons I want to point out that these AC recharge kits are not a miracle worker. Heck, most of the time they aren’t even a fix. What these recharge kits do is take a problem that you have with your car’s air conditioning system and push the problem on down the road.
Your AC system rather it be on a car, house, or freezer all work relatively the same way. The refrigerant goes through an endless cycle moving back and forth between gas and liquid and liquid to gas. The system is completely sealed and no refrigerant should be coming out of it. So, in a perfect world you should never run out of refrigerant. But, as we all know the world isn’t perfect and things break, hoses crack, o-rings crumble, and so on and so on. When this happens your refrigerant begins to leak out. The more refrigerant that leaks out the less potent your air conditioner will be in the dead of summer.
Now what these recharge kits do is pump your system full of refrigerant again. So, you have a leak where your refrigerant escaped out of and if you use a recharge kit you are just dumping more refrigerant into your system. Depending on your leak this could be a good thing or a bad thing. If you have a tiny crack in one of your A/C hoses that barely leaks then an AC recharge kit will be perfect for you. You could recharge it in March and have it last the whole season because the leak is so small. But, if you have a very large leak, or worse, a major part failure then these recharge kits will not work for you. You could recharge your car today, have it blow cold air, and then come back a few days later and all of your refrigerant is gone again. Not a good deal.
So, the point I’m trying to make here is just know that these recharge kits aren’t a miracle worker. Yes, they’ll work in some cases, but not all. Alright, on to the review!
Pros
Sure you could go out to an auto parts store and buy a couple of cans of refrigerant and recharge your car yourself but when you do this you have to realize that when you are buying those R-134a cans you are ONLY buying cans of straight refrigerant. Have you thought about the PAG oil that needs replaced? What about a leak sealer or any other additives? With the Interdynamics AFK-11CS Arctic Freeze you get your refrigerant along with everything else including the PAG oil, the additives, and yes even a leak sealer built right into the formula.
Along with all of that the AFK-11CS comes with a couple extra features that the other recharge kits just simply do not have. The first is that this product comes with two thirteen ounce cans of refrigerant giving you a total of twenty-six ounces. This is much more refrigerant than the other products on the market. In fact if you look at some of the other Interdynamics products out there you’ll see canister ranges between eighteen to twenty-two ounces. The twenty-six ounce for this product is in a class of it’s own.
The second change on this product that I wanted to mention is that it comes with ultraviolet dye built right into the formula. For those of you who do not know UV dyes are used to find and identify leaks in your refrigerant system. Remember earlier how I said that the AC cycle is a sealed system? Well this UV dye will help you find where your leak is. It also comes with a UV pen so that you can scan and identify the source of the leaks. All you have to do is shine the light along all the joints, hoses, and pipes of your ac system and watch for any indication.
The last Pro that I am going to mention here is that the R-134a that comes with this product is compatible with all other types of R-134a. What that means is that you do not have to worry about mixing refrigerants together. Say, for example, you have a pound of refrigerant left in your car and you need to recharge it. You do NOT have to purge all of the old refrigerant before recharging. Like I said before, easy button.
If you get one thing from this review it’s this: The AFK-11CS Arctic Freeze is all about making things easy. It’s the easy button so they say. Everything that would need to be done to add refrigerant to your system is in that one little can. On top of that the product comes with a hose and with a pressure gauge so you can see exactly how much refrigerant you have when you start, when charging, and when you finish.
Cons
Alright folks, onto the cons. The biggest con is something that I’ve already mentioned. Any recharge kit, I don’t care what brand, are temporary fixes and that is if they work. If you have a massive leak or a faulty compressor then these recharge kits aren’t going to do you any good. I still like to buy them though as a kind of pre-cursor before taking my car into the shop. If the recharge kit doesn’t work no big deal. You are out thirty dollars and you take your car to the shop. However, if the recharge kit does work then you just saved yourself a whole mess of money by not taking your car to the mechanic.
Another con that I want to bring up is that the price on this unit is a bit more expensive then the Interdynamics EZ Chill model. The EZ chill is a bare bones price point item to get you product. The Arctic Freeze is just the opposite. You get a higher quality product and a super sized container, but you will be paying more. So, you will be paying more but in my opinion it is worth it as you get a quality product.
Lastly, like with all refrigerants there is risk of shipping damage and the product arriving damaged. This could be either the can being damaged and having the refrigerant leaked out, a damaged gauge, or even a damaged hose. This is obviously a problem and if you run into this please call their customer service number which can be found by clicking here.
Conclusion
Overall I would say that the AFK-11CS Arctic Freeze is a definite buy especially if you are looking for a top-tier product when it comes to recharging your vehicle’s air conditioner. This product gives you all of the features and benefits of the other Interdynamics products out there as well as giving you bonus refrigerant and a UV detection system.
If you are interested in purchasing the Interdynamics AFK-11CS Arctic Freeze please check out Amazon.com. Or, you can also find this product in most retailers and auto parts stores. Also, if you are unsure on how to use this product then I highly recommend you read our ‘How To’ guide on AC recharge kits.