This is news to me, do you know the CVC that authorizes it? The current CVC 26708 states it is illegal, however if the glass is tinted from the factory up to 30%(allowing 70% light in), it is legal. This is the grey area, since there is tinted oem front side window, if you keep the side windows to 40% or less LEO's can't really justify pulling you over just for the tint, since they cannot tell from their car wether or not it is oem tint or roll on.
mldave
As to your original questions about cooling the interior, I took some temp measurements today using my laser thermometer and my white '91(only one in sitting in the sun). Not exactly scientific since I had to roll down the window, but these were the measurements using dark grey strip on the seat cover:
Ambient temp of 68*,
Surface was 86*,
Interior temp 86*,
Side of seat not in the sun was 86*,
Section of seat in the sun with tinted window was 115*,
Window down the same section heated up to 158* even with a slight breeze.
IIRC(tinted the windows 5yrs ago) I used a 35% light reduction 3m film.
I also measured the temp with the limo tint(95* light blockage) and the temp was 91*, dark grey trim which is the same color as I used on the seat.
When I was using the R134 my comp never cycled, and the interior was never really that cool. The circuit board may help, but from what I understand, you really need to use a comp designed for R134 as well as a condenser(I think). I switched over to a different refrigerant about 6yrs ago when my comp started making noise. The refrigerant I use now is called Maxi-fridge, and it works really well. It is a propane based refrigerant that operates at a lower pressure then the R134 and cools similar to R12. On another board a lot of members were concerned with it being propane based, but I haven't had any issues and have used it on a few other vehicles as well.
