I had this bad smell whenever I turned on the A/C. I took my car to a workshop, where they tried to clean the evaporator by fumbling a tube through the evaporator drain in the firewall and through the gloove box cabin filter compartment. The result was so so, and the bad smell soon came back.

I think I found a better way to clean the evaporator: when removing the waterfall and setting the climate controls to positions Cold and Vent , the evaporator is visible and accessible relatively well through the two air duct openings. Therefore it was relatively easy to flush the whole evaporator surface with the help of an A/C cleaner tube. All the excess A/C cleaner liquid drained through the firewall evaporator drain.

I used “Liqui Moly A/C System Cleaner 250ml” and am very satisfied with the result. It has been months now and the smell hasn’t come back since.

 

Good to know. I've never had any bad smells, but it's always possible.

 

I read about the "A/C smell" back around 2007 here, & it was suggested to shut off the A/C approx 1/4 mile from the house. Giving the air ducts a chance to air out. Of course with "outside air" selection on.
I've been doing that for almost 10 years & never had the stink..


Hope I didn't jinx myself for this year.

 

X2 Sleeper on that trick. My old Dodge got that funky smell off and on, and I treated it with some stuff from Dodge that got rid of the funky smell, but then I started doing that shut-off of the A/C and never had another problem since. and when we got the HHR, we did the same and twas all good.

 

Whopper - And best of all, no cost...................

 

An HHR in Switzerland. Cool! The stuff doesn't seem to be readily available in the States, hoping someone knows of some alternative products? Or better yet, a strategy for finding someone who will do this for me? The dealer was no help.

(I've tried the shut-off trick to no avail.)

 

Once you have the funk, the shut off trick won't cure it. At that point, It needs some chemicals I guess, Google might help.,

 

And, don't use re-circ unless it's super-hot. Use it to bring the temp and humidity down and then turn it off. Re-circ tends to create this problem in many vehicles, if you you leave it on. Just running fresh air through the system has kept mine good. The wife's Traverse had issues, because she thought recirc was max cool, so it should always be on...

Auto climate control systems do this for you, and that is what they do. I share a cube with the HVAC warranty investigation guy...

And, by the way, the wife is not the Engineer in the house...