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James, With today's advances you can put a compressor on the engine and suffer a much lower hp loss than back in "the good ol' days". Going to an A/C shop will find you a modern compressor that requires much less of an hp drain, and strain, on the engine making the use of A/C in our cars a realistic function. However (don't ya just hate those!), finding an original under dash unit isn't too easy. Everything else for the system can be made at an A/C shop. The average price appears to be about $1500. As an FYI, I found a complete A/C system on a Square in a junkyard and removed everything myself (except hoses, I'd rather get new ones!) and it cost me $150. We're talking the dash unit, compressor with engine mounting bracket, crank pulley, fan shrouding and condenser (which fits between the spare tire and torsion housing). Since you can get a reasonable looking non-stock evaporator (under dash unit) I wouldn't pay more than $50-$75 for a stock unit unless 1) you just GOTTA have it, and/or 2) it's still in its original, unopened packing box :) My three cents, Toby Erkson air_cooled_nut@pobox.com <-- Please use this address for email '72 VW Squareback 1.6L bored and stroked to 2.0L '75 Porsche 914 1.8L, ORPCA member Portland, Oregon, http://www.geocities.com/MotorCity/8501/ > -----Original Message----- Anyway, I'm curious to know if anyone out there actually has such a unit installed and just how well (or poorly) it works. I always assumed the extra strain on the engine would make air conditioning undesirable (since it would presumably kill your engine much sooner and rob HP), but maybe I'm wrong?