The first thing to do is to find out why your Air Conditioning system has lost it's cooling capacity. It could be a clogged Orifice Tube, a bad Accumulator, or even a Refrigerant leak from a connection, or even thru the hoses themselves. I don't know if $200 is a good price to punch 3 hoses that are reusing your couplings from the old hoses (I too plan on doing this in a couple of months), but I can tell you that 3 hoses for that price is certainly more economical than 1 for $130 for a 20 year old one! Make sure that when you have these new hoses punched for your car that you use Barrier Hose. Barrier Hose is designed to not only take high pressures, but it comes with a Neoprene lining to keep R-134a, and all other non CFC Refrigerants from seeping out thru the hoses over time. Which make no mistake, they will. As for Freeze 12, or any other substitutes, your best bet in making a choice is to reference the EPA's data. http://www.epa.gov/ozone/snap/refrigerants/macssubs.html Freeze 12 contains no CFC's, and that's because it substitutes HCFC's instead! So if you like R-134a, I'd probably just suggest sticking with that, since Freeze 12 is already 80% R-134a anyways (assuming that enviornmental concerns are what have motivated you). What the actual perfomance gains with Freeze 12 vs R-134a are, I've no idea, as I've never seen any claims that it cools any better, or improves component life. But R-134a appears to be much cheaper from what I've seen $9 for one can of Freeze 12, vs $19.99 for 3 cans of R-134a. If you need additional cooling capacity with a replacement refrigerant in your car, you may also wish to consider the use of a Variable Orifice Valve that can increase cooling capacity at idle. http://www.acsource.com/subcatmfgprod.asp?0=273&1=274&2=-1 Myself, I am going to be performing a complete A/C rebuild this spring, and will be installing a VOV. However, I am seriously considering a Hydrocarbon refrigerant substitute due to my extreme climate. -Robert vin 6585 "X" To address comments privately to the moderating team, please address: moderators@xxxxxxxxxxx For more info on the list, tech articles, cars for sale see www.dmcnews.com To search the archives or view files, log in at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dmcnews Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dmcnews/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: dmcnews-unsubscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/