When you’re driving the same coach all the time, naturally you want to take good care of it. After all, it’s your main means of income. Keeping your coach clean and checking under the hood every once in a while is a great place to start. However, there is one major factor when it comes to coach maintenance that often goes over our heads. And it does go over our heads because I’m talking about the Air Conditioning on your coach.
Depending on the coach model, there is only so much you can do on your own. Unfortunately, that’s simply the way today’s technology is advancing. You can’t do anything yourself anymore, forcing you to take your vehicles to expensive services and getting heart attacks from the receipts once the job’s done.
Today, I’m specifically going to talk about cleaning the air conditioning filter on the MAN Lion’s Coach. The same system has been used for well over a decade on this line of coaches, so it doesn’t matter whether it’s a 2009 or a 2022 model.
How often should I clean the air conditioning filter?
You want to clean the air conditioning filter on your coach every 2 or 3 months. Generally, when it starts looking like on the photo, you know what to do:
Taking off the cover panel
This one is attached by four large standard bolts. It’s preferable to use a larger screwdriver as the small ones will just jump right out. Ideally, for taking the cover panel off and especially when putting it back on, you’d want somebody to give you a hand.
It doesn’t matter in which order you unscrew them, but a smart idea is to hold the panel. This will prevent it from falling down once you’ve taken off the second or third bolt.
The end result will look like this. As you can see there are several layers to it. This is where I usually recommend taking a photo just so you remember to put it back on the correct side when you’re done.
Cleaning the Air Conditioning filter on your coach
Once you take it off, you want to get it out of the coach because there is going to be a lot of dust in these things. I resorted to cleaning it in my luggage compartment (don’t worry, I sweeped it afterwards). Place it wherever you deem best and take it apart. The black and white parts of the filter may look sticked together, but they’re not. You want to dust both sides of both pieces, as well as the interior of the plastic cover panel.
What are they called? Honestly, I have no idea. I’m just a driver.
Disgusting, right? And these are the parts that passengers don’t see. What about the piece visible to them? Well, let’s check it out:
What equipment to use when dusting the filters?
For starters, I recommend to give them a few hits with the broom head (for the filters, not for the plastic panel cover). This will do a bit of work, but it won’t be enough. When it comes to stuff like this, I always recommend using the things you already have, as you’ll be doing this just a few times a year. I used a broom and vacuum cleaner.
It’s very important to use a broom with bristles that aren’t too hard so you don’t destroy the filter. I used the one with flagged bristles as you can see on the photo. Takes a while but gets the job done. I suppose you could use stronger models and do it even quicker, but this is not a job to do when you just have 15 or 30 minutes of free time. You want to take your time to do it well.
As you sweep the dust off and out of the filters, you’ll see some dust particles still stuck on the filters.
This is where I recommend either:
- Using a strong enough vacuum cleaner. You don’t need any fancy extensions, just make sure you’re using a proper one and not the discount store edition.
- Put on a pair of gloves (or not) and just do it by hand if you have the time.
A third alternative may be using compressed air. I haven’t used it yet but it might prove useful to those of you who know how it works.
Putting the air conditioning filter back in your coach
I’m gonna be honest guys, this is the most difficult part here. Somehow it’s much more difficult to screw these bolts back in than it was to take them off. Make sure the metal grid is “inside” the actual ceiling of your coach. You’ll probably have some traces of where the filter panel was so that is also something to go by. You can see that by the dark circles on the fabric.
Depending on the size of the cover panel, you may need to ask a colleague to help you put it back. You can do it yourself but it will take twice the time, and I also recommend placing something to hold the cover panel underneath.
When the job is done, the filter will look something like this:
Don’t forget to clean the outside of the cover panel too! A regular wet wipe will do.
That’s it. Now you know how to maintain the air conditioning filter on your coach. If your coach has a drastically different system – why don’t you send it to me and we’ll make a blog post out of it!
To the experienced drivers, most of the advice I’m giving out here might seem obvious or mundane. But its the stuff I would’ve love to have had when I just started out. Looking forward to seeing you here next time!
Good luck!
