In case people are curious -

I took the van to my local Subaru shop for an opinion and they agreed
that the house routing was not optimal. They also said they've seen a
few stock hoses fail like this and recommended that I have a stronger
hose made.

So, I'm going to have the outlet line shortened to improve hose
routing and have a better hose made.

Thanks for all your input,
Luke

On Sat, Aug 27, 2011 at 12:23 PM, Luke Bakken <luke.bakken@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hello everyone,
>
> First some info - I have an '89 Syncro Westy with a 2003 Subaru 2.5 in
> it, conversion done in 2004 by SmallCar. SC also hooked up the Subaru
> A/C to the Vanagon system and until this year it worked fine.
>
> A month ago I noticed the A/C wasn't blowing cold at all, so I took it
> to a local shop and they diagnosed it as having leaky old hoses. So
> they put in new hoses to the front of the van and a new condenser from
> Van Cafe. All was working well until yesterday as I was driving on the
> interstate and heard a pop-hiss in the back. I immediately turned the
> A/C off and pulled over to see this in the engine compartment:
>
> http://goo.gl/mt3FC
>
> You can see that not only did the Subaru A/C hose pop off, but it
> split as well. This hose is no older than 9 years, of course.
>
> What do you think could cause this? Did the local shop overfill the
> A/C system? I'm going to take the van back this Monday and any
> information I could relay their way would be appreciated.
>
> Thanks -
> Luke
>