I’m still of the opinion that having ac in the car would be quite beneficial in San Jose
I’ve known a lot of people that like to brag that they don’t want and/or need ac
Yet when they say this, they’re red, sweating, their pulse is racing, etc.
Just because they say something doesn’t mean you automatically have to take it at face value
I’m not accusing anybody of being a liar . . . yet it’s sometimes good to be a skeptic
My cheapskate friend refuses to use the A/C–both in the car, and at home.
When he takes the ~80 minute drive to my house in the summer, when he arrives his face is so red that I fear it will explode. His first stop in my house is the bathroom, in order to change his clothing because it is so saturated with perspiration. That’s correct. He brings a change of clothing because he becomes so wet. Also, he is unable to hear much for a while after his arrival, as a result of driving on the NJ Turnpike with his windows open.
He “doesn’t need” A/C.
Yeah, right…
When I talk of it, I’m not bragging. It can be miserable, and I’d opt to have it if all things were equal, but I made a strategic decision to not keep forking over $1,300 for a new compressor every 13 months, right after the warranty on the last one expires. Besides, my motorcycle has air conditioning as long as I’m moving. 
Having said that, I know three women* who never run the air conditioning in their cars unless they have a passenger. They keep the air conditioning in their homes set on 78 degrees and they’re always cold. They live in Florida year round, love the heat, and hate the cold, and when they drive in muggy sweltering 91 degree heat, they aren’t red, sweating, with their pulse racing; they’re just comfortable.
*One is a former coworker, one is a current coworker, and one is the woman I am dating.
OK, I thought he mentioned SF in a message. San Jose hits a high of 83, with morning/evening temps in the 60’s. Not every climate needs AC… though my car needs it more than the house. (The car heats up like my greenhouse.)
That’s what I use the money for that I’d otherwise be spending servicing & repairing the AC
Not all cars with ac have problems . . .
My brother’s 2008 Toyota has auto climate control, and it’s never had a problem with the ac system. As far as the ac system goes, I’ve only replaced the accessory drive belt because it was worn, and the cabin air filter naturally got replaced many times over the years
When I bought my Dodge 7 years ago the A/C wasn’t cold enough. I performed an evacuate and recharge and when I disconnected the service lines from the car one of the service valves was leaking. I bought a replacement service valve for $5 and recharged the system. The A/C has been trouble free since then, it is 110 F here, I use the A/C 9 months of the year.
Imagine the good time I could have had with that money if I didn’t have to repair the air conditioner.
You want to keep that system, no matter what they say.
Mid 90's I was sold a new heat pump because my old (working)
system was too small. It was somewhere over $7K. It worked 12
years and the compressor went out. The factory refused warranty
because the company that installed it was only doing commercial
installs these days. It costs $20 more a month to heat the house,
and I can do w/o AC 360 days in the year. (I can’t find a system
that’ll last 35-50 years… even if I would.) lol
+1
Over the decades, I have owned 10 cars, of which 8 had A/C. (The non air-conditioned ones were a VW Karmann Ghia and a Ford Falcon…)
NONE of my air-conditioned cars ever gave me any problems related to the A/C, so I can state that I have spent zero dollars on A/C repairs over the span of 5 decades.
In my family, the only A/C repair that I can recall was the necessity to replace the compressor clutch on my brother & SIL’s Plymouth Barracuda when the car was less than 2 years old. That car was a low-quality POS from day one.
If you keep them long enough they will.
If you trade in your cars every 1-5 years, of course you’re unlikely to ever have serious problems, but if you keep your cars 10-20 years…
I keep mine 10-15 years, have had VERY few a/c problems.
One vehicle 18 years - one 10 years - one 8 years
No air conditioner repairs or problems - besides even if you spend 1500.00 every 10 years for AC repair is 150.00 a year too much to be comfortable .
Never had A/C troubles on any of my cars (09 Focus, 05 Odyssey; previously 05 T&C, 01 Corolla, 94 Saturn). That 94 Saturn had some amazing A/C…I still miss that car sometimes. Manual Transmission that never needed a clutch job despite me learning how to drive stick with it, repairs that I did (it got totaled in an accident over a decade ago, so memory is a little foggy) were all fairly straightforward.
I have had a few of my cars for 10-11 years, and none of them ever gave me A/C problems.
Some vehicles have problems, others rarely do. The pre 80’s cars
seemed (to me) to have more probs.
Very likely, but even my total POS '74 Volvo never gave me any problems with the A/C. That Volvo’s engine, transmission, fuel injection system, electrical system, and paint were all crap, but I never had any problems with its A/C.
80 degrees max temperature (the max of the entire 24 hour day mind you) is so hot AC is absolutely required? … lol … If that’s how folks felt in the 19th century I’d be here all by myself, there’d have been no 1849 gold-rush migration to California , too damn hot!! 
No disagreements that the 108 in Las Vegas today, the 110 in Phoenix, the 99 in Dallas, AC would be highly desirable.
What do you personally do when visiting a place with triple digit temperatures?
Suffer? 
Rent a car with ac . . . ?! 
I don’t need air conditioning during Dec, Jan, Feb but when I visit southern California during those months the A/C makes it more comfortable. My employer might pay for a rental car but I don’t need it.
When he travels, he can do it like we did in the 60’s. There’s the old verse about mad dogs and Englishmen.
Remember, even LA is 20 degrees cooler than Las Vegas. Average LA temps are in the low 80s. If he has to visit silly climates, say NJ in summer, he probably does like the rest of us. Fly in, catch an AC cab, and kick back.