Air conditioning (AC) only blowing out heat

[udonoogen]

I have a 1999 Toyota Solara SLE. I live in Southern California and thankfully it's been cooling down lately ... because my A/C is on the fritz. It was working fine a couple months ago and then intermittently until about two weeks ago. Now, it only blows out hot air. It doesn't matter if I turn the dial to "Max Cool" .... only hot air. The temperature sensor seems to be working okay ... because when it's ~80 degrees inside and I move it up to 80 and the climate control is on Auto, it will slow the blowing of the heat. But yeah ... I only get heat.

Any idea what is wrong? Do I need to bring it into the shop?

If it's just a fuse or a $40 recharge of freon, that's doable. I would prefer no shop, if possible.

[TadS]

Is the AC light flashing? Is the compressor making any weird noises? I'd start with a can of refrigerant, but if it's leaking it may just continue to do so. Make sure to get a gauge, as you don't want to add a leak to your problems if that isn't what it is.

[Gregtrd]

I'm in fontana if youre near by I can trouble shoot the problem.