Removing Air-Con Unit for cleaning / sandblasting

[UUUdirs2newcastle]

Can I remove the air con unit, particularly the air con pipes on the air conditioning unit on my RS2 Avant without damaging it, damaging rare or Unobtainable pipes, and what happens when the gas gets out? Will this cause issues?

is there anything I need to know before I remove it?

I want to clean the front of the engine when I change all the belts and changing the water pump and everything. It looks pretty dirty and oily back there and could do with a spruce up.

[nick]

You should renew the o-rings at least,plug any holes because the system contains a 'dryer' that extracts humidity so you can't leave the pipes/pump exposed to the air.
carefully plug and tape any pipes you want to sandblast and after take out the plugs and make sure not one grain of sand is left behind in the pipes/connections.
Also i would use fine white sand not the coarser type.

[UUUdirs2newcastle]

To be fair, I just want to tidy up the corroded air con unit, I might just use a wire wheel & a dremel for safety.
I am just worried that if I take the air con unit off the car, the unit would break or the pipes would leak or something. The gas has probably escaped years ago, the air con hasn’t worked for years.

[Tractor Dave]

If it's not working and you have no intention to fix it, you may as well remove everything. There is quite a substantial weight saving and better cooling without the condenser.