Vehicle air conditioner with attachment and detachment of evaporator

An air conditioner in combination with a vehicle having an instrument panel on a front side within a passenger compartment, the instrument panel having a passenger's side and a driver's side, the vehicle having a fire wall through which an engine compartment and the passenger compartment are partitioned from each other, said air conditioner comprising:

• an air conditioning case being disposed inside the instrument panel portion within the passenger compartment at an approximate center in a vehicle right-left direction;
• a cooling heat exchanger disposed in said air conditioning case to be inclined relative to the vehicle right-left direction in such a manner that one side end of said cooling heat exchanger in the vehicle right-left direction is placed towards the driver's side adjacent the fire wall and the other side end thereof is placed towards the passenger's side spaced from the fire wall while an air inlet surface of said cooling heat exchanger extends in a vehicle up-down direction;
• a blower unit for blowing air into the air conditioning case, said blower unit being disposed to be offset from said air conditioning case toward the passenger's side and being disposed such that the blower unit does not interfere with an extension of the air inlet surface of said cooling heat exchanger for permitting removal of said cooling heat exchanger for the air conditioning case;
• wherein:
• said air conditioning case has a side surface portion at the passenger's side in the vehicle right-left direction, for removing said cooling heat exchanger from the air conditioning case exchanger obliquely toward a vehicle rear side in the passenger's side;
• and
• said side surface portion of said air conditioning case has a thin wall portion at which a part of said side surface portion is broken by a predetermined force so that an opening having a predetermined area for detaching said cooling heat exchanger is provided.