after sitting with air on for about 10 mins i heard a crazy pffffttt sound when i then saw smokey steam rolling from under driver side oh hood. i thought i was overheating so i turned off everything , sat for a bit then drove home without air on , today i tried turning on the air ,hot as heck....i guess compressor is not kicking? trying to figure out what happened.??

 

Emergency pressure relief on the compressor. There's a discharge port if head pressure gets too high. When it releases it lets out refrigerant which looks like dense steam but dissipates quickly, and sounds sort of like bus air brake chambers firing when it happens.

Need to figure out why pressure was so high, fix then recharge. Look at fan operation first, fans malfunction (which they constantly do on Lancers) and high side pressure skyrockets, head pressure will release. Otherwise you're talking blockage territory which is not too common.