I have a 1997 Safari AWD.It seemed that the blower motor stopped working.I had replaced 2 of these in the 10 years I've had the van, but this time I had my mechanic do it.This was a 'game day' decision,and I got it back literally hours before the blizzard.Never tried it until I was on my way home from work.Now it blows ice cold air out of the defroster, the dash, the floor ducts, wherever.It never had working A/C! The temp gauge reads normal and there's plenty of coolant in the radiator.I had excellent heat/defrost in this van before the blower motor stopped working. I am guessing that a vacuum line isin't hooked up or something equally as silly.The shop's quite a ways from my house and I really need the van for at least another week before I can part with it.
Is there anything I can look for or check?This has got to be a simple dumb fix, but I don't know WTH I'm looking for.Any advise would be awesome.Thanks.
Follow the two hoses from the heater box in the engine compartment. Down and toward the rear a little bit, find the 4-6-8 legged, black plastic octopus valve. Look for the vacuum line to that thing to be off or damaged.
Shouldn't be the vacuum line, unless it was installed the wrong way...no vacuum to the valve means heat. Vacuum to the valve means no heat. I'd check to make sure the blend door is opening. You can see it up under the passenger side of the doghouse, there is a round metal piece with a slot on the outside of it that you can see move when you operate the heat control from cold to hot. Make sure that is moving when you do..it's electrical, not vacuum operated.
The gears inside it are plastic and eventually one - or more - cracks.
Froze my a$$ off on the way home from my brother's place in Buffalo to Maryland when the stupid thing failed. T-shirt, denim shirt, fleece jacket, coat = still damned cold. Was 25° outside. Replaced the actuator, had blasting hot heat.
Not too bad.. remove doghouse and it is located on the side of the heater core air box on passenger side... 2 screws and a little prying to get it off the blend door shaft.
@redfury, you get the moneyvango prize (a big box with no bottom)! You were correct in determining that it was the blend door motor/actuator.It's been colder than a bat's *** here, so I let my mechanic take care of it.The part was about $90 and with the labor it came to about $250.My van is toasty and all is well until something else decides to take a dump in this beast,lol!
The Dorman replacement part is under $40 and takes less than an hour to change... $250 seems pretty steep but at least you have heat again.
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