How I repaired my Blend Door Actuator, without cutting open my housing

[gatzdon]

Winter is here and my explorer was blowing only cold air, despite the hoses to the heater core being plenty warm.

I've seen quite a few threads where people resorted to cutting open the housing for the heater core and manually moving their blend door to the desired position.

Well, I have nothing against people cutting open their heater core housing, but I like to take apart things too.

So, knowing that I never heard the clicking that others reported I wondered if my problem wasn't related to stripped gears.

This youtube video shows you how to remove/replace your blend door actuator

After the actuator is out, you should mark the blend door position because it needs to be in that position to reinstall it.

Then using a screwdriver, you need to separate the cover at all of the clips.

Once the cover is off, the inside looks like this. I posted the pic because sometimes it helps to see it when reassembling it. I noticed that mine didn't have any stripped gears or burnt marks around any of the electrical components.

Now for cleaning the sensor. The piece that connects directly to the blend door has about 8 spring connectors (see red arrows). I wiped them off and gently pulled up on them to give them more spring. Inside the actuator, there are about 8 corresponding semi circle contact lines (other red arrow). I wiped these off and gently rubbed them with a pencil eraser.

I then reassembled everything and plugged it in (didn't reinstall it yet). I turned the key on and the actuator started moving. You can adjust the blend door position back to your mark using the temperature control in order to reinstall the actuator.

Remember, if it still doesn't work, you are no worse off than before and you can still cut your heater core housing to manually move your blend door.

Enjoy

 

[Digital Dad]

This is a fantastic post, thank you and I am sure you have just helped hundreds of people.

 

[Mesozoic]

Ummm yes, this was extremely helpful. Thank you!

 

[SoNic67]

The people that cut their heater core did it because of different reason - their door shaft was broken and the door needed to be replaced. You cannot take the door out easy... either by cutting the plastic or by removing the whole dash.

 

[Mesozoic]

I took my blend door actuator off this evening and found that it's not moving at all with any changes made to the EATC. However, I discovered that I'm able to manually move the blend door by hand with the actuator removed and the door stays in either the full off or full on position, which provides a workaround until I replace or repair the actuator.

Mine is Ford F87H-19E616-AB, btw.

 

[gatzdon]

The people that cut their heater core did it because of different reason - their door shaft was broken and the door needed to be replaced. You cannot take the door out easy... either by cutting the plastic or by removing the whole dash.

Yes, the clicking would indicate that the actuator is not the problem.

 

[gatzdon]

I took my blend door actuator off this evening and found that it's not moving at all with any changes made to the EATC. However, I discovered that I'm able to manually move the blend door by hand with the actuator removed and the door stays in either the full off or full on position, which provides a workaround until I replace or repair the actuator.

Mine is Ford F87H-19E616-AB, btw.

Unless your vehicle is in great condition, it may not be worth it to follow down the rabbit hole trying to fix this perfectly. If you can set it for cold and hot, you have more than many people wanted when their blend door problems started.

It only took me about 15 minutes to take my actuator apart and clean it. It wasn't too difficult to put it back together. I was able to connect it and watch it work before I put it back in. If it didn't work, I was just going to go with manually moving the blend door in the spring and fall, but it wasn't worth the $60 to me to get a new actuator.

 

[SoNic67]

To me it was worth the new actuator (had a stripped gear in the old one). I think it was cheaper that $60 at the dealer because I have an account on FordParts.com (Motorcraft) with free pick up at my dealer, I get a discounted price that way.
The 19E616 part that I got had this information:
"with ATC, If used with the revised 18471 plenum, remove the attached plate and slide the motor into the molded plate on the revised 18471 housing.; A/C door actuator motor & plate assembly"
I had to discard that plate, mine was using the OE style, bolt-on system.

PS: The Dorman ones didn't work for my ETAC (2001), don't know why.

 

[koda2000]

It depends what the problem is. In my '01 ST, with manual controls like yours, the actuator was dead. I also took mine apart. The gears and other mechanical pieces were fine, the electric motor was fine, the TEMP control was fine it was just something in the electronic components of the actuator. I just replaced it with a used one. In my '00 Mountaineer with the EATC controls the actuator (which is a totally different animal to the manual controls actuator) was fine, the EATC unit was bad. Again, I replaced it with a used one.

Maybe I could have screwed around with the electrical components and gotten them working, but for how long? I get it, fixing something rather than replacing it is rewarding, but I figure my time is worth more and removing and reinstalling the actuator is a PITA.

If the blend door is broken (as pictured above) messing with the actuator wont solve the problem and removing the heater plenum to replace a broken door definitely isn't worth the effort required.

 

[1997XLTRollover]

This is why I love my car's from the 60's. Solid cables. No BS to break. Just always works. If something was to crack and require removal of the dash, the entire dash comes out with only a few screws. I don't understand why we need everything so electronic. I can understand needing electronics for an auto climate control, but a manual setup like we have in most gen 2's, there's no reason for all this electronic BS.

Heck I prefer the manual controls. My old 99 EB I couldn't stand the auto climate control. Anytime I had to adjust it I had to look down and play with it. In my 96 I just put my hand down and by feel know exactly where I want the knobs.

 

[SoNic67]

I feel the same way, but sometimes I wonder if isn't just my age that's showing

 

[Mesozoic]

One thing I noticed on my actuator was that the circuit board has no components on it at all, it's just solder joints for the various connectors with no passives (no resistors, caps, etc. to be found at all). Regardless, the gears and everything look ok, but the unit was definitely not moving the output shaft when I adjusted the temperature during testing.

Since it seems that the EATC might be a bit of an annoyance in terms of reliability, is it possible to retrofit a vehicle that came with EATC to a manual setup? I am definitely not interested in having to deal with this again within the next 5 years if I can avoid it.

 

[SoNic67]

I think that if it worked for 15 years, is not that bad of a reliability.

 

[Mesozoic]

I think that if it worked for 15 years, is not that bad of a reliability.

I beg to differ. My '79 Bronco has fully functioning A/C and heat and none of the vacuum or control actuators have had to be replaced yet. 37 years and still running strong.

In any case, comparing the Mounty to my Bronco is useless. I have to fix it and I love the Mountaineer just as much as the Bronco.

I picked up a brand new Motorcraft replacement actuator and plugged it in, the shaft is not moving at all for some reason. I'm debating whether I should try to run the EATC self test and attempt to reset the system or something before throwing in the towel and getting a replacement EATC.

I've read some conflicting info on how to invoke the self test. What is the correct procedure? I've not been able to get it to run.

 

[SoNic67]

To enter the self-test, press the OFF and FLOOR buttons simultaneously and then release and press the AUTOMATIC button within two seconds.
To exit self-test and retain all intermittent DTCs, push the blue (cooler) button. The control will exit self-test, retain all intermittent diagnostic trouble codes and then turn OFF (display blank).
To exit the self-test and clear all DTCs, press the DEFROST button.
http://www.idmsvcs.com/2vmod/eatcswap/selftest.html

 

[koda2000]

I'm not a huge fan of the EATC controls, or even the AUTO DOWN driver's window function, but in general I'm pretty happy with the level of electronics and convenience items on my Gen II's. I'm absolutely sure my age has a lot to do with it. My daughter just bought a new top-of-the-line Honda Accord EX-L. It's got more bells and whistles in it than the Space Shuttle. I'd hate learning how to use all that junk and consider most of it unnecessary. I've already told my daughter not to bring it to me if it ever needs any repairs.

 

[Mesozoic]

LOL, agreed, I'm happy with the level of gadgetry on the Gen 2, but anymore would've been bordering excessive.

So that method of invoking the EATC self test doesn't work on mine. My friend has a professional scanner of some sort however and was able to invoke the self test via the OBD-II port. It works fine and the self-test must've reset the control output to the blend door actuator because we verified that it was working afterwards. So... my issue was the following:

1. Blend door actuator was missing a tooth on one of the gears, internally.
2. Brand new replacement Motorcraft actuator did not solve the problem, ie. no movement of the actuator shaft when changing temperature on the EATC.
3. Self test of the EATC using its button sequence doesn't work.
4. Professional scan tool used to invoke the self test on the EATC works fine and has reinstated blend door actuator function.