New Member Saying “Hi”, And Possible Blend Door Issue?

[sweetbeats]

Greetings, everybody.

I’m an owner of a new-to-me 2003 Eddie Bauer edition Explorer.

It’s pretty straight and clean and well-maintained for 167K miles. It has a few things that will need addressed, but we got a good deal on it and we're happy new owners. So I wanted to reach out and say hello, and also get some direction as to where to start with one of the issues: it has the dual-zone climate controls for the front seats, but the zone controls don't seem to change where the air comes out…its always just sort of coming out of every vent. So the blend door isn't moving. Is this more likely a stuck blend door or a dead actuator? There are no noises when I change the zone setting. Thoughts?

 

[BrooklynBay]

Welcome to this forum! Watch the operation of the blend door when you change the control to see if it responds.

 

[sweetbeats]

Welcome to this forum! Watch the operation of the blend door when you change the control to see if it responds.

Thank you for the reply! I’ll start there.

 

[sweetbeats]

So my HVAC issue turns out to be the dreaded fresh/recirculation blend door issue, so I’m diving into that.

Can somebody tell me where the glove box lamp is supposed to mount? Mine is hanging free and I can’t figure it out:

Also, 2nd row middle seat release lever is busted. I’m assuming this is common. Is there a known hack or fix for this? I’m assuming the lever assembly is not available separate from the seat:

Also coming up is replacing both the heated seat switches.

 

[sweetbeats]

Hi all.

Well, I’d still really like some info on where the glove box light mounts, if somebody can post a pic that would be great.

And anybody else have a busted second row middle seat release lever? And if so what did you do about it?

My heat/AC system is back up and running. The fresh/recirculate blend door and become detached and was laying over the blower fan intake. I was able to pry open the blend door housing enough to get my hands in there and put things back together. There are videos of people hacking the housing up with a sawzall, and also good instructions here for maybe the more correct way to fix it but much more laborious…pulling center console out and partially displacing the dashboard, etc. but I did it without hacking and by just removing the glovebox and removing some of the housing screws and prying it open.