Buick woes

[Guest jackdm3]

1998 Park Avenue with dual climate control last week went to full cold on right side and full heat on driver. There are two blend door actuators on the left, and one on the right. Minimum. And then we have to consider the big one: the climate controls. Right now she's closed the vent on the driver's side and pointing the right two towards her, which barely works now, and Summer's approaching. I hate the car, she loves it, so I keep fixing crap, one after another. If you have any ideas on similar GM type cars, there may a few similarities. Thanks all.

[strickj]

Put a manual shut off valve on your heater hose.

Can get them at any parts store for on only a few bucks.

An added bonus to these is your A\C will actually blow cooler at your vents.

Reason being, air is always passing through your heater core.

Just be sure to open the valve every couple weeks or so to recirculate the water that will be sitting in your heater core.

[Guest jackdm3]

Thank you, brother.

[strickj]

Yup!

There's no reason to spend a weekend pulling a dash out to maybe fix the door(s) when this only takes all of 2 minutes...and get colder air to boot

Oh, and this is what you're looking for at the parts store

(they are universal so there will not be a listing for them in their computer)

Edited April 22, 2010 by strickj

[Guest jackdm3]

Matter which hose it goes into?

[Guest manofsteel]

you may have a vacuume leak under the dash.

[Guest Bonedaddy]

Could the computer have anything to do with it? Disconnect the battery and see. Not sure, just wondering.

[strickj]

I usually go for the inlet hose but I don't recon it really matters as both will stop the hot water from circulating.

[56FordGuy]

Put a manual shut off valve on your heater hose.

Can get them at any parts store for on only a few bucks.

An added bonus to these is your A\C will actually blow cooler at your vents.

Reason being, air is always passing through your heater core.

Just be sure to open the valve every couple weeks or so to recirculate the water that will be sitting in your heater core.

This is how the heater on my truck is. Works well, turns off the heater. Doesn't help with the AC much, but...

[Mike.357]

what is this air conditioning you all speak of?

[strickj]

You ever get that fixed, Jack?

[Guest jackdm3]

Nope. Goes to the shop Monday. After exhaustive net searching, it appears to be one of the middle actuators, of which there are at least 4 under the dash and none easy to reach but with the smallest of 5.5 mm wrenches/sockets. Somehow, our trusted mechanic of 20 years thinks it'll be around $200. I hope it's as easy as topping off the 134, but all this happened within a week of changing the battery. No combination of hooking up the + first or second has helped, nor doing the engine off key on for ten, 20, 30, or 60 seconds has helped. Took the glove out to get to the central actuators, but no joy. I'd spend lots of time this weekend to take the dash out ONLY if I knew it was necessary, which he'll determine. If so, I'll do that myself.

The clincher: We're burying wife's uncle in Jonesboro Monday right after we drop off the car. Be glad to hear any more suggestions before then.

[Guest 1817ak47]

good suggestions, saome cars ahve vacume actuators, some weren't, and were mechanical instead, could be electronics issue to. you should be able to get a bypass even at home depot etc, or even hardware stores often to, it is just a general plumbing like piece

[strickj]

Nope. Goes to the shop Monday. After exhaustive net searching, it appears to be one of the middle actuators, of which there are at least 4 under the dash and none easy to reach but with the smallest of 5.5 mm wrenches/sockets. Somehow, our trusted mechanic of 20 years thinks it'll be around $200. I hope it's as easy as topping off the 134, but all this happened within a week of changing the battery. No combination of hooking up the + first or second has helped, nor doing the engine off key on for ten, 20, 30, or 60 seconds has helped. Took the glove out to get to the central actuators, but no joy. I'd spend lots of time this weekend to take the dash out ONLY if I knew it was necessary, which he'll determine. If so, I'll do that myself.

The clincher: We're burying wife's uncle in Jonesboro Monday right after we drop off the car. Be glad to hear any more suggestions before then.

If you put the cut off on it, then it would be impossible to get hot air through the vents.

The cut off shuts off the water from flowing to the hearer core.

Are you sure you put in on one of the hearer hoses?

[Guest jackdm3]

Haven't done the valve insert yet, Strick, but I absolutely love the effectiveness of the idea! My wife does too but insists on a correct fix first. I'm going to install the valve on hers and my truck regardless. Just hope we remember to engage them in the winter.

[Guest jackdm3]

Took it to our mechanic who wouldn't get deep into if there wasn't a certainty to fix it. Suggested that we replace the control unit under the stereo, but he wouldn't do it because if he had to buy one "it could be hundreds" and he would be left to try to get a refund and suggested we go to a junk yard. Got one for $25 at a junk yard. The dealer would want $1035 for a new one. Took the deco panels off the dash and found the junkyard unit has different locations for the mounting screws, so no go on keeping the unit. But we hooked it up to look for an improvement and found no difference in functioning. He said there was no indication of low freon and a diagnostic test showed several vague HVAC trouble codes.

So I dismantled all the hush panels under the dash. There is a central mix box directly in the middle of the dash behind the ashtray area. Screwed to the sides of the box are two actuators screwed to the left side of the mix box that control flappers in the box to direct air flow and on the right side is one actuator. Took the right one off as I cussed about the tightness of the accessibility of the screws. Took it apart and found no plastic gears broken. Today I took the hardest-to-reach one off the left side while cussing even more because I know it's going to be worse trying to get those little screws back in with no room to work. Took that actuator apart and found the main gear was cracked almost completely in two. YES!!! There's a plastic rod that slips into the actuator. With the actuator off, you can move the rod manually which rotates the flaps inside the mix box. My wife turned the car on, set the controls as normal and said the heat was still coming out of the driver's vents. I turned the flapper rod all the way in one direction. She said no improvement. I turned the rod all the way opposite and she almost screamed with joy. Cold came out of all 4 vents across the dash. Autozone = $140 and the cheapest of all three discount retailers. NAPA woundn't help her when she called, so piss on them.

On the internet, someone said he bypassed replacing his actuators and just ran cables to the rotating rod to adjust it based on the seasons. Kind of like how you open and close window blinds. But imagine explaining all of this when trying to sell the car.

[strickj]

Kind of like how you open and close window blinds.

I once tied a rope to a set of broken wipers like that.

Pulled the rope right to wipe one way, pulled the rope left to wipe the other way

[Guest jackdm3]

Forgot to mention for the Memphis area peeps. Our trusted mechanic is Whitworth Auto in Cordova. He was asked to also:

1. find the water leak that was making the driver's carpet wet, for which they opened up and cleaned out the exterior dash-area vents of tree debris so the drain tubes would operate correctly.

2. lube the chassis

3. run diagnostics for all trouble codes

I suppose that because they are a Christian company, you could say "Jesus Saves" because they charged us $0 for all that time and effort.

[kb4ns]

Forgot to mention for the Memphis area peeps. Our trusted mechanic is Whitworth Auto in Cordova. He was asked to also:

1. find the water leak that was making the driver's carpet wet, for which they opened up and cleaned out the exterior dash-area vents of tree debris so the drain tubes would operate correctly.

2. lube the chassis

3. run diagnostics for all trouble codes

I suppose that because they are a Christian company, you could say "Jesus Saves" because they charged us $0 for all that time and effort.

Awesome! I'll keep that in mind...

[Guest jackdm3]

And death followed with us.

It has a dead A/C programmer and two dead actuators (on top of the one I replaced). A/C levels OK, control module OK. $1,200 at Steve's in Mid-town.

[MacGyver]

I know your wife loves it, but ditch the Buick while you can. Nothing good, or cheap will ever come from this car again!

[Guest jackdm3]

Been sayin' it for years! She said not until she finishes grad school 1 1/4 years out. That'll be another couple of grand.