well i am new to this site and i am glad that i found it..Well I see that too many people are having trouble with the blend door motor,that ford refuses to fix..Well I am an unhappy owner of a 1999 ford expedition eddie b...and only has 79819 miles on it..and guess what the blend door motor is bad,went to the dealer ship to get a price on what it would cost to fix well a good $700.00..and the part only cost $79.00..How can we stop ford from ripping us off.I feel that ford should be fixing this problem,seeing that so many people have had the same exprience...Lets keep calling and writing the ford company and maybe we will be heard..Thanks to all my brothers and sisters,UNITED WE STAND,DIVIDED WE FALL.......LETS STAND FOR WHAT IS RIGHT....WE PAYING TOO MUCH MONEY AND NOT GETTING WHAT WE PAY FOR...........

 

What's a blend door motor?

 

It is the motor that powers the actuation of the blend door - duh!

In those models that are equipped with Electronic Air Temperature Control (EATC), the blend door acutates to distribute air between the various floor/panel/dash air vents. I think that in non-EATC vehicles, the blend door is vacuum/pneumatic driven and is not prone to failure, where as in the EATC vehicles, corrosion from either condensation or some other source of moisture, causes the motor to fail. I believe that the reason why the repair costs so much is that it requires the removal of the dash assembly to access the effected part(s) which is a very labor intensive process even for the proffesionals.


Michael

 

Ahhh, glad I don't have one to worry about. Badnu34 claims it is a common problem, but I've never seen any other posts relating to this part.

 

i m an avid reader of this site , i ve definitely got more out of it than given back because im mechanically inept but ive never heard of this problem either

 

I can't say I've ever heard of this problem before, and with all due respect, you're about 43,000 miles out of warranty.

The huge killer here is the labor. Why does it cost $1500 to replace a head gasket? The gasket itself costs probably $100 - it's the labor. Taking the dash assembly apart to replace this item is a real PITA. I think $700 is actually pretty reasonable.

Remember, it's not the dealership that's working on your truck, it's an ordinary guy like any one of us. Would you take a big paycut just because a customer didn't like the price?

It's a bad situation, but it could be much worse.

Regards,

XXL

 

Is this the same problem the Explorer guys found? If so, will their free 1 hour fix work? Check out the sticky on the top fo their forum list... "Free blend door fix"

 

I also have a 1999 eb and have told I have a problem with the actuator to the blend door. Will the explorer fix work, and are the
motors in the same place on both? Also does the dash have to come out to repair the expy?

 

Yes folks it does happen. It is common in Explorers from what I gather... This fix should work IF you have that type of failure.


http://home.earthlink.net/~kandc1/fo...nddoorfix.html

 

What a TRAVESTY!

Ford has a better idea alright... to engineer flimsy, faulty, bound-to-bust oem parts so that their Trucks are built Ford TOUGH-TO-FIX-IT-YOURSELF...

I spent 7 hours replacing the heat thermostat, which is sandwiched between a horrendous array of electrical wiring harnesses, brass, threaded couplers, and other superfluous crap!

On any other car or truck... it would have been a 2 hour job, MAX!

When all was said and done, my heater still did not blow HOT nor even WArm air... the fan works, air comes out but no heat!

I took it to Ford @ $98/hour for a diagnosis and 3 hours later I was alerted that I needed to pay $400+ in parts and another $700 in labor for replacement and installation of the plenum chamber and temperature blend door motor. *All of this replaced the simpler, better, easier to fix and yet now obsolete, cable system....

I guess I will be going on my annual, winter steelhead trip to the Northern part of the state with a lot of clothes and coats....

I am grateful for the internet and for people like JFrank and Katzen who have taken the initiative and consideration to post the fix.

I will try it soon and would like to either call or email someone who has performed this successfully.

Is that possible?

Thanks~Mark

 

The auto industry as a whole have been building more DRiver/owner unfriendly for years,like when they started outting computer's in them.

Real Service stations are becoming obsolete, they only plaves people can get theor car fixed is at a dealership until you want to fork out $110.000 to buy a code reading robot.

We saw a change coming (I did anyway)to the industry years ago.

They have a warning label everywhere ,

Warning
You are only allowed to touch the green things under the hood.



I understand your venting

 

Don't blamed the industry for the computers and such. They were put in due to GOVERMENTAL regulations demanding reduced emissions etc.

Gad, does anyone here really want to drive something that came off the Ford assembly line from the 70's?

(Not including the guy who's freezin' in his truck right now, though... )

 

I posted how to fix this in the Heating/Air Conditioning section of FTE.

The Explorer fix will NOT work...their motor is on top of the blend door and the Epedition's is on the bottom. Also, the motor is a little different.

Also, shop around...I called one Ford dealership for the motor and the cost was around $70, then I had to go another direction in the Phoenix valley so I called another dealership in the direction I was going...the door was $54 before tax.

One more thing....another quick check to see if it is the blend door is to turn the rear heat on and see if it blow hot....if it does, it is the blend door motor. Ford knows that this is a problem and are now on the second generation motor for this.

Good luck with the fix, it is great when the heat actually works at your feet.

Milkman

 

I actually enjoy driving my 77 F150 (70's ford assembly line). That old 460 will run circles around my 5.4L and I love the sound of that 750 Edelbrock carb sucking down fuel at the rate 6mpg. The headers and true duals with 2 chambered Flowmasters sounds great. I can tune it up in about 45min (plugs, cap rotor, wires, pcv, etc).
Sure, it doesn't have a/c or power windows or door locks. I has a sliding rear window and wing windows to direct airflow.
It has a bullet proof C6 tranny with no lock-up converter to chatter, and a bullet proof 9" rearend to boot.
I also enjoy the luxury comforts of my 01 OFFROAD 4x4 XLT SuperCab.
It has all of the bells and whistles except for leather (which I didn't want) or heated seats.
It's a truck, not a Lincoln LS.
In my opinion, the 73-79 trucks were some of the best ever built. There are still a ton of them out on the road.
I do agree that I would prefer a cable or at least metal actuator pieces to keep the breakage down.
I work in the plastic industry as an injection molder and yes it is the best material to use for a lot of products, but for pieces that are under the load of moving things around such as a blend door that is exposed to alot of temp variations hot and especially the cold makes them brittle and fail. Especially if the door were to bind up slightly and it is very cold, the brittle plastic is apt to break.
Unfortunatly, more and more things are being made of plastic (good for my industry, bad for consumers) and I don't see this trend ending anytime soon.
Jimmy