Blend Door Actuator question

Pantera1973

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My Blend Door works great & I hope to keep it that way.

I haven't looked up under the dash, but is there enough room to access the metal linkage (perhaps thru the glove box opening) and elongate the hole where it attaches to the gray lever without pulling the dash back?

I was thinking about maybe using a Dremel with a 90 degree attachment.

images?q=tbn:ANd9GcT9ts6dETYH4lOSonavpYOlfVdY4eaQC1kii2UIqrAoWVfFX4FwSw.jpg


Thanks,

Jeff
 
I modded mine before I put the replacement motor arm assembly in. I don't think there is enough room to breath much less get any tools in without pulling the dash back a bit :confused:
 
Blend door

Done it before. Through the glovebox you can pull the gray arm out and get at the bar. If you want to take a quick ride to New Hampshire I can do it for you.
 
Done it before. Through the glovebox you can pull the gray arm out and get at the bar. If you want to take a quick ride to New Hampshire I can do it for you.


It's good to know it's been done before, thanks.

Do you just move the gray arm down where you can access the bar, or do you actually pull the gray arm off the lower door?

Were you able to use a regular drill, or did you use something like the Dremel with a 90?

I wish I lived closer, I'd take you up on your kind offer. :)
 
Hopefully just modifying the metal linkage will do OK for quite a while; the car spent it life in Florida and had minimal if any use of the heater. It was garage kept and only driven on nice days (3,600 miles a year).

Seems the ideal fix would be to put some kind of limiter or stop inside the mechanism to take all stress off the arms.

Perhaps placing small stops inside the case for the gear that the lever attaches to would be better?

actuator_internals.jpg
 
Blend door

Pop the push on clip off the gray arm holding the bar on, pull the gray arm staight out and elongate the hole in the bar about 3/16 towards the driver side and put it back together. I use a small air powered right angled grinder with a 3/16 end mill in it. If I couldn't do it in 20 minutes I would take up basket weaving, but I am old and feeble so maybe I am just imagining it. Thanks Bruce
 
Hopefully just modifying the metal linkage will do OK for quite a while; the car spent it life in Florida and had minimal if any use of the heater. It was garage kept and only driven on nice days (3,600 miles a year).

Seems the ideal fix would be to put some kind of limiter or stop inside the mechanism to take all stress off the arms.

Perhaps placing small stops inside the case for the gear that the lever attaches to would be better?
Mine was out of Florida...broke blend door, replaced it two years ago.
Replaced it again last month.

This is the most important mod

P1020974.jpg

Pretty sure I did my last blend door on this car.
 
Hopefully just modifying the metal linkage will do OK for quite a while; the car spent it life in Florida and had minimal if any use of the heater. It was garage kept and only driven on nice days (3,600 miles a year).

Seems the ideal fix would be to put some kind of limiter or stop inside the mechanism to take all stress off the arms.

Perhaps placing small stops inside the case for the gear that the lever attaches to would be better?

actuator_internals.jpg

The actuator uses a feedback circuit to tell the ATC where the arm is positioned at the moment, using that sliding contact (potentiometer) you can see on the right in your pic. The problem is that it's not calibrated correctly and the ATC "thinks" it needs to keep trying to turn the arms way past their intended position. The bracket that the actuator is mounted on has a stop built into it, but the torque of the motor is so strong that it overwhelms the stop and the bracket actually distorts and the arm eventually breaks. In other words, the motor just has too much torque for a simple stop to work.

The ultimate fix IMO would be to modify the feedback circuit so that it "fools" the ATC into thinking the arm is where it's supposed to be. I'm electronics impaired, but I think it might be as simple as inserting a resistor into the feedback circuit. It's just a matter of figuring out what value to use.

Jeremi did a great writeup of the situation here. It also includes a nice vid of the slotted link in action.

EDIT: After looking again, I think Jeremi's mod is probably the best and most practical solution. He actually REMOVED the stop on the actuator bracket and says that it doesn't put any extra stress on the blend door itself. So this is probably the ultimate fix along with the slotted link.
 
Thanks to everyone for your responses. :)

I think for now I'll just elongate the hole & if it does break somewhere down the line I'll fix it with all the other mods once and for all.
 
Jeremi did a great writeup of the situation here. It also includes a nice vid of the slotted link in action.

EDIT: After looking again, I think Jeremi's mod is probably the best and most practical solution. He actually REMOVED the stop on the actuator bracket and says that it doesn't put any extra stress on the blend door itself. So this is probably the ultimate fix along with the slotted link.

I'm thinking the last fix.
At least on my car. :)
I am also thinking the plastic arm at some point will become unattainable.
So common sense dictates to me.... fix it, mod it while you can.
 
i got a basket of parts from a 94 Mark today...the seller pulled this out of the dash and said it's the part that usually fails; is this the actuator?
PC220002_zps61bbc5d3.jpg
 
P1020974.jpg



This part breaks, under too much stress... its thin wall plastic crap.
Brass parts found at any home improvement store will take care of that issue.

Its not "will it break" but when will it break.
This part is on the actuator.
 
Does ford no longer make the black arm that brakes?
Superior ford told me it doesnt the other night
 
Sometimes I'm glad I don't have a Gen 2.

What genius designed this thing?
 
Now I'll just wait until you have to change your IAC and see how much your tone changes

So it was the same guy, is what you're saying. He just got moved around during development.

:D
 
the issue i have with my blend door is that the grey arm completely broke off in the actuator and wanted to know where can i buy just the arm and can it be fixed? and if so whats the part number on that item?
 

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