Air conditioner problems? Recirculate button "works", but not sure it's working

[peripatew]

So the inside / outside air button is messed up in my new HZJ105. It's very finicky on if pushing it will actually switch the lights between the modes. My experience in other vehicles is there's a pretty big difference in the amount of air being pushed out when switching between the two modes. When I can get the button to work, the air flow briefly lessens, maybe 1 second, and then it returns to what it was before. I'm wondering if whatever is supposed to happen mechanically, is getting stuck somewhere?

I'm no A/C pro, but it just seems off. A lot of outside smells come through when either mode is lit on the dash.

What's the best way to diagnose if there is a problem? Where is the location of the mechanism controlling the flow of air from inside / outside? What's it's technical name?

I'm coming up a bit short on vernacular here, so if you could help with some terms that would be great too for further searching.

When changing out my head unit, the air con vent tubes where reeeeeally dirty. Where I'm at, there is an insane amount of particulate in the air. Is it likely that something just needs to be cleaned out?

It's very hot and quite odorous where I'm at, so is love to get this issue resolved. The air-con seems to fluctuate a bit in its coldness, especially after the Cruiser sitting in the sun for a while. My previous vehicle didn't seem to do this much.

Thanks for the help!

 

[Sandroad]

On my '04 100, the air inlet damper is in the blower unit case immediately above the blower motor. There is an air inlet servo motor on the right side of the blower unit case. The operation of the damper can seen, especially with the glove box removed. It sounds like it may be worth removing the blower motor/fan and doing a full cleaning of the blower unit case including the air inlet damper. Also, FYI, the blower speed and total amount of air moved does not change when switching from outside to inside air. It's just noisier on inside air, so it sounds like more.

 

[peripatew]

On my '04 100, the air inlet damper is in the blower unit case immediately above the blower motor. There is an air inlet servo motor on the right side of the blower unit case. The operation of the damper can seen, especially with the glove box removed. It sounds like it may be worth removing the blower motor/fan and doing a full cleaning of the blower unit case including the air inlet damper. Also, FYI, the blower speed and total amount of air moved does not change when switching from outside to inside air. It's just noisier on inside air, so it sounds like more.

Thanks for the reply. I dug around in there to clean the cabin air filters, but didn't go to far beyond that. I'll try to dig up a diagram and get to work cleaning it.

There is definitely a noise change momentarily, but then goes right back to the original state. Perhaps I'm just crazy, but it seems a bit off.

Is there anything else worth looking into?

The air is definitely not nearly as cold as my Tacoma, which even in 105F heat in full sun freezes me out.

 

[peripatew]

Cracked it open, and someone had unhooked the servo from the arm connected to the dampener. They crammed a local takeout menu to keep the dampener "closed", so that it only pulled air in from outside. I have nooooo idea what someone would do this.

So I reconnected the servo, and it works great. My dash button is still difficult to use, but I think we'll use inside air most of the time anyways, as there's a lot of traffic and "interesting" smells in the city I'm in.

Glad I got it figured out. I removed the cover that of the evaporator/condenser... Whichever has the air filters right next to it. The metal fins on the right side looked pretty dirty. Is this part easy to remove to clean?

 

[Sandroad]

I don't recognize the fin thing description because those are on the left in mine. And on mine, they are not removable without major disassembly. Some spray cleaner like Windex and a small brush and small vacuum? In your photo there is a lot of rust and dirt for inside. Air quality there must be iffy.