Well it's the end of August so I decided to start addressing my no heat issue which plagued me last winter.
While my air conditioning works extremely well I suddenly developed a severe lack of heat all of last winter. I don't want to repeat that scenario so I decided to begin tackling the issue this weekend.
What's been done so far:
I disconnected the heater hoses at the metal fitting near the rear of the valve cover, and installed two 3/4" hose barbs. With the HVAC controls on the 'heat' position I used a garden hose to reverse flush both the front and rear heater cores, and then both individually by using vice grips on the rear heather core supply line to isolate the front.
Water flowed freely when using the garden hose, so I decided to circulate some diluted CLR through the system to make sure everything was squeaky clean.
After cycling CLR through the cores (isolating front and rear) for about a half hour the water became scuzzy - but not terrible:
Just to make sure I didn't have anything really bonded in the cores, I decided to use my compressor at 30PSI to shoot the water through the system. I did that a few times, alternating cores, and nothing solid came out (only water).
At this point I was pretty convinced my cores were clean of debris.
I buttoned everything up, and brought the truck up to temperature. At full blast heat there's definitely some heat, but I didn't think there was a dramatic difference. This morning I drove the truck, and it was 64 when I left the house, and there definitely was no improvement. The heat blows luke warm into the cabin.
To be clear, I have plenty of airflow - the heater hoses do get warm. I did have sufficient heat in the winter of 2013, and prior.
In another thread someone mentioned that I should verify that the heater control valve on the firewall is operational. I didn't mess with it, because I know they can be fragile. Can I rule the valve out since the arm does turn when I adjust the temperature - and because I was able to get liquid to flow through the system?
The FSM referenced a heater relay - but I didn't check it. I assume the heater relay would affect the fan's operation, correct?
While my air conditioning works extremely well I suddenly developed a severe lack of heat all of last winter. I don't want to repeat that scenario so I decided to begin tackling the issue this weekend.
What's been done so far:
I disconnected the heater hoses at the metal fitting near the rear of the valve cover, and installed two 3/4" hose barbs. With the HVAC controls on the 'heat' position I used a garden hose to reverse flush both the front and rear heater cores, and then both individually by using vice grips on the rear heather core supply line to isolate the front.
Water flowed freely when using the garden hose, so I decided to circulate some diluted CLR through the system to make sure everything was squeaky clean.
After cycling CLR through the cores (isolating front and rear) for about a half hour the water became scuzzy - but not terrible:
Just to make sure I didn't have anything really bonded in the cores, I decided to use my compressor at 30PSI to shoot the water through the system. I did that a few times, alternating cores, and nothing solid came out (only water).
At this point I was pretty convinced my cores were clean of debris.
I buttoned everything up, and brought the truck up to temperature. At full blast heat there's definitely some heat, but I didn't think there was a dramatic difference. This morning I drove the truck, and it was 64 when I left the house, and there definitely was no improvement. The heat blows luke warm into the cabin.
To be clear, I have plenty of airflow - the heater hoses do get warm. I did have sufficient heat in the winter of 2013, and prior.
In another thread someone mentioned that I should verify that the heater control valve on the firewall is operational. I didn't mess with it, because I know they can be fragile. Can I rule the valve out since the arm does turn when I adjust the temperature - and because I was able to get liquid to flow through the system?
The FSM referenced a heater relay - but I didn't check it. I assume the heater relay would affect the fan's operation, correct?
