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Just purchased '97 C5. The air worked fine until yesterday. It has the auto climate control. The passenger side blows cold, the drivers side blows hot no matter what the setting. It also blows hot air with just the vent on. Any help is appreciated.
From: Supporting the Corvette Community at Abel Chevrolet in Rio Vista, CA 707-374-6317 Ext.123
St. Jude Donor '08
There is a good chance that the temp valve actuator has gone bad. It is basically a flap with a motor on it to pull cold or hot air to either side of the car. There is one for the driver and one for the passenger. When they go out it is common to only get cold or hot air from one side and not the other. Most of the dash has to be torn down to replace it, but the part is not too expensive. List price is about $150, but you can find it cheaper.
When you guys have this problem try disconnecting the battery before anything else. Apparantly the door will become lodged occasionally and it will reset when battery power is removed. I was having the same problem and someone on here suggested it...worked like a charm!
I have a 98 C5. Mine was blowing hot on the driver's side. It had a code of B0361 (left actuator feedback short to GND). After pulling half the dash out to try to figure out what was wrong, I decided to come here and check. After reading tboneinsc's post about disconnecting the battery, I figured I'd try it. I thought it would never work, but it did. I should have come here first, Thanks tboneinsc
Just a comment to those who claim freon is the fix. I would understand that logic if the AC did not blow cold at all, but when it blows cold on one side and not the other, freon would not be my assumption.
There is only one evaporator coil inside the dash (cools the air), even with the dual zone system. Cabin air can pass over the AC evaporator and the heater core, and the actuator doors (left and right )control the blend of this air control the temperature for each zone. If you set the temp to max cold, then the air mix door would move to block the heated air and only allow airflow through the AC evaporator to get cold air, and visa versa if you set it to max heat, or in between when it's set to a middle temperature. If one is hot when the other is cold, then the AC evaporator is working (i.e. freon would not be the problem) but the actuator door on one zone is stuck biasing the heated flow of air.
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