Blend Door and Heater Core....

[98lincmk7lsc]

Done! In less than 4 hours! Woo!! lol.

Sorry, I'm just pretty stoked. I did it for one of the local guys here. He's got a Tan 97 Base with 85k miles. He said that he was getting coolant on the passenger floor board. A year or so ago, when I first met him, he had told me that his blend door was not working and he wanted to fix it, but never had the time. I told him this was the perfect time to do it, since the blend door needs to come out for that anyway. He came over today around 11am and we started a little after 11:30. I had the old blend door actuator in my hands by 12:15. I think we would have been right on track to beating Jamie's time if it weren't for the heater core.
Also, I'd like to add, that 2 people on this job isn't always better than one, especially if you've only got one set of tools between you!
Anyway, the heater core hoses were a bitch to get off because, as always, the spring clamps were installed from underneath the car, before the engine/trans were in it. I'd say that took the most time overall. Once we got the hoses off of it, it was smooth sailing from there. We didn't even have any extra pieces! LOL. He drove away right about 3:30pm.

All in all, a pretty satisfying day!

 

[fastmark1993]

i love my first gen none of that bull shmit! congrats though!

 

[Lownslowlsc]

i replaced my bda allready but if the heater core goes out i'll just bypass the hoses.

 

[98lincmk7lsc]

Yeah, that's how he's been running it for the last month or so, but he didn't want to keep it that way.

 

[Lownslowlsc]

how much more involved is the hc once the bda is out?

 

[Roadboss]

I' say congratulations on a difficult (and speedy) repair that defies most.

 

[98lincmk7lsc]

I' say congratulations on a difficult (and speedy) repair that defies most.

Thank you!

how much more involved is the hc once the bda is out?

Once the blend door actuator is out, you've got to remove the grey arm that actually moves the blend door, and remove the heater core cover (accessible once the blend door is out) That's when we started removing the hoses on the heater core. We ended up having to do a combination of pulling on the hoses and trying to pry them off with a screwdriver at the same time. Luckily the hoses were in really good shape. After the hoses are removed, you need to push the heater core in towards the interior of the car, until you can grab it with some channel-lock pliers or something and pull it the rest of the way through. It's kind of a challenge getting the dash out far enough to be able to pull the heater core out of it's slot. It's pretty tight. Once it's out, you just put the new one in and do repeat all the steps in reverse.

 

[GMAN]

I need to do the heater core and blend door on my silver 93, and on my son's 97. How do you get to the heater core after the dash is moved. Its behind the AC box. How did you get into it?

 

[98lincmk7lsc]

I'm not sure on the Gen1's, but I know on the 97, it's directly under a cover that's directly beneath the blend door actuator. The cover is approximately 3 inches by 7 inches. Something like that. It just slides right out toward the rear of the car.

 

[George Eisenhart]

my 97 gen. ll needs the blend door fix. recently i was reading a for sale add on a MarkVlll and the owner reported that he had made the blend door fix with some part or procedure the rendered the repair perminent. can anyone give me some advice on the best way to do the fix. I have removed complete dash panels on ford F-150's. I assume the mark is a bit more involved. Jamie's recent 4 hr. change has given me motivation as I was anticipating a day and a half. Thanks in advance for your time. George Eisenhart-

 

[98lincmk7lsc]

my 97 gen. ll needs the blend door fix. recently i was reading a for sale add on a MarkVlll and the owner reported that he had made the blend door fix with some part or procedure the rendered the repair perminent. can anyone give me some advice on the best way to do the fix. I have removed complete dash panels on ford F-150's. I assume the mark is a bit more involved. Jamie's recent 4 hr. change has given me motivation as I was anticipating a day and a half. Thanks in advance for your time. George Eisenhart-

Here is a link to the instructions on reinforcing the blend door...
http://www.lincolnsofdistinction.org/lincolntech/modrepair/blenddoorreinforce.html

Here is a link to the instructions...
http://www.lincolnsofdistinction.org/lincolntech/modrepair/blenddoorrepair.html

The first time I did the blend door actuator, over 6 years ago, it was the first thing that I had ever worked on on the Mark VIII. I didn't even have a set of tools yet. I had to borrow them from my friend. I did the blend door actuator replacement in about 4 hours. Going by how the procedure went yesterday, I'm now confident that I could do it in less than 2. It's really not that hard of a job, you just need to know where everything is, and you also need to know how to remove everything without breaking it/messing it up. The set of instructions linked above help with that very well.

Oh, and by the way, my name is Jay. Jamie is BAD97LSC on here. He's actually done the blend door actuator replacement in 88 minutes, not 4 hours.

 

[kustomizingkid]

Why did this job kick Chris' ass so bad??

 

[George Eisenhart]

Thanks for the help and god advise. Ill, report back with my sucess story.joining this forum has been a great experiance. I installed a set of strutmaster air ride replacement struts. they have been a big dissapointment. its the type that lowers the car. it looks good but the ride is too soft and it bottoms out eaisly. befor i bought them a strutmaster engineer told me to expect a stiffer ride,the opposit has been the case. so far strutmaster hasn't giving me any answers except to say they havn't experianced this condition before. any thoughts? George Eisenhart

 

[GMAN]

A quick note to everyone. The gen 1 blend door problem is not the arm, but the AC box that the blend door actuator plugs into. The od (outside dimension) becomes wider over time due to constant use and the actuator just twists inside the bore.

 

[BAD97LSC]

a gen 1 blend door is also super rare, and unlike the gen 2 blend door thats dirt cheap, you cant even buy a gen 1 blend door motor new anymore! so take the you gen 1 fans!

 

[Lownslowlsc]

Thanks for the help and god advise. Ill, report back with my sucess story.joining this forum has been a great experiance. I installed a set of strutmaster air ride replacement struts. they have been a big dissapointment. its the type that lowers the car. it looks good but the ride is too soft and it bottoms out eaisly. befor i bought them a strutmaster engineer told me to expect a stiffer ride,the opposit has been the case. so far strutmaster hasn't giving me any answers except to say they havn't experianced this condition before. any thoughts? George Eisenhart

I'm sure its not the first time they've heard it. Mine are the same way. Though its been alot better since i modified the inner fender liner

 

[BAD97LSC]

my old lowered strutmasters was the same way, sloppy and bashed everything i went over, it just floated up and down a ton. it does look cool though!

 

[Jeffintampa]

Air shock

Dude, when mine go out I search the world over for stock ones in good shape so far have replaced the passenger 2 times, and the Drivers is stock on my 96 (knocks on wood)

I will continue looking as I like the highth of the stock look.

Thanks for the help and god advise. Ill, report back with my sucess story.joining this forum has been a great experiance. I installed a set of strutmaster air ride replacement struts. they have been a big dissapointment. its the type that lowers the car. it looks good but the ride is too soft and it bottoms out eaisly. befor i bought them a strutmaster engineer told me to expect a stiffer ride,the opposit has been the case. so far strutmaster hasn't giving me any answers except to say they havn't experianced this condition before. any thoughts? George Eisenhart