heat works only for 10 seconds

i have a 98 taurus. the problem is that the heat works for about 10 seconds and gradually gets colder untill there is only cold air coming out. if i leave the heat on, only cold air comes out. if i turn the heat off, wait several minutes and turn it back on, the same thing happens.

i had this problem last year in the fall and took it to the shop. they fixed it without replacing anything. i think they said something about an air buble?

what should i do? can i fix it myself?

according to your symtoms, the haynes manual says it's a faulty thermostat or inaccurate tempature gauge.might be heator core to. if this dosnt help, try to give more info on your prob

i have a 98 taurus. the problem is that the heat works for about 10 seconds and gradually gets colder untill there is only cold air coming out. if i leave the heat on, only cold air comes out. if i turn the heat off, wait several minutes and turn it back on, the same thing happens.

i had this problem last year in the fall and took it to the shop. they fixed it without replacing anything. i think they said something about an air buble?

what should i do? can i fix it myself?

Yes....this sounds like there is air in the cooling system. Flush and refill it.

The big question is where is the air coming fromm? Do you have any visible leaks? Do you keep the overflow full? In the 3.8l taurus that was usually a sign of head gasket failure.

I have the same car and had the same problem. I back flushed the heater core with hot water from my hot water heater thru a garden hose, and got heat back right away. The whole job didn't take an hour. I have read that ford uses some type of cast in the block that gets the coolant nasty brown color, maybe the deposits are the problem. I had the system flushed at Jiffy Lube before I did this and it didn't solve the problem. Good Luck! :)

I also have a 1998 Taurus with same heater prob. I am going to try the heater core backflush in the next couple of days. I will post my results when the job is done. Thanks for the tip!!

i had the same problem with my 98' taurus...thats how my problem started...i took it in to get checked out and they told me that my thermostat was bad and they replaced it...after replacing my thermostat it was throwing warm air only...i got it checked again and it ended up being that my heater core was clogged and i had to get it replaced which ment they had to take off my whole interior dash out... i had my car dealer do the job for me.

Back flush with garden hose worked great I did like Fireman said and all is great