Some problems with my 99 Tahoe, please help!

Hello Automotive Forums,

I recently purchased a silver 99 Tahoe LT. I love the vehicle, but there are some problems and i'd really appreciate some help.

Some of the lights on the stereo dont work at times, some never do. The thing is that when the eject and recall buttons on the HU dont work, neither does the passenger seat heater. Since that is where my girlfriend sits, its very important that i get it fixed. Or i will have a constant nagging noise coming from that region of the vehicle.

In addition, little lights around the vehicle just dont work, the lights for the window switches and mirror toggle/switch/whatever, and other random lights. Its just annoying, and i'd really like to fix it.

The Lock on the drivers side door is giving me problems as well. It works manually, but when i use the keyless entry remote to lock or unlock it, sometimes it doesn't unlock, or lock completely, so i end up having to use my key.

The right side mirror housing is broken, the mirror itself works fine, its just the housing. It's epoxied together, it functions fine, its just an eyesore.

As well i would like to replace the drivers side seat, as the leather is work out on the left side. Where should i look?

Any help or insight would be very well appreciated. The headunit will probably be replaced, but i'd still like to figure out whats going on with the seat heater and what the fix is.

Preston

Wonder if the lock problem might boil down to an actuator. It's strange, it just started today.

I'm also hoping the heat seater situation is remmedied when in install a new headunit.

I am lucky and don't have that many problems with my tahoe, but I did have a problem with the door lock not working. It started having the problem you talked about in the summer, but as it got colder it worked good. The next summer as it got hot it started messing up again and the passenger side and back door started having the same problem. I ended up replacing all 3 and it was not as hard as I though it would be. You wil need a rivit gun and a drill to get the old ones off. I bought the actuator on ebay.com and they were about 1/3 the cost of the Chevy dealership. To remove the inside door cover is not too hard if you know what you are doing. There is a plastic piece at the front top that is inside the mirrow and to remove it you just slide it up and it will come off. There are 2 screws on the handle you use to close the door. At the bottom of the door panel in the middle there is a area you can get your hand in and you pull it straight out. It will make a really bad noise, and if you pull straight out it will not break the plastic tabs that hold the door panel in(They will fall off the door panel so don't loose them). I think there is about 8 of them around the bottom and the sides. Once all the tabs are free you pick up on the panel a little and it will be free. There are a few wires that need to be released to get the panel all the way off, so a flat head screw drive can be used to flip the tabs to get them off. You can pull the control unit for the windows from the panel, but the mirrow and rear child window lock is better to remove the the cable connector and leave the control units in the door panel. Once you have the door panel removed there is another metal panel that is held in with a few small screws and 1 large screw. The window is attached to the metal panel so you can not remove it all the way. You drill out the old rivits and pull the actuator out and rivit the new one in. When you are putting the door panel back on you just line up the tabs and press them back in. Good luck on finding out what the light and seat heater problem is.

Wow, I have the exact problems on my 99 tahoe.

The radio buttons have to have the lights replaced. I have seen some people offering this service on ebay, but you have to send them the radio and pay for shipping. If you can locate another good source, please let me know. I'd like to keep my original radio in mine too if possible. Other lights going out is still a mystery to me. I haven't begun to tackle that problem yet.

I've been told that the actuators will need to be replaced. Once one of them is going bad, it supposedly draws power from the others to compensate for the bad one. Try replacing the drivers side and see if that solves the problem.

I just found a pretty good website (rockauto.com) that has pretty cheap parts and shipping is SUPER fast. I had my stuff the next day. No, i don't work for them...just sharing the resources.