98 sable heater doesn't work

[bcmason]

I have a 1998 Mercury Sable sedan. The heat does not work -- it blows cold air.

Sometimes if I turn it off for awhile and turn it back on, it will blow warm air for a few seconds, and then blow more cold air.

I know there was a leak in the coolant overflow talk. I replaced the tank myself and then had Jiffy Lube run a full radiator flush and fill. The tank is filled to the upper bound of where it should be.

There are some comments here already about this same problem... but the radiator flush didn't work for me! Is there anything else this could likely be? Did Jiffy Lube perhaps do a poor job on the flush?

Thanks muchly.

[stoned]

the heater core becomes air locked to fix the problem reverse the hose's on the heater core, the same thing happened to me & it worked doing that

[[email protected]]

I had the same problem with my 98 sable and here is what the problem turned out to be. Ford issued a service bulletin for the heater core that basically said it was not grounded properly and suffered corrosion from electrolysis. Took it to the dealer with bulletin in hand. They flushed it and charged me and would not acknowledge the bulletin. It did not fix the problem. I took it to a radiator shop and they were familiar with the problem as they had done a lot of warranty work for dealers on that heater core. They gave it a special flush (heavy duty with a special name I forget) and told me they had the only equipment capable of this type of flush in the area. It fixed the problem. The heat output does not seem to be as high as "normal" but it is acceptable and no problem even in recent -10 degree weather. The sable, other than minor problems and an incompetent dealer service department, has been a great vehicle for 100k miles. But will I ever buy another Ford product? Absolutely not. I just bought a new Kia Optima from a dealer and manufacturer who will stand behind it. It is a great car and exceptional value.

[vicv]

There is a post at the Ford forum called "blend door fix" that may apply here too. I have an Explorer that had no heat and it was a broken blend door. I was able to fix it after reading the post.Might want to take a look if the hose switch doesn't work.

[vicv]

Here's the address for the door fix. www.ford-trucks.com/forums. Scroll down and choose the Explorer forum, it's 3rd or 4th on that page.

[KyooMac]

Does anyone know if the blend door in a Sable is in the same area as the ford explorer? I need to check the blend door actuator on my Sable and do not want to remove the entire dash if I don't have to. I have the TSB on the Sable blend door, but it does not mention if I need to remove the entire dash.