1996 Villager heater problem

[bdan49]

The heater in my 1996 Villager is not working properly. When the engine heats up and I'm idling the heater blows cool air, but when I'm driving it gets nice and hot. Why doesn't the air stay hot when I'm idling? Thermostat needs replacing or something else? Please Help!

[Ranga]

I have a 2000 villager and I had the same problem. This is an indication that your heater core is getting clogged up. Try flushing your system a couple of times using a weak solution of scale remover, keeping the engine running all the time. You need to keep the revs up around 2500 to 3000 to help circulate the flushing solution through the heater core.

Once you see clear water coming out of the drain plug, turn the engine off and drain all the water.Add fresh water and run the engine at high revs to complete the flush, and then drain all of it.

Now fill the system with the recomended coolant, and start the engine and get it to operating temp. Keep adding the coolant until there is no air in the system. During this entire process, keep your heater temp to the max.

Let me know if this helped.
Ranga.

[samdiego]

To read the full proceedure on bleeding the coolant system click on http://home.earthlink.net/~vqfaq/Vil...ant_Refill.jpg
Once on the page click on the images to enlarge.

[eltigre]

Originally Posted by bdan49

The heater in my 1996 Villager is not working properly. When the engine heats up and I'm idling the heater blows cool air, but when I'm driving it gets nice and hot. Why doesn't the air stay hot when I'm idling? Thermostat needs replacing or something else? Please Help!

What you want to look at and/or replace is your heater control valve....it works off the vacuum, so when you're driving it will pull more vacuum thus opening it and letting coolant thru to the core....check the hoses to it

[czgator]

Hopefully you have already fixed the problem, but for future readers, I saw an answer to this question in another forum. They said that it could also be caused by having air pockets in the cooling system, which required a process of adding coolant/water to the radiator, running for several minutes with the heater all the way on high (both in the front and then in the rear), topping it off some more, etc. In the Haynes manual it also says to put a bent wire in the relief valve of the radiator cap to prevent a vacuum leak from forming during this process. I am not a mechanic, just repeating what I have read, but there were some more complete answers on refilling the coolant in this and other Villager/Quest forums. Someone even suggested that if this didn't fix the problem, you could take it to a garage where they have specialized equipment for replacing the coolant while removing trapped air.

[thegreenhornet95]

I'm having similar problems. mine will blow hot while sitting parked idling but on the highway it blows cold. What could this possibly be?