Cold/Hot knob gets stuck

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burns
Posts: 23
Joined: Mon Feb 09, 2009 7:16 am

Cold/Hot knob gets stuck

Post by burns »

The knob that controls temperature for the a/c gets stuck half way between hot and cold. It's on hot now, and I can't get it to go to cold. What could be causing this?
omega2551
Posts: 19
Joined: Sun Dec 25, 2011 12:53 am

Re: Cold/Hot knob gets stuck

Post by omega2551 »

I'm having the same issue...disconnected the cable at the bottom and it still does it. Pulled out my radio to make sure no cables were blocking it, still does it. I don't know what's going on.
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Rayven01
Posts: 525
Joined: Wed Jan 16, 2013 12:07 pm

Re: Cold/Hot knob gets stuck

Post by Rayven01 »

It's possible there's an obstruction blocking the vent door inside the dash. Try removing the cabin air filter behind the glove box and look around for any debris inside there.
Image  Image
omega2551
Posts: 19
Joined: Sun Dec 25, 2011 12:53 am

Re: Cold/Hot knob gets stuck

Post by omega2551 »

Nope that's not it, pulled out the cabin filter and nothing's in it. Also like I said, I unhooked the cable from the knob so it's not even connected to the blend door but it still gets stuck, about 1/3 of the way to cold. The blend door moves freely by hand. For a temporary "fix", I've left the cable unhooked and just pushed the blend door closed by hand. The cable also moves right along with the knob, it just stops moving when it gets to that 1/3 of the way to cold.

Is this a stripped or otherwise broken knob?
omega2551
Posts: 19
Joined: Sun Dec 25, 2011 12:53 am

Re: Cold/Hot knob gets stuck

Post by omega2551 »

On another note, this didn't happen until I was in there this past weekend to replace the HVAC damper actuator, so maybe I knocked something loose? But that knob and cable aren't really near where I was working. And the circ-recirc is working fine now.
omega2551
Posts: 19
Joined: Sun Dec 25, 2011 12:53 am

Re: Cold/Hot knob gets stuck

Post by omega2551 »

Well I thought maybe this had happened:
ColonelPanic wrote:Or, like what also happened to me, the bulb can fall down inside the mechanism for one of the knobs and keep the control from going all the way to one side like what happened to my temperature cable.
But no, I just checked and my backlighting is fully functional so the bulb hasn't moved. There doesn't seem to be much on the forums here about this particular problem. I guess tomorrow I will try to feel around back there and just see If the cable is somehow tangled or catching on something.
omega2551
Posts: 19
Joined: Sun Dec 25, 2011 12:53 am

Re: Cold/Hot knob gets stuck

Post by omega2551 »

Aha, I fixed it. Since this doesn't seem to be a common problem, I'll post my experience. It actually was similar to what happened to Colonel Panic.

It turns out it was somewhat related to when I changed out the damper actuator. I had a feeling that there had to be something stuck in the knob mechanism, or just a broken tooth on the gear (after seeing what happened to the damper actuator, why not?). Well the thing is, when I put my aftermarket radio in I used these plastic retainers to hold it securely in the bracket. When I pulled the radio out to gain better access, one of the retainers fell out and apparently dropped right into the mechanism for the knob. Of course it was impossible to see at all, and I couldn't confirm it until I completely removed the entire white plastic knob assembly and shook it around. Sure enough, a little plastic retainer came falling out.

A little blurry, but it's right at the tip of the yellow gripper thing.
Image

I pulled it out and everything was working back to normal. Reconnected everything and I'm back to having control of my air temperature.

Also, I seem to notice a lot of people on here talking about not being able to get the knob assembly out without breaking it. Well mine came out just fine. The only thing you have to be sure to do is take out the screw behind the center knob and then insert a small screwdriver on each side between the assembly and the little chrome looking things to press down on the clips holding the assembly in place. Then it pops right out. Of course, you also have to remove the plastic around the shifter to also remove the plastic on top of the knob assembly.

Depress the clips on each side of the assembly to pull it out.
Image

Image

The hardest part about this for me was disconnecting the cable from the diverter knob. First, it was a pain to get off the hook on the knob because it was on really tight and I think I managed to bend the cable in doing so (but it still works fine). Then you have to look in from the front of the knob assembly and push the cable out of it's clips on the assembly with a screwdriver ( in hindsight, I probably could have pushed the cable out of the clips first and then I could have gotten it off the knob easier).

The lesson learned is that any time I go to remove my radio, always turn the temp knob to full hot first because that way the mechanism doesn't have that open gap on top to allow stuff to fall in to.
scottgarrett
Posts: 1
Joined: Tue Mar 12, 2019 5:07 pm

Re: Cold/Hot knob gets stuck

Post by scottgarrett »

Just wanted to thank omega2551 for this post and the pictures.

I have an 06Vibe that had a light in the center console go out.
I ordered led replacements from ebay 4x T4 Neo Wedge Climate Base LED Cluster Instrument Dash Bulb Light Lamp Red 12V for about $2
Using details from others posts I replaced the bulbs.

This was a painful process and I dropped bulbs many times and didn't manage to find them all, once things were back together neither of my knobs would go all the way to the left anymore.

It's fuzzy but you can see the bulb stuck in the mechanism.
image-2019-03-20.jpg
image-2019-03-20.jpg (67.85 KiB) Viewed 1751 times
Took about 90 minutes but eventually I managed to get them both out and now I have lights and dials.
image-2019-03-20 (1).jpg
image-2019-03-20 (1).jpg (162.28 KiB) Viewed 1751 times
This really should not have been so hard
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