no heat in an 04 sedona

0falcon8 · 10-25-2008, 04:41 PM

first of all, i want to thank all of the experts for their advice and guidance on these forums.
i have a 04 sedona and the front cabin vents will not blow any heat at all. the rear vent works great. i have had the ac compressor replaced in may (i don't know if this has anything to do with the current problem) and have not used the heat until this week. in reading of other problems with heating systems, i have checked the coolant, removed the plastic engine cover and checked the hoses going in and out of the firewall behind the engine (both hot) and checked the fuse marked "heater".
poking around under the dash, i did find a curious thing. i removed the stops on the glove compartment and behind it on the left there was an oblong white piece of plastic with a meandering groove set in the middle with white lubricant on it. above it was a wedge-shaped silver metal piece with a screw in one corner. in the other corner was a brass pin pointing forward (toward the engine). along the far (left) edge, there is a slightly curved track with more lubricant. it looks as if the white plastic piece was supposed be rotated up a bit and the pin was supposed to seat in the track in the middle (i saw a similar arrangement on the driver's side with the vent selector mechanism). i pulled the metal plate out and pushed the white piece up and reseated it, but nothing changed. neither piece moves with any adjustment to the heating selections. is there a fuse or relay that controls the air temp? or a wiring harness i should check? am i even on the right track? i feel confident that it is not a bubble in the lines because there is heat in the back. do they both share the same regulator?
sorry for the long post, but i thought the more information given, the better.
any advice is greatly appreciated!
i can also snap a pic of the items described if it helps at all

Raven1210 · 10-26-2008, 04:13 AM

It could be a thermistat. I am don't know much about the sedona. But some van that have rear heaters has a line that comes right out of the rad to get there heat. There temp on the dash does it go to the middle or does it stay down near the cold??

0falcon8 · 10-26-2008, 11:32 AM

the air in the front is the ambient temp of the air outside. it gets neither warmer or colder (unless the ac is on-that works fine) no matter what you do.

pm124493 · 10-28-2008, 08:03 PM

I had the same problem. I had heat to the rear, but not to the front. Put selector on full heat and defrost and the air was cold like the AC was on. I checked the forum and there was a post about the air postion switch having bad contact. I followed this post which was excellent, but I did not have that problem.
I took it to the dealer and it was the internal vent selection actuator. It took them two days to get the part. Cost was $274 to replace with labor. You can pull the lower glove box down by undoing the small retention cable. Then there are two rubber stops on each side. You need to use a flat tip screw driver to pop the right stop out. Then use the screw driver to push the left stop inward to allow the glove box to drop.
Once the glove box is down you can look inside behind the center console and see a white lever. Change the selection knob from front to defrost and see if the lever moves. If not then it could be the actuator motor has failed.

Because the dealer could not get the part until Tuesday and it was Saturday, they offered to rent me a car until mine was fixed, on them. My car was disassembled.
That was good service. They even gave me a $20 discount for the inconvenience.

Hope this helps.

Driving the car home though, the OBD engine light came on. I wish I knew how to read the failed code. I will call them tomorrow.

2005 Kia Sedona EX, 102,650 miles.

ESKORT27 · 10-28-2008, 09:06 PM

there was a recall on some sedonas that had techs replace the heater control nit.