My 1987 300E air conditioning blows very strongly from the two side vents with only a feeble amount of air drifting out of the twin center vents, hardly enough to even feel. The manual roller on the outside works fine to open and close the shutters.
I suspect a vacuum operated valve is stuck closed; it has never worked since I got the car in 1999. How do you get in there to check things out? Remove center console and radio, or is it an even worse job?!!
Pete Cowper
1987 300EDo you have alot of air coming out of your defrost vent? Regardless of what position you set them in?
Tiger wrote: "Do you have a lot of air coming out of your defrost vent? Regardless of what position you set them in?"
Yes.
There is air blowing up through the defroster with any of the left four of the five buttons pushed (obviously the fifth on the right is off). The volume of air coming up through the defroster vents seems a slight bit less when the middle of the five buttons (compressor 'on") is pushed on. May mean the vent control is trying to work?
Pete
1987 300E
I suspect Tiger will have a similar response, but here goes my opinion.
You have a bad vacuum pod for your center vents (possibly the other four as well). To change it, you need to remove the entire interior, along with the transmission, then its a piece of ca just kidding.
Yeah, I think I may have posted something wrong. Thanks to sneaky friends, and computer left idle...
Anyway, I was going to say that all you have to do is remove the glove box to get to a couple of the pods. The center vent hoses need to be removed to get to the vacuum pod that is probably the problem, but some people have reported that its not necessary (only really helpful).
There are multiple how-to's on-line for doing this repair. I have read at least three different ones. Here's a really helpful one that was recommended to me (I think from this newsgroup):
Sorry about the previous post.
Yep, my thought exactly... your defrost vent vacuum actuator is probably dead. Make sure you got vacuum at the yellow checkvalve (maybe 2) in between your two firewalls in the engine compartment by the master cylinder... Check at the one hose side... that should have vacuum.
Thanks for the tips on getting behind the dash to the center air vent vacuum valve(s).
I was transporting houseguests from the cool Seattle area in the back seat. The side vents don't reach back there as well as the center vents since the two front passengers hog all the cold air. They were suffering seated back there in our Fresno area 100+ heat. Figured I ought to get around to fixing it after 8 years of ownership . . .
Pete
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