2005 Suburban blowing hot air on driver side.
 

Hello all, I am new to the forum. I have found a wealth of info so far, and decided to join. I realize similar questions on this issue have been posted, but I needed some clarification on some points.

My wife and I just bought a 2005 Suburban last week. The battery was the original, so I swapped it out last Sunday. Pretty easy thing to do, but now we have problems. We have digital dual climate control, and the driver side is blowing hot air. The passenger, and rear are working fine. I have done alot of research and have come to the conclusion it may be the blend door actuator. I have followed some "re start" procedures and it seems to calibrate and starts blowing cold air, but ends up blowing hot.

The questions I have are as follows. What I don't understand is it was working just fine, until I swapped batteries. How can it all of a sudden be "faulty"?
I have seen the diagrams to remove and replace the actuator, and the re-calibration steps. What I need is clarification on something. Is the HVAC Control Module the same as the blend door actuator? If I replace the blend door actuator what do I have to reset it?

Thank You

Welcome to the Chevrolet Forum. Someone here should be able to help.

Blowing hot air on drivers side
 

Hopefully you have resolved your problem by now, but in case not:

I'm having the same problem on a 2004 Suburban. Mine was intermittent a few times but has now failed on full hot. I have a set of shop manuals for our 2003 Avalanche, which also covers Suburbans. Probably the same for 2004.

There is a left side air temperature actuator and it is apparently going to full hot. I removed the "Insulator - Instrument Panel", which is on the passenger side so I could get to the actuator. Then I unplugged the connector from the actuator. The A/C on the drivers side would then work more or less normally. I assume that the actuator defaults to a neutral position if it doesn't get voltage, at least that is what it seems to do.

In my case I am suspecting one of the temperature sensors is the actual problem. My vehicle had been stolen and the gauge cluster and radio were taken. They have since been replaced with new units. I suspect there is either a damaged wire or a plug that is not fully seated. Could also be a defective part.

With a Scan Tool and the Shop Manual, it looks like you can monitor and control most of the A/C electronics so it should be possible to isolate the problem. I'll be working on that myself once I get a Scan Tool. Need on to maintain the vehicle anyway.

2004 Z71 Suburban. Same problem with drives side air???

Beebe, what kink of restarts did you do? I have heat on the pass. side and ac on drivers. Same thing happen with mine, had a dead battery this morning and when I put in new battery it wasn't working correctly.
2004 Tahoe.

I had that problem on a 2004 Avalanche after replacing the battery. Here's what I did to fix it. Start the engine. Set the passengers side temp to max hot. Set the drivers side to max cold. Wait a while, turn off engine. Restart engine and reverse the settings (passenger max cold, drivers max hot). Wait a minute and turn off engine. Restart and move settings to desired temp. You may have to repeat the procedure but it worked for me.

Sorry, Just read my email. I tried a bunch of things. But if I recall the following worked for me.

1. Turn the car to "on" but don't start
2. Press the OFF button on the heater two times
3. Turn ignition OFF - wait 30 seconds
4. Turn ignition ON - but don't start
5. Wait 3 - minutes then start vehicle...

Thanks for the info. I went out to the Tahoe this morning and it was working fine. I guess it reset on its on.

Thank you Beebe! I had the same problem with my '09 tahoe. I reset it just like you said and it worked like a charm. Guess the dealership will hafta find another way to take my $400.

Most of the time, it is the blend door actuator that goes bad. Same on my 04 Suburban. Shutting the ignition off usually resets it but it generally happens again. Replaced my actuator tonight. Will let you know!!!

glfclbs -
How did the swap go and did it work?
Can you replace it from underneath the dash or is it a full dash removal?

My wife's 2004 suburban does the same thing and you can hear the actuator (i guess that's the noise) making some noise behind the dash most of the time. The fault to drive's side hot air though is intermittent.

Blowing hot air on drivers side
 

Thanks Beebe and DShepard!! I just did this and it worked!!!

I had my battery drained on my 2004 Tahoe by leaving a GPS plugged in for weeks, and didn't drive the truck. I recharged the battery outside the vehicle and when I put it back in and drove it, hot air was blowing out of the drivers side. Pass side was cold. Tried the sequence you suggested and it reset the control. Thank you very much!!!!

hvac not working properly
 

I wasnt sure how to start a new thread but i was hoping one of you could help me. My duel zone climate control in my 08 silverado seems to hav a mind of its own. it usually just blows barely cool air regardless of what it is set on. the passenger side usually just blows hot but has blown cool before. The actualtor on the driver side was replaced about a year ago but that didnt fix the problem. Today at the dealership the printout they gave me said bad hvac control. They want $763 to fix it. Are they talking about the digital controls under the radio or is there some kind of control module up under the dash? Either way this sounds high to me. Please advise. Thanks.

I have the same problem on my 2005 Suburban. I didn't want to deal with it, so I took it to a shop. They said they couldn't replicate the problem, so they couldn't do anything about it. I asked to have the actuator replaced, since that's what I would have started with had I done it myself. They replaced the actuator and did the reset procedure. It worked fine until today. . . I let me daughter use the Suburban and she mentioned the problem came up again.

There's an older TSB (Technical Service Bulletin) that covers the issue, 01-01-39-007. The wiring harness may have been miss-routed, causing strain on the connections, and consequently losing control functions. Just something to check before anyone goes and buys a new control module.

Actuator Fix
 

The actuator on my 2004 Suburban occasionally did the same thing.

I removed it, and took it apart. It is pretty simple inside, the important parts are a PCB with a thick film resistor and a copper spring contact that moves. There isn't anything to break and I saw no wear. Didn't seem to make much sense to replace something that didn't appear to be broken.

So I removed the copper spring contact and bent it a little more so it would put more pressure on the PCB, then redistributed the grease onto the moving parts.

Put it back together and no problems since.

Looks like a design/production problem where the contact doesn't put enough pressure on the PCB to maintain a good contact.

Bout Went Crazy - 2005 Suburban A/C
 

A/C blowing hot on drivers side only. Read everything on this bulletin board and tried everything. Nothing worked. So I took a suggestion to unplug the vent direction actuator while it was blowing cold in first 30 secs after starting truck. Now, I've got A/C. Guess ill plug it back in pre-winter. This is an insidious problem.

Just remove the actuator, carefully take it apart, bend the copper contact springs down so they put a little more pressure on the printed circuit board, redistribute the grease so everything that moves is covered, put it back together and it should work fine.

I have 2004 chevrolet avalanche with duel Ac/heat levers. with A C running and blowing cold gos TO HOT AIR On driver side. While the right side continues to blow cold air. If i stop and tour of the engine and restar it, then the Ac will blow cold on both Right and let sides, I went to a/c repair and he told to change the control panel, what I should to fix this problem?

I have tried these reset steps for my drivers side heat from the ac on my 2004 suburban but the problem continues. I have had a temp control in dash replaced ($450) by dealer and compressor ($900) at a shop. No luck so far. This all began after the dealer installed a new battery. Very frustrated. Great car with lots of life left but don't know what to try or who to trust.

heat from ac in suburban
 

Do you remember if you were able to resolve this issue and how you did it?

Thanks,
It worked like a champ for me, too.

I have had to "Fix" & replace my blend door several times now. every year around spring it seems to break staying on hot air. Replacing the blend door motor as well as glueing and trying to beef up the door its self so it wont break again. but it keeps on breaking. is there some form of replacing all of the blend door parts for new ones that wont break?