Cleaning Heater Vents/Ducts and Fixing Heater Door

[jb3t]

I have a 1978 C10 with no A/C. I’m getting a mouse smell in the cab and I’d like to clean my heater ducts. Anyone ever do this and where did you start?

Also, my heater door does not shut and hot air blows out 24/7. Any luck on fixing this?

Thanks

[Dead Parrot]

Yes. My 84 CUCV had a mouse family take up residence in the heater system. Pulled the fan and pulled out what I could with hands and fingers, then used a shop vac to get a lot more. Dropped the bottom(floor) vent piece and repeated the process from that side. That managed to get most of the mouse house although it took many minutes of full heat to convince the mice to vacate.

Possible the heat door is jammed by the mouse house. Clean things out then see if it will close. Also possible the cable is loose or broken from past attempts to force a no heat setting.

Still smells some of mouse after several applications of bleach mix and pine-sol mix.

The proper fix is pull the housing like you do to replace the heater core and give everything a proper cleaning but that is a PITA.

[jb3t]

Thanks a lot. I may pull the dash too. Tackle it from that angle.

[Shark_13]

I pulled the whole plastic housing out of mine when I did my heater core.

Wasn't too bad other than making a mess dripping coolant.

Good opportunity to scrub it all, not in the vehicle, and dump out at least 7 bolts lol dropped into the vents from above I assume. Now all my controls and sliders work perfectly.