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| ickle Member Since: 22 Jul 2010 Location: South Vendee Posts: 1780   
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Its a feature!
Mine starts working (sometimes) when you go round a corner...... On a more serious note IIRC there was a recall/modification that blanked part of the matrix to put more heat on the other side. HTH Keith |
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4th Mar 2024 8:22pm |
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| blackwolf Member Since: 03 Nov 2009 Location: South West England Posts: 17372  
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The Puma heater is not a great design (but it does at least emit heat in large quantities, something Land-Rover heaters hadn't done since the days of the round Smiths heater).
One of several basic flaws is that both the inlet and outlet pipes to the heater matrix enter on the left hand side of the matrix, and the majority of coolant flow therefore never makes it to the right hand side (and this is the same for both LHD and RHD vehicles, since the heater is the same). As a result, the left side of the matrix is usually very significantly hotter than the right, unless you have the heater in full supernova mode. This flaw is then compounded by the fact that the design of the airbox in which the heater matrix lives guarantees that the airflow through the box to the right side ventilators passes through the right side of the matrix and to the left side vents through the left side of the matrix. The result is that it is quite possible for there to be tepid air coming out on the right whilst the air on the left is hot enough to blister flesh and singe hairs. Land-Rover did at one time issue a service instruction to dealers to modify the hear if the owner complained enough, I have a cope of it somewhere. The modification involved the removal of the dash to allow the heater to be removed, then the heater was dismantled and a strip an inch or so wide along the left side of the matrix was masked with heat-resistant tape so that no air could pass though. The theory was clearly that this was the hot part of the matrix, and by doing this the air the left-hand vents came from a cooler area of the matrix. It was a typical half-hearted and (I suspect) completely inadequate Land-Rover bodge to make the annoying customers go away, and I doubt it really solved the problem. It would not be difficult to modify the heater box to make it work a lot better, but it is a major job to get it out of the car. It would not have been at all difficult to design it sensibly in the first place, but sadly very little of the TD5 to TDCi evolution was designed at all well (leading me to suspect it was left to the work-experience lad). What is odd about the OP's post is that it sounds as though the driver's side (presumably the right) is hotter than the left, and that is extremely unusual ! |
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4th Mar 2024 9:16pm |
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| Puma_Badger Member Since: 04 Mar 2024 Location: Essex Posts: 9 
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Yes, the right hand side is a lot hotter. I have been under the bonnet and sprayed the cable with WD40 and the valve didn’t seem to shut all the way so have manually shut it and will try it in the morning
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4th Mar 2024 9:37pm |
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| MatLandy Member Since: 11 Sep 2020 Location: Paris Posts: 184 
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This is the bulletin that BW is referring to :
SSM39653 - Defender 07MY onwards Heater Temperature Imbalance (LHD only) And the corresponding official bodge from Land Rover is available here: http://www.defender2.net/gallery/albums/us...er_fix.pdf My 2008 110 has always been suffering from this. /Mat |
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5th Mar 2024 8:54am |
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| Puma_Badger Member Since: 04 Mar 2024 Location: Essex Posts: 9
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I drove to work this morning having shut the valve manually last night and I had cold air out of both vents, when I adjusted the temperature it did go up and down but never went back to fully cold on the drivers side. I have ordered a new valve and cable this morning so will swap them both out and try again
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5th Mar 2024 9:38am |
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| Ianh Member Since: 17 Sep 2018 Location: Essex Posts: 1999
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This is worth a read, plus read the other topics that it has links to.
https://www.defender2.net/forum/topic78660.html?highlight=valve |
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5th Mar 2024 10:49am |
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| Puma_Badger Member Since: 04 Mar 2024 Location: Essex Posts: 9
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Having ordered the new valve, control cable, plus box of springs and pliers to clamp the hoses when changing. The heater stuck on hot and when turned to cold you could move it about 1/2" just by flicking the dial. When I got home having had the windows open in the pouring rain I saw that the control cable had dropped down and was holding the heater flat out. I got a stainless steel L bracket that I straightened, a stainless steel cable tie and bolted the bracket through the small hole in the top off the valve, put the cable tie on loose around the outer of the cable and no more dropping. On the drive to work today it was the best it has ever been. Still need to fit the spring to return the valve fully closed but hopefully that will solve my issues.
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12th Mar 2024 8:00am |
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