Seicento Hello

[CommanderBond]

Hello all, just passed my driving test and for my birthday my parents got me a 2003 Seicento Sporting ( I know lucky me !!! ) it's the fastest one in yellow apparently, still getting used to the pedals being so close together and the rather responsive steering, but it's top notch, lovein it.

Looking for some info please, when my dad went to check the car over he made sure the heater was not blowing cold air out the vents when the engine was hot (ie to make sure no head gasket issues) but it has turned out it only blows out hot air even when the temp dial is in the blue sector !!! when you turn the dial towards the windscreen demist side and let go it seems to spring back a quarter turn as if cable is spooling up rather than twisting the inner cable, is this common and if so how does he fix it ? and if it's a "control panel" off job how much of a chore is it going to be ?

Any help and info will be greatly appreciated.

Will post some piccies later.

 

[fingers99]

My guess -- I've never encoutered those symptoms -- is that the cock which turns the heater on and off (rather like a valve on a domestic radiator, or a water "stop cock" ) has seized.

Not sure if the cock is available separately from the heater matrix.

Seicento Technical Manual is in the Downloads section (3 files, put them all in one folder and use an unrar tool from sourceforge -- google will find, but sourceforge is the best source for clean, free, Open Source software -- to open).

 

[CommanderBond]

Thanks fingers99 your seized temp "cock" theory makes sense I guess, just need some help now on how get to the valve thingie to check to see if it is faulty, perhaps some more info will be coming from other forum members who have already sussed the job out, other than that I'll get pops to contact Fiat in the week.

 

[fingers99]

If you want do do some rooting around, access is through the "carpet" stuff on the engine compartment bulkhead.

There is a post here somewhere on it. You might try using the advanced search thing on the site for "heater matrix".

IIRC, the important thing to note is that on the Sei, there are quick disconnect fittings on the end of the water pipes to the matrix, so release them, rather than cut through them.

 

[CommanderBond]

Thanks, we'll have a look for any info using the search thingy.