Hi all, my first post on here
Hello and welcome to the forum. Sorry to hear you've got a problem.
...it sounds like it may now have a broken flap, but I'm not sure about that without dismantling the whole thing
If someone has already tried an improvised repair and it hasn't worked, then your options are limited. Dismantling the heater box is a major job; most of the interior forward of the seats has to come out, along with both front doors - it's a day's work for an experienced mechanic and probably at least €1000 in labour alone if done by a fiat dealer. New replacement parts for the box are not individually available and a new heater box will cost you about the same again.
There's an independent specialist in the UK that can do the repair using secondhand parts for about £600-£700 all in, but with secondhand parts, there can be no guarantee that it won't happen again.
Someone recently repaired one using secondhand parts at home with the help of a mechanic friend and IIRC it took them a week .
It's a design weakness that potentially affects all 500's & Pandas with climate; AFAIK there is no way of checking the condition of these parts during a prepurchase inspection.
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