Whether my vents are in the closed or open position & whether the vents are closed to outside air or open to it.... I'm getting HOT air coming through these vents. Most often notice it when the top is down. It is VERY annoying. Since i've tried every possible scenario of closing/opening the vents internally & externally...does anyone have a suggestion as to what I can do. Aside from having to putting on the air conditioning (which I hate doing) when the tops down on a nice day to avoid this blowing "heat" issue? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

well, dunno, if you don't turn AC on, how can you expect cold air to come in?

 

Vent air temperature is controlled by mixture solenoids which can go out. This will cause what you are describing. I had to replace one in my SC400 years back. They can be tested as well. If this is something you are willing to tackle yourself let me know and I will walk you through it. It will require a little bit of technical know how on your side.
Lee

 

I agree. I think you have a malfunction.

When I hit the "OFF" button, which I often do when the top is down, I get no air of any kind through the vents.

 

I notice that the drivers side footwell get quite warm when the top is down. It feels as if hot air is being blown into the footwell even though I do not feel any air down there. And this is happening when the climate control system is off. I tried turning on the climate control system on and lowering the temp to its lowest degree and then shutting it off . That did not help.

 

Just set your system to 'recycle' when the system is 'off', and all vents should close (no air at all). That should do the trick for you.
If air temperature is not right when operating the system, then you probably have the solenoid problem Pearlpower is talking about. And yes, even when the system is off (and system in 'fresh' mode), air from the vents is at pre-selected temperature. When it's summer, air will always be hot with A/C off, but in winter, you can have the system off and warm air is felt with the system off. Just play with it; I doubt you have a malfunction. Take care.

 

JillBS: If you search the archives here you will find that a few SC430 owners have experienced the same problem. I have too. Other readers do not seem to appreciate the problem or accept it as a problem. Service managers don't have a clue. Pearlpower's comments are the most specific I have seen posted on this issue. Anyway, in my case, I found that the problem seemed to occur when I had turned off the Climate control system for some reason. I now keep it on all the time and switch off the A/C button if I don't want that function. This seems to help avoid the hot air through the vents. Ocassionally, turning the A/C on for a few minutes would seem to "reset" the system and stop the flow of hot air from the vent. But this did not always work. My car is an April 01 manufacture, but I believe that this has occured on other years too.