Camry 05 with no A/C, Heat, or Rear Defrost

[artk]

Hello, I am hoping someone can help me isolate this interesting problem that I found after I came back from a 3 week trip. My car was idol during this time. When I returned to it, I found the front window down and the climate control buttons located on the front center console not completely operational. If you rotate the vent heater defrost switch to the far right of the driver that works. However if you rotate the temp control from cold to hot that doesn't work. The air stays the temp of outside air. Nor does the knobs when pushed in to operate the rear defrost, A/C or the Max A/C. There are no light action within the knobs. I had the manual out and checked all fuses under the dash that looked like they pertained to the A/C or Heat or defrost. I also checked fuses under the hood.
I am thinking I have a bad relay, but how do I determine which one?

does anyone have any ideas?

Thanks

Art

[rob1218]

iwould check ALL your fuses sometimes it will be some compltely random fuse blow that has nothing to do with the label.. and also i kno this is wierd and im not familiar with 05 camrys but did you ensure the plug is plugged in behind the controls??

as far as the relay being bad.. it is possible but relays rarely go bad from my experience.. esp on such a new vehicle.. if it did i imagine it could just not make any click when powered on.. but when i have seen relays go bad. they usually make a loud buzzing noise almost like those door bells.. a pretty awful and obvious noise..

to test the relays.. for example if u found the relay that was supposed to power that stuff.. you could take it to the bench and plug wires in but thats a pain.. i think an easier way to test it would be to find another similar relay in the car for example usually the HORN uses the same exact relays usually.. unplug that one and plug the suspected bad relay into the horn location.. if your horn works than most likely the relay is okay.. and when you unplug the horn relay obviously the horn should not work.. just to verify you got the correct relay..

any more questions let me know.. and good luck!

[artk]

Rob thanks for the reply. I will go through all the fuses. regarding the connection behind the controls, I have not checked. simply think that would be a weird thing for connections behind 3 knobs to become disconnected simutaneously however I shouldn't leave that option unchecked.
Do you know how those knobs come out of the dash? How does one check the connections?

art

[rob1218]

it should be similar to taking the radio out.. shouldnt be too hard.. look at this. 05 Camry Dash Disassembly

and yes i highly doubt they just came unplugged based on your circumstances but who knows.. is there a possibility that pack rats or sumthign got into your car?? thats usually one of the most common reasons stuff randomly doesnt work have leaving your car for a period of time.. which could end up being a mess to fix.

Good luck!

[artk]

It appears you are right Rob, I have a rodent of some kind. I found dropping in my air cabin filter. I still have not found wire damage but at least I now know the culprit.

[rob1218]

eghh.. sorry thats not good.. really hope they didnt do too much damage.. could really be a mess to figure out what they did.. hopefully its something easy.. good luck with that !

[artk]

Rob, I have traced the wiring from the controls to the fire wall and respective fuse blocks. I found nothing. I will have to take to the pros. I had the underside of the dash on both sides completely off. I did find that the camry is easy to remove the dash parts and put back together. Much easier then american cars.
when I find the answer for my problem from the pro, I will post so there will be an answer to the problem in the archives.
thanks
art

[rob1218]

wow.. yeah good luck with that hope they dont charge you too much!! :/ let us know!