[Van Gogh]

Hey folks,

Some of you may have other needs regarding the recirc button than the one mentioned below. One poster said his is constantly stuck on recirc no matter what temp settings he uses; what I wouldn't pay to have that. And some may find this all trivial and unnecessary. If you fall into those categories, please just ignore and move along. But if you're like me (asthmatic), and you have to contend with dust storms, old semis and work trucks blowing sooty exhaust (some new trucks intentionally; e.g. "coal rollers"), forest fire smoke, pollen haze, etc, so you want to be able to keep the van on recirc until outdoor air quality has improved, I found a not-so-ideal but totally workable solution.

I had noticed that when the a/c was on max cool mode (little max light is lit), recirc persisted. Sometimes it'll stay on recirc at other settings, but anything off of max cool and it'll eventually switch to vent mode if you encounter the right climate. It's very dry where I live, but either changes in ambient humidity or the a/c system's humidity sensor sensor or some other set of circumstances causes it to switch to vent mode. It's happened on a day with 20% humidity when I haven't been living in the van and there's been no other source of moisture in it for weeks. Drive to get gas, rotate temp knob to 60% cold, turn on recirc, and a few minutes later it's off. Turn it on again, same deal, over and over, any setting from 99% cool to max heat. I'm certain it's designed to prevent mold and excess humidity in the vents, but my last SUV had a button that persisted and I never had any issues with it. I think it's design overkill on the Transit.

That lead me to a work-around that isn't perfect but so far it's good enough that I'm glad to have it. I wear a jacket when I drive (the ridiculous part), close the vent's on the driver's side using the little wheel adjusters, turn the temp nob to max cool, then turn the fan knob down to setting 1 (but max cool light stays illuminated because temp knob is still at max). With only the passenger side vents open and pointing toward the back, it's usually tolerable, and at fan speed 1 shouldn't be an issue for the blower. Thankfully southwest winters are pretty mild, and I don't always need recirc if outdoor air quality is good, so I can do this pretty much year round.

The last piece that makes it all come together is a trick I got from "Grandma" (what we all affectionately call Mom these days on account of so many grandkids calling her that). She and "Grandpa" drive a lot to visit grandkids, and she had learned that turning on the seat warmer helps with leg pain. Wow was she right! Not only does it definitely help with leg pain, but on the lowest setting it's perfect to counteract the cold from having the a/c on max + fan speed 1 + driver side vents closed. Go Grandma!

Cheers.

 

[Vanaroo]

I don't mean to butt into your thread, but I have another possible solution. I'm like you in that when I put my vehicle on "recirc," I expect it to STAY THERE unless or until I tell it otherwise. If my windows are fogging up (they aren't, I'm in a dry area), I can figure out how to fix that by turning off recirc.

This is how my car works. I could put it on recirc and a year later it would still be there unless I changed it. What a concept.

Riding in my buddy's Ford, you put it on recirc and toodle along happily. Until.... suddenly the cab is filled with the diesel exhaust of the person in front of you rolling coal. You look down, oh, it turned recirc off FOR me. Thanks! Or, you are toodling along happily with recirc on and then you noticed that wildfire smoke has permeated the cab. What the? Oh, Ford turned off the recirc. Argh! Wash, repeat with dust, cigarette smoke from the car next to you at the light, whatever.

I hunted and HUNTED for a way to deal with this. First when I thought I might buy my buddy's F-150 (decided to hold out for a van) and then once I decided I would like a Transit.

Lo and behold, some amazing person put instructions on the web for how to wire the F-150 recirc with a toggle switch so that it would maintain "last selected position" on one way, and "as built" in the other position. Glory be!

By this time my buddy had a 2021 Ranger and while he wasn't as rabid as I am about it, he was getting sick of the dust, smoke, diesel, etc. (when he had put it on recirc). So he agreed to try to use the instructions that I had saved (from the F-150 guy, who deserves a medal). We weren't together so we Facetimed and I guided him and gave tips while he was upside down in the footwell and I had the instructions in front of me (plus a few photos someone had taken of a Ranger dash apart for some other job). The Ranger wasn't exactly the same as the F-150 in terms of the location of the two-wire connector we were looking for (F-150 was by glovebox; Ranger was more toward center stack), but he did find the wires! He spliced in a toggle switch and ever since that day recirc STAYS ON when he puts it on (or if he flips the switch, it goes back to as-built and Ford decides). Since fogging windows aren't a problem in the SW where he is, the toggle stays in "I rule the world" position all the time.

Van Gogh: Are you interested in this? In this thread? Or should I turn back? 😅

 

[Michael Ophus]

As long as you keep the transit seat back straight up there is no back and leg pain, When you use the recline that is where you get into trouble. Other people in the past on this forum have said the same thing.

For the first six months of driving a transit that seat hurt my back so bad that I looked at buying a aftermarket drivers seat until I read about keeping the seat back up right here.

Bucket seats have always made my back and legs hurt, It may have had something to do with the slight recline built in to them.

 

[Van Gogh]

As long as you keep the transit seat back straight up there is no back and leg pain, When you use the recline that is where you get into trouble. Other people in the past on this forum have said the same thing.

For the first six months of driving a transit that seat hurt my back so bad that I looked at buying a aftermarket drivers seat until I read about keeping the seat back up right here.

Bucket seats have always made my back and legs hurt, It may have had something to do with the slight recline built in to them.

I wish that worked for me, but after 5+ hours driving in any car with the seat in any position (have tried every one multiple times, even used to switch between seat positions just to get some change in the pain), I can say for certain that the issue has nothing to do with the seat position. It's remaining still for that duration.

But it sounds like it could be even worse for people who recline while driving. That I believe. I already keep the Transit seat straight, because that's the same way I keep my work chair (a herman miller aeron) and the way an ergonomist once trained me and my colleagues to do. She also advised removing arm rests and avoiding them (I removed the transit ones first thing) and when working on a computer, using keyboard trays that keep your arms at a perfect 90 degree angle to help with neck pain.

I would be doing the old routine of periodically changing the seat position to get some relief, but the heated seat trick has pretty much solved the issue. Seriously, give it a shot. Lowest setting with the a/c comfortably cool. I was skeptical but it works.

Cheers.

 

[Van Gogh]

I don't mean to butt into your thread, but I have another possible solution. I'm like you in that when I put my vehicle on "recirc," I expect it to STAY THERE unless or until I tell it otherwise. If my windows are fogging up (they aren't, I'm in a dry area), I can figure out how to fix that by turning off recirc.

This is how my car works. I could put it on recirc and a year later it would still be there unless I changed it. What a concept.

Riding in my buddy's Ford, you put it on recirc and toodle along happily. Until.... suddenly the cab is filled with the diesel exhaust of the person in front of you rolling coal. You look down, oh, it turned recirc off FOR me. Thanks! Or, you are toodling along happily with recirc on and then you noticed that wildfire smoke has permeated the cab. What the? Oh, Ford turned off the recirc. Argh! Wash, repeat with dust, cigarette smoke from the car next to you at the light, whatever.

I hunted and HUNTED for a way to deal with this. First when I thought I might buy my buddy's F-150 (decided to hold out for a van) and then once I decided I would like a Transit.

Lo and behold, some amazing person put instructions on the web for how to wire the F-150 recirc with a toggle switch so that it would maintain "last selected position" on one way, and "as built" in the other position. Glory be!

By this time my buddy had a 2021 Ranger and while he wasn't as rabid as I am about it, he was getting sick of the dust, smoke, diesel, etc. (when he had put it on recirc). So he agreed to try to use the instructions that I had saved (from the F-150 guy, who deserves a medal). We weren't together so we Facetimed and I guided him and gave tips while he was upside down in the footwell and I had the instructions in front of me (plus a few photos someone had taken of a Ranger dash apart for some other job). The Ranger wasn't exactly the same as the F-150 in terms of the location of the two-wire connector we were looking for (F-150 was by glovebox; Ranger was more toward center stack), but he did find the wires! He spliced in a toggle switch and ever since that day recirc STAYS ON when he puts it on (or if he flips the switch, it goes back to as-built and Ford decides). Since fogging windows aren't a problem in the SW where he is, the toggle stays in "I rule the world" position all the time.

Van Gogh: Are you interested in this? In this thread? Or should I turn back? 😅

Oh I'm totally down with this. Thank you in advance if it works. I even offered a $300 bounty for anyone would create a fully working solution. I had planned to intercept the duct wiring as a last resort, but that was all based on the assumption the recirc button was not a simple analog toggle and was instead part of the CAN bus like the auto start/stop button. Maybe it's still old-school? Or maybe your instructions are actually to intercept the duct vent power wire? I'll rip into the dash someday when I'm not travelling and give it a shot if you can link to those instructions. Like you, my old SUV's recirc button persisted, and I want that same behavior!

Cheers.

 

[Vanaroo]

So now I'm a little nervous (I mentioned a possible Forscan command for turning off A/S/S in another thread but of course it's possible it could mess things up. That was pointed out and I deleted it.). But then we talk about a lot of things here on the forum that could mess with a stock Transit. So, a thousand caveats go here. Your van could start actively SUCKING IN diesel fumes if the mod gets messed up.

So I hunted, and Hunted, and HUNTED for a way to deal with this. For weeks! I knew this would drive me insane in a Transit. I finally found a post. I now worship 2015 Super Duty Guy I stupidly didn't save the person's screen name. (ALL THE CREDIT to this fellow! Sanity Saver!). He explains exactly how it works in concept, which is so valuable. His vehicle was a 2015 Super Duty truck, but this fix worked on my buddy's 2021 Ranger also (he drives the Ranger in glorious dust/soot/fire-smoke free splendor now). He takes it out of recirc when HE wants to (imagine).

More notes after this section in Italics from the Super Duty guy:

I was able to fix it on my 2015 Super Duty, and it was actually pretty simple. Perhaps this method will work on older model F150s. First, I'll explain how the HVAC module actuates the inlet mode motor, and then I'll explain how I fixed it, so I now have complete control over when and where the door switches
How it works: There are two wires that run from the HVAC Control Module to the Inlet Mode Door Motor, and these wires determine which position the Air Inlet Door is in. One of wires is green with an orange stripe, and the other wire is blue with a grey stripe. When the button on the dash is pushed to turn off recirculation or when the timer runs out and the system does this automatically, power is supplied to the Inlet Mode Select Motor from the green with an orange stripe wire for approximately 10 seconds. This runs the motor backwards long enough to open the Air Inlet Door. When the button is pressed to recirculate, power is supplied to the Inlet Mode Select Motor from the blue and grey wire for about 10 seconds, and this runs the motor forward for long enough to close the flap. When switching to fresh air mode, the green and orange wire is the power wire, and the blue and grey wire is the ground. When switching to recirculation mode, the blue and grey wire is the power wire, and the green and orange wire is the ground.
• It is important to note that the Air Inlet Door Motor is not designed to receive power all of the time, so it should NOT be wired in a way that could cause this, or it will fail.

The fix:
Step 1: Open the glove compartment.
Step 2: Locate the stop on right side that prevents the glove compartment door from swinging out of the dash, and push in on it, so it clears the dash and allows the glove compartment door to swing down out of way revealing the inside of the dash.
Step 3: Locate the two harness connectors that are located behind the glove compartment. With the glove compartment out of the way they are easy to access.
• The top harness connector is the HVAC control. This can be verified by turning on the fan motor and then disconnecting the plug. If it is the correct connector, the fan motor will shut off.
Step 4: Locate the green wire with an orange stripe, and clip it in half.
Step 5: Run the wire through a switch, so that turning the switch off prevents power from being able to travel through the wire, and turning the switch on allows power to travel through the wire. Note: Do NOT supply power to the switch. As I noted before, this will cause the actuator door motor to run all of the time, and it will fail.

Once these steps have been completed, turning the switch off will shut off all controls of the flap door, and it will stay in whatever position it was last in. Turning the switch on will then restore both the button function and the automated controls.

Okay, so we did find these two wires on my buddy's 2021 Ranger Lariat, and the fix worked exactly as described. He put in a toggle which toggles between "last set state" (which is obviously RECIRC) and "works as was built" which I call Whimsical Recirc.

The only difference is the connector and those two wires were not exactly in the same place (or not as my friend interpreted it anyway). Actually, I think they were over to the left (driver's) side of the glove box but IIRC he coudln't find them from there and went behind the center stack.... but then maybe he said later he could have gotten to them from the glove box area. I can check with him on this (although he has a poor memory).

Also one more thing: Now keep in mind my buddy is NOT a good detail person and makes mistakes and then forgets what he did. I was doing this with him via Facetime so was not "there" to verify. But anyway, he found what looked to be the correct wires (color, etc.). He cut the one wire in such a way that it would be easy to re-crimp if it wasn't correct, then did the test in Step 3 with the blower motor. He said that the blower motor still worked (I'm not sure he is correct on this though because he got confused). However he proceeded with the fix as described and it has worked exactly as it did for Super Duty Guy for over 6 months now. He put in a small toggle switch so he can switch back to "as built" if desired.

I would ask him more details but since it might be slightly different again on the Transit maybe not worth it. To me the main thing was knowing how the thing worked, the solution, the wire pair colors, and the approximate location of them.

 

[Van Gogh]

So now I'm a little nervous (I mentioned a possible Forscan command for turning off A/S/S in another thread but of course it's possible it could mess things up. That was pointed out and I deleted it.). But then we talk about a lot of things here on the forum that could mess with a stock Transit. So, a thousand caveats go here. Your van could start actively SUCKING IN diesel fumes if the mod gets messed up.

So I hunted, and Hunted, and HUNTED for a way to deal with this. For weeks! I knew this would drive me insane in a Transit. I finally found a post. I now worship 2015 Super Duty Guy I stupidly didn't save the person's screen name. (ALL THE CREDIT to this fellow! Sanity Saver!). He explains exactly how it works in concept, which is so valuable. His vehicle was a 2015 Super Duty truck, but this fix worked on my buddy's 2021 Ranger also (he drives the Ranger in glorious dust/soot/fire-smoke free splendor now). He takes it out of recirc when HE wants to (imagine).

More notes after this section in Italics from the Super Duty guy:

I was able to fix it on my 2015 Super Duty, and it was actually pretty simple. Perhaps this method will work on older model F150s. First, I'll explain how the HVAC module actuates the inlet mode motor, and then I'll explain how I fixed it, so I now have complete control over when and where the door switches
How it works: There are two wires that run from the HVAC Control Module to the Inlet Mode Door Motor, and these wires determine which position the Air Inlet Door is in. One of wires is green with an orange stripe, and the other wire is blue with a grey stripe. When the button on the dash is pushed to turn off recirculation or when the timer runs out and the system does this automatically, power is supplied to the Inlet Mode Select Motor from the green with an orange stripe wire for approximately 10 seconds. This runs the motor backwards long enough to open the Air Inlet Door. When the button is pressed to recirculate, power is supplied to the Inlet Mode Select Motor from the blue and grey wire for about 10 seconds, and this runs the motor forward for long enough to close the flap. When switching to fresh air mode, the green and orange wire is the power wire, and the blue and grey wire is the ground. When switching to recirculation mode, the blue and grey wire is the power wire, and the green and orange wire is the ground.
• It is important to note that the Air Inlet Door Motor is not designed to receive power all of the time, so it should NOT be wired in a way that could cause this, or it will fail.

The fix:
Step 1: Open the glove compartment.
Step 2: Locate the stop on right side that prevents the glove compartment door from swinging out of the dash, and push in on it, so it clears the dash and allows the glove compartment door to swing down out of way revealing the inside of the dash.
Step 3: Locate the two harness connectors that are located behind the glove compartment. With the glove compartment out of the way they are easy to access.
• The top harness connector is the HVAC control. This can be verified by turning on the fan motor and then disconnecting the plug. If it is the correct connector, the fan motor will shut off.
Step 4: Locate the green wire with an orange stripe, and clip it in half.
Step 5: Run the wire through a switch, so that turning the switch off prevents power from being able to travel through the wire, and turning the switch on allows power to travel through the wire. Note: Do NOT supply power to the switch. As I noted before, this will cause the actuator door motor to run all of the time, and it will fail.

Once these steps have been completed, turning the switch off will shut off all controls of the flap door, and it will stay in whatever position it was last in. Turning the switch on will then restore both the button function and the automated controls.

Okay, so we did find these two wires on my buddy's 2021 Ranger Lariat, and the fix worked exactly as described. He put in a toggle which toggles between "last set state" (which is obviously RECIRC) and "works as was built" which I call Whimsical Recirc.

The only difference is the connector and those two wires were not exactly in the same place (or not as my friend interpreted it anyway). Actually, I think they were over to the left (driver's) side of the glove box but IIRC he coudln't find them from there and went behind the center stack.... but then maybe he said later he could have gotten to them from the glove box area. I can check with him on this (although he has a poor memory).

Also one more thing: Now keep in mind my buddy is NOT a good detail person and makes mistakes and then forgets what he did. I was doing this with him via Facetime so was not "there" to verify. But anyway, he found what looked to be the correct wires (color, etc.). He cut the one wire in such a way that it would be easy to re-crimp if it wasn't correct, then did the test in Step 3 with the blower motor. He said that the blower motor still worked (I'm not sure he is correct on this though because he got confused). However he proceeded with the fix as described and it has worked exactly as it did for Super Duty Guy for over 6 months now. He put in a small toggle switch so he can switch back to "as built" if desired.

I would ask him more details but since it might be slightly different again on the Transit maybe not worth it. To me the main thing was knowing how the thing worked, the solution, the wire pair colors, and the approximate location of them.

Good info. Thank you! This is exactly what I meant by "wire up switch that cuts power to the duct servo/motor" in that old December 2021 post when I was desperate enough to offer $300 for a workable product.

With the temporary fix described above, the need to pursue the last resort solution has dropped significantly. But I still want total control over recirc (I know, such a control freak) so I'll almost certainly give it a shot now that you've shared that guy's positive experience with his 2021 ranger.

Hopefully the wiring is the same as described on the old F150 (reasonable chance) because that's the real hassle. I do have the wiring schematic for the van and at some point I can dig around to see if I can verify the wire colors and the harness location, assuming those are included (big assumption). It's also very helpful to know the correct terminology is "Inlet Mode Door Motor". That alone may be enough. And it pretty much guarantees this fix can be implemented, which I originally suspected, but I thought it would be a ton of work. If it's just behind the glove box, that's great news. Hope so!

If your buddy only cut the wire and didn't pull apart the entire connector, then the fan would have continued blowing because the wire described is only for the Inlet Mode Door Motor. That might explain it. But yeah, if you can ask him where he found the connector and if he has any tips on accessing it from the glove box, that would be great. It's better than nothing.

Thank you Vanaroo!

Cheers.

 

[Vanaroo]

It's been awhile now, so my memory is fuzzy (and I knew I wouldn't be buying a Ranger), but I think I was thinking along the same lines as you, and so I googled "inlet mode door motor" and found some Ranger diagrams (the term, we have the term!). I didn't put that in because I can't remember everything about it. I also think that it was one of those "Oh, here it is, I didn't look behind that other plug" scenarios, so it wasn't that hard ultimately.

Good point on the plug, At that point it was hard to tell what he was doing. I just knew it looked like we had the correct two wires, and we now knew how they worked. I have wired up similar "interrupt but don't actually supply power" switches to trim tab circuits on boats (retract/don't retract), so that made sense to me once I read about it.

One other thing that made me confident enough to suggest it (on someone else's new truck, LOL) was that the 2021 Ranger still has a physical recirc button.

At the time I was debating ordering a Transit with the SYNC 4 screen... or not. I could see that the SYNC 3 recirc button looked very similar to the Ranger button. But when it's all on a screen, then what? Actually, as I thought about it more, I came to the conclusion that the new Transits with SYNC 4 very likely have the same ol' "inlet mode door motor" and hence you could probably still find those wires that control it and do this fix. Of course it's more obvious that you can likely do it on the Transits with physical buttons (but it seems unlikely that SYNC 4 is replacing inlet door motors with digital ones).

I will see what additional details or "mind jogs" I can get. Maybe I have some Facetime screen shots too.

If I get a Transit this would be my first mod 😊

 

[Vanaroo]

Okay, got my buddy on the phone plus went through my notes. BTW, six months later and this mod is still working perfectly in his 2021 Ranger (SYNC 3 with physical recirc button, if it matters).

So just to set the scene, when we did this job, I was on Facetime with the Super Duty instructions plus some Ranger wiring diagrams I had dug up, and he was lying upside down under his dash with a flashlight, tools, and his phone on Facetime speaker. Teamwork!

The connector was pretty much where it was supposed to be. It was to the right of the glovebox and slightly up (he removed the glovebox). So in other words, to the passenger side of the glovebox (and up in a little under the dash, but not far).

This first picture is the connector unplugged. You don't technically need to unplug it to do this mod, but the colors show up better in this picture than the next one, where the flash makes the wire look sort of gold. So it's the green wire with the orange stripe, just as in the older Super Duty. It's the wire all the way to the right in this photo.

(I can't seem to get rid of all the blank space below this photo, but just keep scrolling and the rest of the post will come into view.)

In the photo below, the mod has been made. The two pink adhesive heat shrink connectors and the two new white wires are the added ones. So the green/orange-stripe wire was clipped, and each of the two now-free ends connected to a new wire. These two new wires (happen to be white) lead to the two an on/off toggle switch (location decided by modder - this one is below the center stack, but no pic).

The way it works is that the "on" position, restores the green/orange-stripe wire to as-built, and the recirc will work exactly as it does stock (whimsical recirc). When the switch is in the "off" position, the recirc will stay in whichever mode it was in when you flipped the switch to "off." Obviously for our purposes, we want the HVAC to actually be in "recirc" when we flip the switch to "off."

Same pic without all the notes:

 

[Van Gogh]

It's been awhile now, so my memory is fuzzy (and I knew I wouldn't be buying a Ranger), but I think I was thinking along the same lines as you, and so I googled "inlet mode door motor" and found some Ranger diagrams (the term, we have the term!). I didn't put that in because I can't remember everything about it. I also think that it was one of those "Oh, here it is, I didn't look behind that other plug" scenarios, so it wasn't that hard ultimately.

Good point on the plug, At that point it was hard to tell what he was doing. I just knew it looked like we had the correct two wires, and we now knew how they worked. I have wired up similar "interrupt but don't actually supply power" switches to trim tab circuits on boats (retract/don't retract), so that made sense to me once I read about it.

One other thing that made me confident enough to suggest it (on someone else's new truck, LOL) was that the 2021 Ranger still has a physical recirc button.

At the time I was debating ordering a Transit with the SYNC 4 screen... or not. I could see that the SYNC 3 recirc button looked very similar to the Ranger button. But when it's all on a screen, then what? Actually, as I thought about it more, I came to the conclusion that the new Transits with SYNC 4 very likely have the same ol' "inlet mode door motor" and hence you could probably still find those wires that control it and do this fix. Of course it's more obvious that you can likely do it on the Transits with physical buttons (but it seems unlikely that SYNC 4 is replacing inlet door motors with digital ones).

I will see what additional details or "mind jogs" I can get. Maybe I have some Facetime screen shots too.

If I get a Transit this would be my first mod 😊

Yeah, that's the beauty of cutting the duct motor, it shouldn't matter sync or physical. I'm traveling now, but someday I'll get into this. Thanks again.

Cheers.

 

[ShadeTreeMech]

Maybe try opening the hood and taping some plastic over the vent intake?

 

[Vanaroo]

Maybe try opening the hood and taping some plastic over the vent intake?

If I hadn't been able to figure out a better solution (that I hope we prove will work on the Transit, but does work on the Super Duty and Ranger), I would almost have considered that.

What I don't love about it though, is that you can't easily/quickly get fresh air intake via the HVAC system. That can be a convenience or, more importantly, safety factor. I mentioned I'm usually out west, so humidity and fogging aren't an issue. But I was traveling last year in the Midwest and there were plenty of times I needed to get fresh air in to make the defroster work properly and clear the windshield. Sometimes right now please! With a switch you just flip it the opposite way (I would install within reach of steering wheel, just like any other HVAC control) and you are back to stock setup, and can get fresh air in via defrost. So that's no different than the fact that you might have the selector on "heat" and need to move it to defrost (in other words, you typically have to select the appropriate HVAC, but the controls are right where you can reach them, as expected).

Conversely, with something taped over the intake under the hood, you cannot get fresh air in as you are driving along if you need it. Sure, you can open a window, but that doesn't work as effectively as fresh air coming out the defroster. It could be a safety issue. (And in the Midwest, in my unaltered car, I did also have to open a window in some fogging situations; but that was coupled with the defroster's fresh air beaming right on the window, which I would not have wanted to give up.)

On another topic: Did you add that screening over the intake or was that there from Ford? That's the sort of place I look for on any of my vehicles because I don't like "Come on in!" open invitations to rodents. Looks like a tidy job

 

[ShadeTreeMech]

@Vanaroo,


The thought behind the "Maybe" suggestion was to see if it would work or not. The screen is there on my '19 cargo. If blocking it works, then maybe a simple flap cover that gets pulled down by a cable and is returned back with a spring ... or some such arrangement ... with a catchy title ... might work.

 

[Van Gogh]

@Vanaroo,


The thought behind the "Maybe" suggestion was to see if it would work or not. The screen is there on my '19 cargo. If blocking it works, then maybe a simple flap cover that gets pulled down by a cable and is returned back with a spring ... or some such arrangement ... with a catchy title ... might work.

If there was no other way, I might do this. But the max a/c lowest fan speed + heat warmer has made it a low priority for me, and cutting into the inlet motor wire will very likely work and make it easy to bring in fresh air when necessary (defrost).

Cheers.

 

[scapps]

So now I'm a little nervous (I mentioned a possible Forscan command for turning off A/S/S in another thread but of course it's possible it could mess things up. That was pointed out and I deleted it.). But then we talk about a lot of things here on the forum that could mess with a stock Transit. So, a thousand caveats go here. Your van could start actively SUCKING IN diesel fumes if the mod gets messed up.

So I hunted, and Hunted, and HUNTED for a way to deal with this. For weeks! I knew this would drive me insane in a Transit. I finally found a post. I now worship 2015 Super Duty Guy I stupidly didn't save the person's screen name. (ALL THE CREDIT to this fellow! Sanity Saver!). He explains exactly how it works in concept, which is so valuable. His vehicle was a 2015 Super Duty truck, but this fix worked on my buddy's 2021 Ranger also (he drives the Ranger in glorious dust/soot/fire-smoke free splendor now). He takes it out of recirc when HE wants to (imagine).

More notes after this section in Italics from the Super Duty guy:

I was able to fix it on my 2015 Super Duty, and it was actually pretty simple. Perhaps this method will work on older model F150s. First, I'll explain how the HVAC module actuates the inlet mode motor, and then I'll explain how I fixed it, so I now have complete control over when and where the door switches
How it works: There are two wires that run from the HVAC Control Module to the Inlet Mode Door Motor, and these wires determine which position the Air Inlet Door is in. One of wires is green with an orange stripe, and the other wire is blue with a grey stripe. When the button on the dash is pushed to turn off recirculation or when the timer runs out and the system does this automatically, power is supplied to the Inlet Mode Select Motor from the green with an orange stripe wire for approximately 10 seconds. This runs the motor backwards long enough to open the Air Inlet Door. When the button is pressed to recirculate, power is supplied to the Inlet Mode Select Motor from the blue and grey wire for about 10 seconds, and this runs the motor forward for long enough to close the flap. When switching to fresh air mode, the green and orange wire is the power wire, and the blue and grey wire is the ground. When switching to recirculation mode, the blue and grey wire is the power wire, and the green and orange wire is the ground.
• It is important to note that the Air Inlet Door Motor is not designed to receive power all of the time, so it should NOT be wired in a way that could cause this, or it will fail.

The fix:
Step 1: Open the glove compartment.
Step 2: Locate the stop on right side that prevents the glove compartment door from swinging out of the dash, and push in on it, so it clears the dash and allows the glove compartment door to swing down out of way revealing the inside of the dash.
Step 3: Locate the two harness connectors that are located behind the glove compartment. With the glove compartment out of the way they are easy to access.
• The top harness connector is the HVAC control. This can be verified by turning on the fan motor and then disconnecting the plug. If it is the correct connector, the fan motor will shut off.
Step 4: Locate the green wire with an orange stripe, and clip it in half.
Step 5: Run the wire through a switch, so that turning the switch off prevents power from being able to travel through the wire, and turning the switch on allows power to travel through the wire. Note: Do NOT supply power to the switch. As I noted before, this will cause the actuator door motor to run all of the time, and it will fail.

Once these steps have been completed, turning the switch off will shut off all controls of the flap door, and it will stay in whatever position it was last in. Turning the switch on will then restore both the button function and the automated controls.

Okay, so we did find these two wires on my buddy's 2021 Ranger Lariat, and the fix worked exactly as described. He put in a toggle which toggles between "last set state" (which is obviously RECIRC) and "works as was built" which I call Whimsical Recirc.

The only difference is the connector and those two wires were not exactly in the same place (or not as my friend interpreted it anyway). Actually, I think they were over to the left (driver's) side of the glove box but IIRC he coudln't find them from there and went behind the center stack.... but then maybe he said later he could have gotten to them from the glove box area. I can check with him on this (although he has a poor memory).

Also one more thing: Now keep in mind my buddy is NOT a good detail person and makes mistakes and then forgets what he did. I was doing this with him via Facetime so was not "there" to verify. But anyway, he found what looked to be the correct wires (color, etc.). He cut the one wire in such a way that it would be easy to re-crimp if it wasn't correct, then did the test in Step 3 with the blower motor. He said that the blower motor still worked (I'm not sure he is correct on this though because he got confused). However he proceeded with the fix as described and it has worked exactly as it did for Super Duty Guy for over 6 months now. He put in a small toggle switch so he can switch back to "as built" if desired.

I would ask him more details but since it might be slightly different again on the Transit maybe not worth it. To me the main thing was knowing how the thing worked, the solution, the wire pair colors, and the approximate location of them.

I did this and it works. I installed a toggle switch on the dash and ran wires down to the flapper motor which in my 2020 Transit is behind the glovebox.
THANKS!

 

[Scotty49]

One thing you might consider is placing an air cabin filter in the slot behind the glove box especially with concerns for air quality. Our van did not come with an air filter installed from the factory. The slot is shown in @ShadeTreeMech post. The part number is: Baldwin filter PA30000; Grainger calls it Air Filter, Panel 45AP28