Finally got my Expo

[GngrBeardMan]

Hey all, been creeping on the forums for a while now. My kids mom offered to sell me the 2006 EB Expo they had before they upgraded to a diesel for well under the BB. Finally got the money together to buy it and have to say it's amazing going from a 03 Mazda 6S to the 06 Expo. It's rust free and ask the paint is good. 139K miles and has had a ton of work done recently. Luckily a full tuneup was just done including all new injectors. The 10 ply all season tires only have 6k miles on them. So far the only issues it has are the rear ac/heat click, the DVD player won't stay in the up position, the pass front window is slow going up, the driver side has a bad switch that only rolls the window up when you hold your mouth right, and the pass side Cat is bad. All things I believe are in my skill level to fix. For $4500 I've got no complaints.

 

[whtbronco]

Nice, sounds like a good price.

The rear heat is most likely the actuator. Fairly easy to swap, just takes like 1-2hrs the fist time.
Stupid DVD player. The spring kept popping loose that holds the latch in place on ours. I just push the latch now and it usually stays in place. I'd remove the DVD player since I disabled it, but I use the screen to block headlights behind me that bug me.

Ahh power window switches. 90% chance it's just carbon buildup. Carefully take the switches apart. Clean use Electronics Cleaner spray and a tool to scrape the carbon off the contact points. Reassemble. I have found this lasts almost as long as a replacement and I've done it on ever vehicle we have, except the Ranger. On some of the Expy's switches I also had to slightly stretch the springs due to wear on the plastic pins. You'll see what I mean if you pull one apart.

The cat well I hate old exhaust. The rust is always a pain, but an impact wrench makes it much easier. I used to always shear the bolts/studs off by hand. With an electric impact the nuts turn off just cleaning the rust on the way off.

Good luck.

 

[Aspen03]

The rear actuator for the heat, assuming your hand fits is accessible by removing the tray on the passenger side back there and squeezing in. If you can get it into the upper vent mode just simply unplug the power and it'll stay put. Both our expy and navigator are this way and have been for years. The floor vent option is utterly useless anyway. You have much more control of the airflow with the headliner vents.

Whtbronco is on it w the switches as that's a common mode of failure. Chryslers of the same era suffered from it a lot as well. I've taken apart many of them and cleaned up and worked good as new. I haven't had the problem with my expy but ready for it when it happens.

All of those are very minimal problems for the price given the rest of the good points. Some good velcro strips would hold that DVD screen up. Not the most slightly thing if it's going to see regular use but easy, cheap, and effective.

 

[whtbronco]

Aspen, that's a great idea for the actuator. We always use the overhead vents as well, pretty much no need for the floor vents and saves the time, effort and money to replace a near useless actuator.

The velcro is also a fantastic idea.

You sound like me. Make it functional and try not to spend a fortune doing so.