Top 5 Problems Jeep Grand Cherokee SUV 2nd Generation 1999-2004

Hey, friends, it's Len from 1A Auto. So today in the studio, we have a second-generation Jeep Grand Cherokee. We wanna go over some of the top problems that we've come to find. So let's get started. Now, for our first problem, I wanna talk about blend doors and blend door actuators. Now, what is a blend door or even a blend door actuator? Essentially, if you were to get behind your dash, there's gonna be blend doors that are in there that are gonna be able to divert the air that's getting pushed through by your blower motor. The reason why you would wanna have that air getting diverted is because, essentially, if you were to go ahead and put this knob on hot, that's gonna end up pushing the air through your hot heater core that's getting heated by your coolant and then warming up the air that's coming through your little vents here, and that's always nice. Of course, if you wanted it in the opposite direction, you can go ahead and turn it to cold, and that's gonna divert the air away from the heater core and then just bring it through the vents, and then you'll have some nice cool air coming through, and that's nice as well. With that said, the issue that this actually has is that the blend doors can tend to bind up inside. If the blend door binds up, you might go ahead and switch this from cold to hot, but the air that's coming out of here says, "No. We're not going through that heater core. We're gonna kinda stay where we're at. We like it here."

Well, that's not really the best thing because maybe you don't wanna have cold air blowing through your vents when you're expecting hot air. That could happen for a couple different reasons. Essentially, maybe, like I said, that blend door could be bound up for some reason. Maybe something fell inside one of your vents, a penny, a nickel, I don't know, a little wood chip or something like that, and it binds up the blend door, or even the actuator itself that's supposed to be able to move that blend door isn't getting the proper communication that it's supposed to or that's damaged in some way. So, you're gonna need to do a little bit of diagnosing to see what's going on. If I was to go ahead and try to turn this, and I could hear a little clunk, clunk, clunk, clunk, clunk coming from behind the dash there, that's telling me that the actuator's working but the blend door is bound up for some reason. So, that's something that I'm gonna need to get in there and check out. Luckily for us, they came up with an updated subassembly with the blend doors inside there, so in case you did actually have this issue and you had to go ahead and service it or even replace things, you're not necessarily gonna have this issue reoccurringly. Okay, friends. So now we're gonna talk about our second problem, and this one's gonna come down to window regulators.

Now, the window regulator is gonna be located behind your door panel here, and the purpose of the window regulator is so that as you go ahead and you flip your switch to either put your window up or down, the switch is gonna send power down to your motor, which is, of course, attached to that window regulator, and then the window regulator is gonna go ahead and either lift the window up for you or bring it down. So you don't necessarily have to go ahead and grab onto it like a monkey and try to do it yourself. Unfortunately, with these window regulators, they tend to bind up inside. When this happens, you might go ahead and pull on the switch a little bit, and maybe it kinda comes up or maybe it doesn't, or even, in some cases, it starts coming up, and then it kinda goes off that little kilter and seems like it comes off track. If this is the case, typically, it's gonna come down to, like I said, the window regulator. That's gonna be located right behind here, and it's fairly easy to fix. Now, right here is the window regulator, and, no, this isn't the one for this Jeep, but it is something that I can show you. Right up along this channel right here is where, of course, the window would be mounted, and then this is all gonna go to the door, and it's gonna be held in place so it doesn't move necessarily.

So now as you power up that switch and send power down to your motor, it's gonna, of course, move this cog right along here, which is what's gonna make this pivot and then make your window go up or down. So, essentially, if this gets bound up in any of its pivoting points, that's obviously gonna cause an issue where the window is not gonna wanna move. So if we're gonna talk about fixes real quick, we're gonna, of course, wanna diagnose to see what's going on. You wanna make sure you get down to the motor and make sure you have power getting there. If for some reason you don't have power, well, then you got a different issue that you're gonna have to chase down. More than likely it's an electrical issue. It could come down to the switch or even maybe a fuse issue, but, of course, if you did happen to find that it is the regulator, go ahead and replace that, and, of course, be careful with your glass. Make sure you're wearing safety glasses because you don't want anything to potentially happen to your eyes. Now, for our third problem, we're gonna talk about fuel tank recirculation issues. Now, for symptoms for this, you're probably gonna notice it at the gas pump.

Of course, with this Jeep right here, you're probably gonna be spending a lot of time at the gas pump, so if you end up having this issue, you're really gonna wanna deal with it ASAP. What I'm talking about here is you go ahead and you try to fill up your Jeep. You put it in there. You click the little thing that lets it go ahead and autofill on its own. You're hanging out. You're waiting for it to do its thing, but it shuts off. It only put in what? Five dollars or 3 gallons' worth of gas for some reason, but it shut off. You know you had an empty tank. You hit it again. Release it. You wait a little bit. Boom. It shuts off again. What's going on? Typically, what this comes down to is a fuel pressure issue inside the tank. Essentially, what's going on is you try to pump in the fluid right here or the gas, it's going down in, but for some reason, there isn't enough air being able to come back out. So basically it's kinda pushing that fuel back up, and then, of course, the gas pump thinks that, well, your fuel tank's full when it's not. So some of the common causes for this could potentially be the vapor circulation tube, the fuel fill tube or even the EVAP system. It's gonna have a little valve in there that's supposed to make sure that the air is able to come out as you're putting fuel in.

If, of course, that valve isn't working properly or if there's any type of restriction that's going on inside the system, you're gonna have an issue where you're not gonna be able to put in fuel and the pump's gonna keep turning off on you. All right. Now, for our fourth problem, we're gonna talk about a thermostat. Now, the thermostat serves a very important job inside your cooling system. Essentially, what it's supposed to do is help your Jeep achieve operating temperature. So what it's gonna do is it's gonna stay closed, keep the coolant inside the engine. So as the engine's warming up, it's gonna warm up that coolant, but, of course, as the engine starts to get maybe a little bit too hot after it achieved the operating temperature, this little valve right here is supposed to open up. When the thermostat valve opens up, that's gonna allow the coolant to be able to flow through the radiator, which in turn will cool it down a little bit. Of course, if this valve was stuck shut or even open, you're gonna notice that you have an issue with your cooling system. If it's stuck open, more than likely you're gonna be running a little cool, especially in the winter time, and if it's stuck shut, well, you're probably gonna have an overheating condition, and that's gonna be very bad in any condition.

So symptoms that you might have if you have a failing thermostat could essentially be your Jeep just doesn't wanna heat up to the normal operating temperature or even it overheats past that normal operating temperature. In either case, it's very bad overall. Other than that, maybe you're sitting inside the Jeep after you've let it warm up for a little while, you go ahead and you turn on that heat, but for some reason, there's just cold air blowing from the vents. The thermostat being stuck in the open position will, of course, make this happen. So as far as fixes for this, you, of course, wanna diagnose to make sure that you're having an issue with the thermostat and it's not necessarily something else. If, of course, you had your Jeep running for a little while, and it was at the normal operating temperature, if you were to carefully grab onto your upper radiator hose and kinda gauge the temperature of it, it's probably gonna be pretty hot so be careful. And then go ahead and carefully reach down to your lower radiator hose. You wanna essentially try to see if these have approximately the same temperature. If one's super hot and one's very cold, more than likely this is stuck shut.

If you happen to find that you're having an issue with your thermostat being stuck in the open or shut position, it's something that you're definitely gonna wanna replace. Typically, when you go ahead and do this, you're gonna wanna make sure you drain out all of your coolant. Flush out any of the existing coolant that's in there, and then, of course, we're gonna replace this thermostat, and then we're gonna go ahead and install the brand-new coolant as well. Okay, friends. For our fifth problem, we're gonna talk about four-wheel drive differential leaks. Now, if you were to carefully slide underneath your Jeep, you're gonna be able to see up in the front a front differential. It's gonna be very common for these leaks, especially along this area right along here. This is considered your pinion seal. The reason why these would typically leak essentially would be, of course, this drive shaft is gonna be spinning as your wheels are moving. Any dirt or debris that makes its way up onto the rubber seal is, of course, gonna wear it down, and then once that happens, you're, of course, gonna have fluid that starts making its way out. The pinion seal is definitely an area that you're gonna wanna pay attention to.

Other things that you're gonna wanna pay attention to on these differentials would be down at the ends where the axles go in. If you happen to see fluid coming out of either end, that essentially means that you're having an issue with your axle seal. Now, the axle seal on the front differential isn't gonna be located all the way out by the wheels. On these, it's gonna be located much closer to the actual differential itself, and it's not necessarily the easiest job to replace. Typically, if you wanted to go ahead and try to service this, you're gonna have to go ahead and take apart your front differential cover and then remove the gearing from inside. Once you've done that, of course, you're gonna remove your wheels and the axles and everything like that, and then you're gonna be able to separate everything and get to those axle seals. Now, for the rear differential, you're, of course, gonna have that pinion seal. You're gonna wanna pay attention to that, and then, of course, if you were to look down along the backing plate area, you might see some crispies and crunchies and gooeys that look like this. If you see a whole bunch of gooey build-up on the backing plate that looks like that, that's essentially telling you that you have an axle seal leak coming from there.

Of course, if this was leaking like that, it's more than likely gonna go ahead and get on your e-brake shoes and even your brake pads. This is gonna be very unsafe, so you wanna definitely take care of it. Okay. Okay. I know. On these top problems, usually we give you about five of them. For me, I like to go a little bit extra sometimes because you know what? I really love you, guys. On these Jeeps, it's gonna be super important to pay attention to this area right along here. This is your rear A-arm. You're gonna have some mounting bushings that come up along this, and if you see that they're starting to separate like this one is right there, that's gonna be very dangerous. Other areas that you might happen to find, of course, would be on the other side. You're gonna have the same exact thing on the opposite, and then right here in the center, you're gonna have a ball joint. If any of these are loose, you're gonna feel like you're loose and squarely driving down the road. You could potentially feel as though the Jeep just doesn't have the traction that you feel like it should, and, of course, if you're going around a corner, it might feel like it's just kinda not very safe. Now, if you live in a rust belt like me, you're gonna have to deal with rust. That's just one of the things that we have to deal with.

If you were to look along the rear arms here, of course, it might look fairly decent, but then as you start to look a little bit closer, you might happen to see that the metal itself is starting to rot away. You might also happen to see that the bushing is starting to pull away from this arm. Obviously, any of this could be an issue, because if this arm was to get weak and let go on you, you're probably gonna not be going down the road very straight and potentially, well, go off the road. Now, of course, if you had to replace either of these items, you're typically gonna wanna go ahead and check all of your front end and all of your suspension. If you happen to see anything leaking or rotted or broken, go ahead and replace it. After that, you definitely wanna make sure you get yourself a four-wheel alignment. Okay, friends. So that's pretty much what I've got for you for top problems on a second-generation Jeep Grand Cherokee. I went over a lot of stuff here. Hopefully, you kept up. If you got one of these Jeeps or even a car of your own and you wanna talk about it, leave it in the comments section below because I always love to hear from you. If you like the video, smash on the like button for me. It'll mean the world. While you're at it, go ahead and subscribe and ring the bell. That way there you can be kept up with all of our latest content. Thanks.