No air from center vents on 300SD

[300sd2000]

Need your help guys,

My air conditioning is running well and blowing cold air. The only problem is that I generally cannot get any airflow from the center vents?

The system was running fine until about a week ago. Now it seems I cannot get ANY of the actuators to flap at any setting (DEF, ACC, EC, etc!). I AM getting 60 mm vaccuum at the manifold at the red/green line so engine vacccum appears to be okay? Strange is that none of the flaps seems to want to move under any setting.

I read some of the other posts and noted that I should check the actuators by applying vacccumm to each of them individually. I did this at the 6-way manifold on the right, with some of them opening. Once I got air to come out of the center vent but I could not repeat it (#4 vaccuum line at the manifold)....

Anyway, I am not skilled enough to remove the dash (as it seems this will be necessary to replace the center actuator)? Does anyone know exactly where it is located and can it be replaced without removal of the dash?

Otherwise, I am probably gonna need to take it to the dealer. Anyone have any idea about how much this is likely to cost ? 1000? 1500? (I guess I will need to have teh center actuator replaced and likely some of the other ones as well!?)


Thanks