its winter time again and my heat does not work very well, blows fine but not very hot and it take a long time to get even warm. temp gauge reads fine and engine heats up fine but heat not hot, any thoughts please feel free.

 

If your radiator is low your heater is not getting any hot water to heat the air.

 

radiator not low and i had a flush before winter.

 

May be a vapor lock. Could also be a restriction in the heater core. Just cause radiator flushed, doesn't mean heater core was.

 

Forgot, could be tstat is stuck in open position. This will keep truck from over heating, but will also keep water temp from being able to heat up as it should. All of these are inexpensive easy checks and fixes.

 

Heater Cores are problematic in Dakotas ... Prob. need to flush, or even reverse-flush the Heater Core ... This was a hot topic at the begining of winter. If you want to do a search on it, I'm sure you can pull up lots of threads. Good luck

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I'm having this same problem with my truck. I bought it from my friend in AZ, and he has never run the heat in it since 97 (or if he has it has been very minimally) so I am going to try flushing both the radiator and the heater core and see if that helps. If not I will probably replace the heater core altogether.

 

yeah muy your right i had the prob also take the heater hoses off and flush them forwards and backwards several times you wont believe the crap that is clogging your heater core

 

Well, seems like you might have solved this problem already, but First I would start with the Thermostat. Its most likely stuck open like previously said.