Blower/Fan Problem

[Leah]

My blower stopped blowing - suddenly - with no warning. It was working fine when I shut off the truck, but when I started it again, the blower didn't come on. None of the positions work. The A/C comes on fine but the blower doesn't work at all. My husband checked the fuses and tapped on the blower. He noticed moisture and ran his hand along under the dash on the passenger side and when he pulled his hand out his fingers were dripping. Does anyone have a clue as to what could have happened? Is the water on the passenger side related to the blower stopping? Has anyone figured out why we have water on the passenger side? Do I need a new blower or is something else at fault? Has anyone else had blower problems?

Thank you in advance for help.

[AREA 51]

Plenty of posts on all your questions . Do the search thing. Yes water could affect the blower by shorting the motor, resistor, or corroding any contacts at connections.

Impure water+ electricity= BAD juju!

[loco6464]

sounds like the same thing Im working on my self. The dealer has mine now (1 week and 2 days now). If I ever get it back Ill post what they found.

:mad:

[Leah]

LOCO, thank you. I look forward to the answer.

Area51, I did a search and found nothing that could help me. I found that a lot of other people have water on the passenger side, but nothing about water intruding into the blower housing.

[SGT.BATGUANO]

You should be able to find info on troubleshooting the controls, resistor and motor on this site. I'm not sure if the blower problems and water leakage problems are related, but it's possible. How many VX'ers have had blower and water leak problems? Should we start a poll?


For all the problems that are posted, I think related posts should indicate the model year and mileage when problem was first noted. Then we could track them and see if a pattern developes.

[carlymac]

Hey Leah,
I had the same exact problem with my '99 Ironman after several days of sweating and probing I was able to track my problem down to the blower resistor. I wrote a how to as to how I deduced to the resistor. I'll bet a dime to a dollar that it's your resistor as well. Check out this thread it has the steps I took along with the part number for the replacement resistor. Ended up costing me around $40 minus the blood, SWEAT and tears. Hope this helps...carlymac

http://www.vehicross.info/forums/showthread.php?postid=13668#post13668

I too noticed moisture behind my glove box (blower area) but dismissed it as condensation build up on the blower because the cool air wasn't blown out of the blower housing...95% humidity will do it every time;Dr;

[Leah]

Sgt Bat. Thank you for your idea. I was wondering the same thing about how many have had this problem and whether or not the water was related.

Has anyone found out how the water is getting in yet?

Carlymac, thank you VERY much for your help. I guess I looked up the wrong thing because I never saw your thread. Thank you for posting the shortcut to it for me. My husband and I will be able to do this ourselves now, thanks to you. I'll keep you posted on what happens.

Spazz, that's just what happened with my blower. I wondered why it wasn't blowing as hard anymore, but since mice chewed on some wires in my engine, I just figured that was the problem and forgot about it. (Don't ask me why. Is there a smilely with a dunce cap? If so, insert here> )

Thank you one and all for your help. I love this site and all the people on it! You're all amazing!

[carlymac]

SPAZZ,
If the blower is blowing at all I would say your problem is either vacuum or the actual lever arms that open and close the different venting routes under the dash (from floor to dash..etc). The resistor is one of those, it works or it don't parts, no gradually going bad. I had a simular problem some time ago where a little air always blew from the floor area and the dash vents seemed to be on half speed. After searching high and low I found I caused the problem when I installed a siren. One of the siren wires was caught in the floor venting door under the dash so it couldn't close completely. After moving the wire she sealed up tight as a drum. If you have mods and have routed wires under the dash it might be worth looking into. Just an idea...carlymac

[Leah]

Carlymac, thanks to your step-by-step instructions, my husband was able to pull out both the blower motor and the resistor. As it turns out, it was the blower motor that was bad. I will ordering one tomorrow and hopefully I'll be chillin' again in a few days.

[Leah]

Well, Carlymac, you were right. It was the resistor. The reason we thought it was the blower motor is because we took it and the resistor to a mechanic friend of ours who said the blower was bad. The squirrel cage was super stiff and would barely turn. He could be, and perhaps both the blower and resistor were bad, but at any rate, we had to spend $170 for the blower and because Isuzu did not have the resistor on hand, we had to pay the $45 for the resistor PLUS another $12 to have it delivered overnight. (It will be here tomorrow). They said that the next order wouldn't go out until tomorrow and wouldn't come in until Tuesday. Well, we are leaving Friday to go me mum's so we had to pay the extra to overnight it. I asked the parts manager if we could return the blower if it turned out that the original was still good and he said no. :( Me hubby will be very unhappy about that. It sure is a good thing we love this truck so much.

Oh, I'm not sure how much help this will be to future blower-motor-problem sufferers, but the resistor has five pins into which go a plug. (You can see how to get to that item from carlymac's url above). Once you remove the plug you will see that the pins go through the resistor body, fold back to run along the bottom, then fold up to run up the side. The tip of the pins sticks out a hair's breadth at the top and you really have to look closely to see them. I could see clearly, once I got to looking, that the fifth pin tip had snapped off. Hope this helps.

FOOTNOTE: The blower motor for the VehiCROSS is the same one used for the Rodeo - per the Lee Imports Parts Manager.

[carlymac]

Gosh Leah,
I nearly posted "not to order the motor just yet"
Because my first thought was "this motor is way too stiff..it's got to be bad" In fact I pulled the Squirrel Cage off to lube, it still was very stiff. Then I hot wired it to the battery and she spun like the wind. So I moved on to the resistor.
I would make a bet if anybody else has there blower just stop (works fine one day and won't hit a lick the next) It's THE RESISTOR.
wish I would have spoken up before you had to buy a new motor, sucks being stuck with part you have no use for. I guess it would have been better to be stuck with a $45 part over a $170 one.

[Leah]

:D Well, this is me today. Poorer but cooler. The parts manager said that if the resistor went bad, it was because the blower caused it to do so. Well, between you and me, I knew that wasn't true because of what you told me, Carlymac, but, because we were $170 in the hole, I repeated to my husband what the parts manager said. It made my husband feel a lot better. I didn't tell him the rest of the story because what's the point of making his life miserable-er? Anyway, new resistor and everything is working fine. I don't mind having the new blower motor either because the mice really did a number on my old one.

Thanks again~