1G Blower motor not working... [heater speed control resistor]

[Mike1992]

Motor and tranny are in my old parts car, AKA my new daily driver. I converted the 90 talon to all 91 wiring along with 91 engine wiring. Well its cold/rainy and I finally decide to take it out for a good 20 min drive (NO plate/tags/insurance cant go far) Took me a good 5 mins to figure out how to get the windshield wipers workin , So then the windows start foggin up since its 35 degree's outside. I go to turn the heat on and i get nothing No air comes out until I turn it to the last dial (full blast) can someone explain to me if something isnt hooked up its chilly and i wanna go drive, and i cant see through the fogged up window.

I let it sit warming up for 30 mins and I got no heat either just cold air coming through the vents

Ok took some of my dash apart to find the AC/HEATER cable came off, also the recirculate cable was loose so that ones fixed to. I got heat again!!!! Ok now wheres the selector cable at for switching feet/defromt/middle is that on the driver side?

Why dont i get any air coming out the vents until i turn it to full blast? Maybe the electronic connector in back isnt plugged in or its bad?

 

[luv2rallye]

Check all the fuses, then the heater relay, then the blower switch.

 

[LunarEclips]

maybe one of the wires are pinched/melted at the end of the wire, trace it, it also could be grounding out, but then again...if it were grounding out then the fuse would keep blowing.

 

[steve]

Perhaps it's just worn out. I had to replace the brushes in the blower motor in my car 2 years ago.

The quick way to check is apply 12v directly to the motor. If it spins the problem is elsewhere.

Steve

 

[clipser]

the motor turns over and works fine i actually have it hooked up to the battery right now with a toggle switch because i had to go to a wedding wearing a suit and it would of been really hot with out it. every fuse in the car is good i dont know where the heater relay is but i checked the fuse under the dash for it and its good im gonna go and trace the wires hopefully i come up with something..
keep em coming thanks...

 

[clipser]

i traced the wires and they look fine...

 

[Wpgdsm]

My blower motor did this just the other day. I turned on the heat and got nothing. I could'nt figure it out, got ticked off and kicked the fan and viola fan starts right up. I just had a bad conection. Try checking to see if you're conector at the fan motor and switch have any oxidation or corosion on them, this may be all you need to do. If it was you're relay you would still have high because the high setting bypasses the relay so that if it does go bad you can still use defrost on the window.

 

[steve]

The blower motor gets power from sub fusable link #6 to fuse #16 in the drivers footwell.
From the fure it goes to the heater relay pin 1. Out of the relay on pin 3 and to the motor on the blue/white wire.
The ground side of the motor goes to the blower resistor and the switch and to chassis ground #6.

The coil of the heater relay gets power from the ignition Switch IG2 the fuse #3 in the drivers footwell to pin 4 on the relay. The other side of the coil, pin 3, looks like it's grounded all the time.

So the heater relay should energize when the ignition switch is in ACC, RUN, or START putting battery voltage on the motor. The switch selects the botor speed and when set on high bypasses the resistor.

Check those fuses again, turn the ignition on, then look for battery voltage at the motor. If you have it then the switch and resistor might be the problem. If you don't have power check the relay. If the blower only runs on high replace the resistor.

Steve

 

[clipser]

im trying to find the relay to check it because i think it might be the problem but i have no fuse #16 to trace it from my car is a 1990 somewhere i reade the wiring is different
for the 90's

fixed it found the relay replaced it works fine thanks alot
damn my car looks good in the avatar

 

[steve]

fixed it found the relay replaced it works fine thanks alot

Since you had trouble finding the relay other might also. So tell them how you found it.

Steve

 

[clipser]

to find the relay i looked at the fuse block and found the white/blue wire and white/black wire they go into the back of the fuse block and on the other side is the relay looks like a black box...
this is on a 1990 the wiring might be different but im not sure

 

[blk98tsi]

My car-98 tsi awd.
Recently the blower motor stopped working on any speed. I did some troubleshooting today, its blowing the 10 amp fuse inside the car. I threw a 20 & a 30 in there and it blew them both. I jumped the fuse with a wire, and the blower worked for a moment, but I then blew the 30 amp fuse under the hood for everything(car wouldn't crank when I turned the key, but the dash lights still worked). I took the dash apart, and the black/w yellow wire into the back of the switch looks pretty cooked. I took the switch apart, and didn't see any sorts in it, but I'm no expert there. I'm attaching 2 pics of the harness plug for the switch and how burnt it is. Now what is causing this? What wire is it thats heating up, whats it for? & what do I need to do to troubleshoot this? Is this one of those unwrap the harness and trace it back? and where does this wire go to anyway?
Pics:

You must be logged in to view this image or video.

You must be logged in to view this image or video.

thanks in advance for any help

 

[hellotbone]

From my experience when stuff gets hot and melts its going to ground. So you either have a short somewhere in your wiring harness and its getting hot at that point. Another possibility is the blower motor its self has been getting bad and the brushes are worn out in the motor its self causing it to go to ground. This happens in an electic motor as it runs the brushes wear into the armature and it can ground out. If its not to much haslte I would pull the blower motor and bench test it. If need be I have a parts car and an available blower motor

 

[toybreaker]

The original 10 amp fuse blew for a reason!!!

Replacing it with a 20, and then a 30...and then hotwiring it is not troubleshooting.

And the result appears to be more trouble.

I would guess your blower motor has some issues. Maybe the bearings are tight, maybe there's some other issue, but any rate, it's taking more than the 10 amps that it should.Take the blower motor out of the dash and spin it. And then post back with what it feels like.

If you want to check a suspect component, use a battery and some fused jumper wires OUTSIDE the vehicle...so you don't inadvertently cause more damage. In the case of a blower motor, be carefull!!! It will torque up considerable when you put power to it and could quite easily hurt you... ...I know I've done it.

The problem with the connector in your picture is it carried too much current, and got rather hot and bothered by the experience.

Please find the source of the problem, and repair it, and the trauma that's occured since then. I would be happy to help you. I did this exact same thing many years ago when I was first starting out, and I learned some hard lessons from it.

The most important was DON"T SUBSTITUTE FUSE RATINGS....ever.

If you have a fuse pop, Look for the reason why. The fuse will tell you some things by how it fails.

If it's just open, replace with one of the same rating, and you may be okay.

If'n it's flat vaporised, some further investigation will be required.

For now, please disconnect the battery, drop the lower dash trim, and check for damage.

Start with the harness at the blower motor and work towards the fan switch. Hope fully, the only problems will be in the blower harness, or with the blower motor itself. But those wires carried a lot more current then they were designed to, and there's probably going to be some carnage...

Please post back with results on what you find.

 

[blk98tsi]

Ok, so I wasn't so much troubleshooting as I was poking around.
I probably won't be able to work on this again until tuesday or wed, but I will definately follow up.
Now you guys are pointing me in the direction of the blower, but if the blower was the issue, would I be melting the wire on the switch like that? My impression was that the switch just went to the relays under the hood, and the blower gets its power from the relay, no? :dunno:, I just remember seeing all those relays in the fuse box under the hood for different fan speeds.

 

[toybreaker]

It's definately a learning experience to have an issue like this.

When I was younger I let the smoke out of an Audi 5000 quattro...So, Ive been there....

The good news is doesn't sound like there's too much damage.

Let's start at the blower motor. Yoke that out of the dash, and let's see what's what. If it spins freely, we can test it out of the car, I can cover that in another post if need be.

I'm hoping the blower motor is seizurified. It would make things a lot simpler!!!

Electrical issues can be very frustrating! Let's just take it one step at a time, and we'll get things figured out, the problem repaired, and get on with the task of breaking something else

It's pretty cool that someone offered up parts! It'll make it that much easier to fix if you could replace that connector that got frazzled. Hellotbone!!

 

[blk98tsi]

I found and downloaded the eletrical guide. Heres the diagram of the blower & switch :

You must be logged in to view this image or video.

click the picture for a bigger version.

From what I'm looking at, I'm thinking it isn't the wire coming from the fuse box, the blue & red stripe, because it isn't blowing the fuse until I turn the switch on, if that was shorted, I would expect it blow as soon as I put it in. That black w/yellow appears to go straight to the blower fan, supporting the bad blower motor theorys. I guess I'll start there, check the motor liek everyone said, and then trace that b/y wire back to the switch. Sound good?

 

[toybreaker]

Thank you for posting the diagram! It will insure we're all on the same page.

And, the diagram also poses an interesting question about whether it's the motor or not.

I may be reading the diagram wrong, but it looks like the 10 amp fuse (#13) is not directly feeding the blower motor. It looks like it feeds the blower motor relay coil, and also the blower motor switch at pin #8. When the blower switch is any position but off, it passes power out on pin #1. That wire (white with black tracer) dissappears down the rabbit hole at "c" .

At this point we need a little more diagram information, like where "c" remerges

I don't have a diagram for your year's electrical system, but I looked at my 92 diagram, and learned some interesting things.

The base cars (non a/c) work just like you would think with a few twists. The blower switch is actually switching the ground side of the circuit. Power is available to the motor from the blower relay... FROM THE 30 AMP fuse..(#11)..(that's important!!!!) It passes thru the motor and splits. one choice is thru the resistor pack, for low, med, or med hi speed. The other choice is directly thru the switch, and then to ground, for high speed.

Interestingly enough, on the 92 cars,they don't use the 10 amp fuse to do anything creative after the switch on non a/c cars....it's just the relay coil and a dead end at the switch for the 10 amp fuse.

The a/c cars add a whole bunch of complexity to the circuit. With a/c installed they're doing some creative things with the thru put of fuse #11 from the blower switch. I hope you can post us more diagram information, as we need to see where it goes at "c"...

I'm still curious about the motor, but that's fed by the 30 amp fuse (#11) and that's the fuse that *should* fail if the motor's got issues.

Since the fuse that's failing is the 10 amp (#13), the problem may lie elsewhere.

This is an interesting problem. Please keep us posted.

 

[blk98tsi]

Ok, here are the other 3 pages of the diagram, c picks up on the 2nd page and goes to the a/c switch

You must be logged in to view this image or video.

You must be logged in to view this image or video.

You must be logged in to view this image or video.

Heres where I downloaded the manual from, many thanks to Velocita Paola:
http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/showthread.php?t=219988&highlight=download+manual

 

[blk98tsi]

C goes to the a/c switch, and thats just open if the a/c isn't on, or the defroster switch. I should be able to pull that #1 w/b wire that goes to the a/c switch, from the harness going to the blower switch to isolate the problem to that side, no?
Looking at the resisttor block, resistors are usually just resisting or open if they fail, so that probably isn't the issue, no?
I'm still going to check the blower motor
If that isn't it, I was thinking get a few 10 amp fuses, & get a jumper wire and jump the harness that goes into the switch from that ground at position 5 to the different settings, 3,6,2, & 7 and see if they all blow the fuse, maybe they don't, and the switch is bad.
After that, :dunno:
Just start tracing wires from the blower to the relay I guess.

 

[toybreaker]

I can tell you're giving this a lot of thought, and that's very good. Thinking the problem thru is a very effective way to understand what you're looking for, and how to recognise it when you see it.

I have asked another member, Luv2rally, for some help on this problem.

I think he's the best man for this particular problem. As a 2g owner, and a proficient electrical troubleshooter, he will get you to the problem, and the fix, with a lot less wasted time and steps.

I would like to see you get this problem resolved with the least amount of confusion.

I know my limitations, and in this particular case, I'm starting to get a little bewildered. My usual technique is to start at the most likely cause and then branch out from there. Without the car in front of me that is not possible...and I need your help to be my hands and eyes. The most likely problem is the blower motor has some issue, and for some reason it didn't pop the motor fuse, and instead has taken down the control circuit.

I do know you've been lucky so far about creating additional issues with your technique. I would like to respectfully request that you refrain from powering up the affected circuits until we have a chance to examine things a bit more. Let's start with the motor, and then we can test individual components, outside the car, and without powering up a damaged circuit. The possibilities for disaster far outweigh any information that could be gleaned from this type of approach.

Electrical problems can be really frustrating. There's a cause and effect relationship that needs to be understood in order to solve the problem fully. In this particular case, that one frazzled wire gives us a clue to examine the motor circuit, even though it's not on the 10 amp fuse's power path. I can see how an excessive current draw from the motor could create problems on the control circuit, but it's all guess work and speculation, untill the motor has been tested...

outside of the vehicles electrical system...please...

I do know there's something else going on as well, and we can resolve that after we find what frazzled the wire on the blower motor circuit.

I will now step aside and let an expert assist you...Please follow his instructions.and he will teach us both a thing or two about this system on this car..and how to correctly approach the problem.

John

 

[blk98tsi]

I'm in for all the help I can get on this!
& more than willing to listen & learn

I'll try to make time to take the blower motor out tomorrow(if not, then wednesday), and examine it then.

What would proper bench testing be for it after a visual inspection?
I have a mulit-meter, so I can check it for different things, but what?

& thanks for the help, I appreciate it.

 

[toybreaker]

I really like your attitude!

I've been where you're at, and I know how frustrating electrical stuff can be.

Once the blower motor is on the bench, we can get serious about figuring out what happened, and what to do about it.

I don't think I'm qualified to give you more than just general advice, as I've never had a 2g apart. However, there's a few simple things you can check yourself pretty quickly.

How does the bearing feel when you spin the fan by hand? Is it all tight and bound up, or does it spin nicely?

To actually power the motor up on the bench is pretty easy. You just need some fused jumper wires. You can make them or buy them, just be sure there's a fuse in it, to prevent smoke testing anything. Put the positive wire (blue) from the fan to the battery +, and the wire from the fan ( black/yellow) to the battery negative terminal.

A quick word of caution...

When you put power to the motor, it will torque up a bunch as it tries to accelerate the fan from a stop, and if'n you're not carefull, you'll have some explaining to the wife where all the kids superman band-aids went,... and how come there's little bits of skin stuck to the fan..

(not that I would know or anything... )


And, all kidding aside, DO NOT touch the fan if it's stuck/stalled and there's power to it!!!
It could suddenly spin up and actually hurt you for real.

Luv2rally had an excellent theory he shared with me when I asked him for some insight to your problem. It has to do with the blower motor relay. There's a possibility that there may be an internal failure of the relay, with some possibility that some terminals may be shorted against each other internally. I think he's the best guy for telling you how to check that possibility out, as he's way better at explaining stuff than I am. Thanks Luv2rally, I appreciate your imput!!!

Good luck and let us know what you find!

 

[GTM]

I'm in for all the help I can get on this!
& more than willing to listen & learn

I'll try to make time to take the blower motor out tomorrow(if not, then wednesday), and examine it then.
...

Has anyone suggested that you unplug the resistor unit and then try the key? Or unplug the blower motor?

If it's the blower the wires should show they have gotten hot at either of these these plugs. I'm more suspicious that you have a short in a loom which would show up if you just unplug either the resistor pack or the blower.

Cheers,
GTM

 

[luv2rallye]

The big black/yellow wire (12 AWG and one you melted in your picture) goes from the blower motor to the "hi" position blower switch which connects it to ground when in that position. That wire could only melt if the blower itself was shorted (so I agree with hellotbone - bad blower motor). Normally this should only blow the 30A fuse in the car (which you should also check and may be blown). The short was probably so great, however, that it melted/fused the blower motor relay such that relay pin 2 got fused/shorted to pin 3 (or pin 1 to pin 3) which blows the 10A fuse inside the car that you should never have replaced with a wire. This wire replacement blows the 30A fuse in the engine fuse block and hopefully not melted any other wires from that fuse back to the blower switch that cannot handle 30A+.

So the blower and blower motor relay are most likely trashed. The blower motor relay is the right one of two relays next to each other right above the inside car fusebox. The blower switch "hi" position contact may also be burned (replace switch if so) or possibly lower blower switch position resistors if in those positions when motor shorted. The 12 AWG black wire from the blower switch to ground may also be melted.

NEVER, EVER replace fuses with a wire or higher amperage fuse. This will melt wires in harnesses where even experts have a heck of a time finding. If you want to find a short without going through fuses, place a test light in series with the car battery as per my article: http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/showthread.php?p=1496998#post1496998 and then use a voltmeter to find the short.

 

[GTM]

The big black/yellow wire (12 AWG and one you melted in your picture) goes from the blower motor to the "hi" position blower switch which connects it to ground when in that position. That wire could only melt if the blower itself was shorted (so I agree with hellotbone - bad blower motor).
...

I'm confused which switch he took apart and which plug he has pictured??

"I jumped the fuse with a wire, and the blower worked for a moment
...
I took the dash apart, and the black/w yellow wire into the back of the switch looks pretty cooked. I took the switch apart,"
.............

It would be good if he had a short-finder, eBay has a couple of inexpensive ($15 plus $10ship) units which will do the job. They have a couple of wireless units for $120+ which I've never used but can see some advangages if they are able to identify flow direction as can the inductive meter. There are a couple tricks which most mechanics miss when using the inductive meter which I can discuss later if anyone is interested.

For intertainment value and to muck up the works I'm not ready to sign off on the blower motor. His first post indicated the blower worked briefly. A short after the motor (most negative) would only make it spin, a short before the motor may have enough power to make it spin until the major short burns fuses or other wires and creates other shorts.

Since in real life unlike the schematics both positive and negative conductors will be in the same loom and their may be several small grounds all connected to a heavier gage wire within this harness which will frequently be where it will get hottest and burn through to another positive feed. What may have started out as a small short now has become a massive burn and not unrelated to the initial problem.

It is this which causes me to suggest he just unplug the blower as a first step for it will eliminate the "shorts in the blower" as being the source.
...............

Using a tail light bulb either/both the 5 watt or the 20 watt terminal, he can solder wires to it which can be used to prevent overloading a circuit when substituting a fuse. If the wires are long enough he can move it around where he can see the effect as he unplugs different components.

This can be in series or parallel with a short finder which can be made from a heavy duty turnsignal flasher depending on need.

Cheers,
GTM