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Heater blower motor fail

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1995 Legacy.  Last few weeks the blower has failed.  Fooled with it a few minutes tonight and can hear a relay under the dash click when the "speed" switch with is turned.  

Thinking problem is either the relay or the motor has failed.  Leaning toward the motor because I can hear the relay click

 

Been super sick last few weeks, haven't been to china, and don't want to go through the trouble of replacing one of the two guesses only to learn it was the other guess.  

Because the relay clicks, does this mean it is good?

 

 

Easy to pull the motor and wire it direct or read voltage under load.

I have spares if you need one.

Larry

51 minutes ago, john in KY said:

Because the relay clicks, does this mean it is good?

No. The contacts could be burned so bad they won't make contact.

Does the motor run on high setting?

If not then it probably is the relay.

Edited by Rampage

  • Author

Crawled under the dash today and didn't take long to determine gaining access to the relay would be a nightmare so went to the other side and pulled  the motor.  Replaced it and the system works.  Just for jollies, test the original motor out of the car and it worked?  Guessing the motor has a "flat spot".    

Edited by john in KY
spelling

It's possible the worn brushes on the motor were knocked clean as you replaced it (for the first month or so of driving my winter beater Outback this year, I had to smack the blower with my snow brush to get it to start working in the morning), just like smacking a bad starter.

 

Or, your problem is actually a bad contact somewhere that you jostled when replacing, and it'll return...

Ah the 95 didn’t start!  You’ve had that thing a long time, that’s great   

Could pull it apart and see how bad the dust or brushed look though probably a good chance of being inconclusive.   

Ive had electric motors work after disassembling, blowing all the dust out, and cleaning up the contacts. Like chux said, working on it may knock dust off, unstuck something, jiggled a wire.....

I have had a problem like this in the past. It turned out the blower motor was still good. The real problem is that leaves, dirt and crap, drops down from the couling to jam up the motor from rotating. I cleaned out the accumulated crap, and the blower motor began working just fine.

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