Hello folks,

I haven't posted in a while, being a question asker rather than advice giver in the main. But after getting around to sorting my duff heater blower and having a look on here for posts about the heater I found a quicker fix and thought I'd post it here for others with the same problem.

Vehicle: 1.9D cube van

History: Blower stopped working last spring. As I didn't really need it, and I thought it might be a complicated repair I ignored it and did without the blower until now.

I read the posts on here about the blower and set to work. It took all of ten minutes to repair doing it this way.

Looking towards the back of the engine bay in the center you can see the air intake for the heater. Remove the rubber surround. Gently prise the upper plastic cowl off. Lift out the filter grille.

The blower motor is now exposed in the middle of the two outer plastic fan cowls. You can slacken off the right-hand side cowl by removing the spring clip with long nosed pliers if needed.

The upper carbon brush is visible as marked on the next picture:

Note the very fine spring that holds the carbon brush in and forces it onto the commutator to ensure good contact. This spring will fall back into the recess if you are not carefull. So gently pull it back and hook it onto a suitable spot when you remove the carbon brush. Carefully withdraw the carbon brush by prising it upwards. Examine the brush for damage or severe wear. If worn out you'll need to replace the brushes. If, like mine, there is plenty of life left in it carry on as detailed here.

Place the CB to one side. You can now see the commutator (just about) at the bottom of the carbon brush housing. If you have a comm stick use this to clean the commutator. If not a slim piece of stiff abrasive will do. Slip it down the recess until it is touching the commutator and then rotate the fan blade by hand...this is only possible if you have slackend off the fan cowl.

The abrasive will clean up the commutator, which in my case was black with carbon and dirt. Spray with electrical cleaner. Push back the carbon brush. Put the spring back on top of it.

Turn ignition key to position 1 and try heater blower control...and bingo! Re-assemble cowls and filter grille Etc.

This method means you can do the repair very quickly and without the need to remove the motor unit from the vehicle. As I say, 10 minutes in total. And now I have powered heat! No more shivering and straining to see through misted windscreen.

Many thanks to those who posted the original fixes because without them I'd have carried on simply wiping the widscreen and carrying a heavy coat.

Edited 4 January, 201016 yr by cobweb

great guide, thanks for that :-)