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98 Gs300 Blower Motor Noise-Need To Replace?


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The A/C blower motor in my 98 GS300 with 138K miles has been making noises primarily at low speeds for many months. The noise sounds like louvers being actuated continuously. Not sure how else to describe it. Blower works fine at all speeds. My questions are:

1. Is the bearing on the motor slowly failing?

2. Where is the blower located? How do I access it.

I enjoy car maintenance and plan to replace it myself. Cannot be more involved than replacing a 92 LS400 starter! Under the intake manifold-what were the Japanese thinking? When the auto parts store tech told me where it was mounted, I assumed he was pulling my leg.

Thanks in advance for any input.

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The blower motor is under the passenger's side dash. It's a piece of cake. When the bearings fail, it usually sounds more like a metallic, rotating squeaky sound. The sound you describe may be one or more of the servo motors that control the air doors. I've replaced several over the years and I'm going to do another one soon. There are (4) motors. One for the mode, one for recirculate, and one for the temperature of each side. I find the temperature servos tend to fail the most as they move the most to maintain the set temperature. If you want to figure out if a motor is your problem, do the following. Turn on the climate control and turn off the auto-mode. Select the lowest fan speed. Turn on dual temperature mode and adjust the temperature on one side at a time; one degree at a time. Listen to the motor move. The driver's side motor is to the left and below the radio, inside the dash. The passenger's side is to the right and below the radio, inside the dash. As you adjust the temperature one degree at a time listen to the motor move. They move in steps. If you have a bad motor, you will find a position where the motor does not just move and stop but starts to jiggle back and forth. You can hear the motor "searching" for it's set position. When a particular position starts to wear inside the motor, it will not be able to stop accurately at that spot. They usually exhibit this phenomenon at a temperature you use most or slightly below or above it.

If your motors seem to be quiet, you might want to remove the panel under the passenger's side dash and remove the blower motor. It is quite possible that some debris got into the fan and is causing the noise. It's a good time to check the filter behind the glovebox. The filter is directly above the blower motor. Remove the access panel at the rear edge inside the glovebox to access it. It is behind a cover, straight behind the access cover.

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Good stuff! Very technical!

Based on your details. it must be the driver side servo. I will follow your diagnosis instructions to confirm. I also can now replace the air filter. See the dirty displays at the auto parts store counter, but did not realize replacement did not require major dash disassembly.

Another weekend project. Thanks again for thorough and quick response.

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