[flatcat47]

Hello
It's an '88 Cougar. Mostly nicely maintained but then spent a couple years unused in a garage w/o doors. Mice in the fan, and so forth.

My mechanic has told me it is likely the blower needs to be replaced, that this is a real bear, requiring removal of the dash, and could run a grand.

I am feeling my oats (just changed the belts in a Pathfinder all by myself) and want to do this job if it is not impossible for the neophyte.

Can someone direct me to an extant set of directions to this, or walk me through it?

Seems like there'd be some preliminaries. First, what engine, right? Other than that, as much as I can test as to whether the heater heats and the AC cools. Is there a way to tell these things without the blower working? [I think at first it spit out nutshells and such; maybe not working at all now? I will check this].

Thanks

 

[Local Hero]

I have an '88 T-Bird which is basically the same car from the backseat forward. I had a mouse nest end up in my blower motor and the acorn shells jambed up the squirrel cage and blew the heater fan regulator. A trip to the dealer (in 1993) netted that. But I was able to get the whole blower housing out with only having to remove the glovebox. I took apart the whole housing and cleaned everything and put it back together with some self adhesive air fresheners in it. Spent about a total of 2.5 hours on it.

So what I'm saying is that I don't recall it being as involved as your mechanic is saying.

And I'm not trying to run you off. But you might have better luck finding the info you need on a later model Cougar board. This one caters mostly to the classics 67-73.

Good Luck!

 

[flatcat47]

Thank you. That was fast.
I will take a look at the situation in this new light and see what it looks like.

 

[flatcat47]

Like to report progress. I got the thing out in about half an hour. Thank you SO MUCH for pointing me at the right place to start. Also can see its main problem: the squirrel cage fan blade is in about 200 fragments. No, I didn't count them. Looks like the motor itself is a separate piece, so I will get a new one, put it back together while I remember which screws go where...

I manually --- ugh! --- removed a bunch more mouse nest/nut dust debris, and can feel but not do anything about some residue at the bottom of the mini-radiator in the next section of the heater beyond the blower. Do they make cool little dashboard vacs, or should I be jerry-rigging some little piece of hose onto a shop vac?

 

[flatcat47]

Hmmm...maybe I can merely replace the fan wheel. Would anyone have that part number? I'm looking online, no luck yet except a logical suggestion to call a dealer.