I've recently developed a mystery noise coming from my heater motor. At first I thought that maybe it was some sort of foreign object in there because it sounded sort of like the sound of when you used to tape a playing card to the fork of your bicycle so it hit the spokes when you were a kid. The sound keeps coming and going though so now it's got me thinking maybe it's the bearing in the fan unit itself. Anyone ever had one of these apart? I found where I think it is under the dash and it looks like a pain. The motor still blows fine but I don't really want to end up without defrost one morning. Any info on this bad boy would be appreciated....

 

Not..... I helped change a heater core/fan motor once and my knuckles were bleeding by the time it was over...!!!! Mind you it was on a VW so it may not be as hard.

Good Luck!!!

 

I think sometimes people actually get things stuck inside these motors - leaves, cigarette butts, etc. It may be worth taking it out and looking to see if there is anything in there before buying a new heater motor.

 

The motor is not too hard to get out. I think that you may have to take the glovebox out to get to the 3 or 4 bolts/screws holding it in. If you park outside regularly and use the vent, you may get small bits of debris stuck or sticking into the blower wheel. If you allow it to build up in you AC evaporator core it can cause it to corrode(trust me on this) On my wifes RAV4 some packrat had filled the box up with bits of string and other goodies and it was making that card in the spokes sound. On another car I had thin twigs enter through the cowl vent and make that sound. Best bet is to remove the fan and check. Even if it is the bearing you can take the motor apart and lube them. I've done that a few times. I am going to have to do this to my '90 Runner some time soon. The bearing is starting to squeak intermittantly. Hope this helps.

Paul

 

I juat did this to mine but it is a 3rd gen.....I imagine you will find yours quite similar. When you get the blower motor out, hold onto it and turn it on to see if it makes any noises.....you may be able to isolate your "card in the spokes" right away. Then clean out up inside the ducts to make sure there is no debris restricting airflow or interefering with the fan.

Here is a link where Bob did his:
https://www.yotatech.com/forums/show...117#post237117

 

Thanks for the info guys. Today it was pretty quiet. I plan to yard it out of there when I get some spare time and check it out though.

 

UPDATE: Well I didn't have time to mess with my motor so I kept driving it and after a couple days the noise has disappeared completely so I guess it was something foreign in the motor and worked it's way out.. I love it when the truck fixes itself!