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This past weekend I took on the challenge of replacing the blower motor on my 2000 9-5 2.3t after it was running intermittently over the past couple of weeks, and finally gave out completely. Even after reading as many posts as possible, I still made some major mistakes that I am hoping to prevent with others who try this job.
Purchased the new blower motor on-line for about $260. I had also purchased the Haynes (Euro edition) manual previously and used their instructions.
Problem #1: First order of business is removing the wiper arms so that the plastic cover between the firewall and windshield can be romoved. I had read that the wiper arms can be stuck and took the advice of purchasing a puller. I could not find a small puller, and ended up buying a 4" three-pronged (smallest I could find) puller just in case. Needless to say, after removing the nut from the base of the wiper arms, they would not budge off their spindle. Before attemping to pull them, I used several applications of cleaning lubricant to help un-sieze the arms. This is where it started going down-hill. I tried to get the arms off by hand, but they still wouldn't budge even after soaking for an hour. So I pulled out my brand new puller and found out that it was too big to effectively hook under the arms, so it was useless. Frustrated, I took out the pry-bar and began trying to pry up the arms, realizing that I needed to be careful of the windshield. Unfortunately I was not careful enough, and did not realize how far the windshield extended below the plastic cover and that the edge of the windshield is not supported, and I proceeded to CRACK the windshield with very little effort (this was on the drivers side arm).
Now I am ticked off and decide that if I can get the center (passenger) arm off I could just leave the driver's side one attached and spin the plastic cover out of the way to get to the blower motor. So I start trying to pry up the passenger side arm but, no matter what, it won't budge. This is where I should have stopped to have a beer and settle down. Instead I kept trying to pry from different angles, and you guessed it, I cracked the windshield above that wiper also! Now I am extremely ticked off at myself for deciding to do this job since I now need a new windshiedl (there goes my labor savings plus some!).
Deciding that I am not capable (or that I just don't have the right tools) of getting the wiper arm off, I come up with an ingenious plan to CUT the plastic cover above the passenger side wiper arm so that I can slip the cover around the spindle that the arm is attached to and rotate the cover out of the way, leaving the drivers side one alone. Well, that worked (if you call destroying the cover acceptable). I could finally see the the blower motor, but....
Neither the Haynes manual, or any posts I read, mentioned that the mechanicals for the passenger side wiper arm need to be removed to be able to pull out the blower motor. I just could not see how the blower motor could be pulled out with this bracket in place. The problem is, from what I saw, in order to remove the wiper arm bracket to get it out of the way, YOU STILL NEED TO REMOVE THE WIPER ARM FROM THE SPINDLE (remember I made the decision to cut the plastic cover and leave the wiper arm attached). So I am back to the problem of needing to remove that wiper arm!
After many more attemps at prying, banging, wiggling etc., I pulled out a 1x4 peice of wood to lay over the engine and butted it up against the base of the wiper arm. They I wegded a pry-bar in between the base of the wiper arm and the piece of wood, and put upward pressure on the wiper arm. Then I took a small mallet and whacked the top of the spindle and YES, the wiper arm popped off! Only after doing this did I realize that the bracket could have been removed without removing the wiper arm after all. If you just remove the two from screws from the bracket, and then loosen (not remove) the screw on the back/underside of the bracket, you can remove the bracket (the back is slotted to slide out from the back screw. Then you just need to unscrew the wiper motor to be able to remove the wiper arm mechanicals out of the way for the blower motor removal.
From this point, everything went very well. I was able to shimmy the old motor out and the new one in without too much effort. THANKFULLY the old blower motor was the problem (blows great now) and I didn't go through all of this in vain! Of course now I need to deal with a windshield repair.
In the end I have a blower motor that is working great, but the plastic cover between the firewall and windshield took a beating. With the cut that I made, and the marks from impatiently trying to pry-off the wiper arms, I am not happy with how it looks, and it does not lay nice against the windshield. So hopefully this will help other DIY-wannabees avoid my mistakes, and hopefully it gave the experienced mechanics a good laugh about how someone tried to save money on labor and ended up paying more in the long run (new windshield).
My advise would be to find a small puller that will fit the wiper arm prior to starting this job. The Haynes manual showed a small puller attached to a ratchet, but I checked three different places and could not find that type (might only be available in Europe). If I had a puller that worked, or could have figured out the pry-and-smack method earlier, I would have saved myself much frustration, time and money.
I hope this hels someone down the road.
posted by 209.103.215...
, Mon, 29 Aug 2005 14:19:59
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