Quick question for the forum: has anyone else had a problem with the A/C fan motor?

My wife's 2012 just started going out. At least that's what I think it is. The A/C blows cold, when the fan blows. The problem is the fan or blower (whatever makes cold air come through the vents) started out intermittently turning off, and now the intermittent has gotten to it's off almost all the time.

Is there an easy way for me to troubleshoot this? Is there a known problem? I hate to start pulling a dash apart without having much of a clue what I'm looking for.

 

The least expensive place to start is to turn the fan to a mid or high speed setting and use a test light to back probe for power and ground to the blower fan motor connector when the fan fails to blow. If the blower fan motor always works in manual mode, then you know it's not the fan motor. If there is no power to the blower fan motor when in manual mode, you know it's not the fan motor. If the fan blower motor fails to run yet there is good power and ground to the motor, the fan blower motor is the most likely culprit.

If you're able to rule out the fan blower motor as the culprit, things are going to get a bit more challenging to diagnose....

-Rod

 

That's a good idea. Thanks.

Is there a good source for getting full part diagrams to help me figure out what's where?

 

If you're just looking for wiring diagrams of the system, you can access those from BBB Industries website. This will not tell you where the items are, but will show you what's in the circuit and what color wires serve which function.

If you're after more of a mechanical diagram, you'll need to find service manual information. FCA is pretty tight with their information. The best source I've found for FCA products is Alldatadiy.com. That's a subscription service but the data they provide is the factory service manual information.

-Rod

 

Took a quick look today when I met my wife for lunch. The fan was running, but at a low-ish speed and turning the manual control **** didn't vary the speed at all.

The other interesting thing is I felt air coming from the heater vent below the dash. Changing the air direction didn't change anything except on defrost.

Now I'm starting to think it's not the fan motor or resistor. It's either the control ****, or it the blender door or motor. Or something in between. I'm going to do some more in-depth diagnosis tonight and will report back.

 

So, more investigation tonight. Here's what I found....

The fan speed works fine. But the fan itself is intermittent. It'll run fine for a little while, then stop, then start back up again. I'm lead to believe this is the blower motor module gone bad. Fortunately it doesn't look like a hard fix.

But... the air is coming from both the dash vents and the lower heater vent. It make no difference when I push the button to change the air direction. The same thing happens on both sides, so it's not the blender door.

So, is there two problems or just one problem? Do I have something bad that causes the blower motor to intermittently shut off and misdirects air? Or do I have a problem with the blower motor module and another problem? (I hope that makes sense.)

 

Did you figure out what it was? I have a 2011 Crew that started doing this a couple years ago. It's now to the point where it's constant.... it'll switch between high and low / minimum fan speed every 2 minutes or so. I replaced the blower fan resistor module and it made no difference. Next thing I did was pull the fan out and clean all the connectors.