Blower fan rheostat - which one?? 1986 Phase 1 1.6GTi

[paul mcgrath 2 1 Cars]

HI,

 

I have an inop blower fan. If i apply 12 volts to the fan OR earth out the cream wire, the fan runs at 100%. I have therefore decided the resistor is the likely culprit.

 

My dilema is that the resistor has 5 pins yet the plug within my car only has 4 pins - center pin has no wires or terminal. The car has been within the family from brand new so i don't think it has been changed but it has been left at a friend of a friends garage for the last 18 yrs (and not driven) and i am wondering if it may have been 'swapped'. 

 

4 Pin resistors seem to be plentiful compared to 5 pin resistors but i don't want to buy a 5 pin if I need a 4 pin or visa versa. 

 

Just wondering if anybody knows if 5 pins were fitted to some cars even though the plugs were wired 4 pin (center pin unwired).

 

Many Thanks in advance

Edited July 10, 2018 by paul mcgrath

[dcc 855]

You can repair your old item very easily.theresa guide on here

 

iirc its circa 50p and about 5mins

[Tom Fenton 1,548]

The only difference is the 5 pin resistor card bypasses the resistive bit and so lets the fan run at full voltage. Base model 205's never got this, only GTI's, but maybe early ones didn't get it either. 4 or 5 pin will both work I reckon.

[paul mcgrath 2 1 Cars]

The green wire mod looks the one for me. I have tried to open the sucker but it appears stuck solid.

 

Is there a knack to releasing the pcb from the plastic base?? 

[paul mcgrath 2 1 Cars]

Hi All,

 

Just an update, my fan wasn’t working at all and i took the resistor in to one of the tech guys at work as I couldn’t open it. Long story short it would appear things have to be desoldered to release the circuit board within.

 

What he did at the same time was resolder all the connections and checked the transistor. He said it was knackered and was leaking heavily. 

 

Ordered new part as per the guide and also did the spring earth mod and it works a treat so thanks a lot guys. Cost me £7 for 2 transistors (can only buy 2 at a time) and i gave the lad a bottle of wine for his missus. I only wanted him to strip it down for me so i could try and fix it :).

 

Photos below of my repaired item

 

[dcc 855]

Good result

 

I tend to grab these from scrappers as they're getting thin on ground, generally speaking though all the 'faulty' ones I have seen were repairable

[paul mcgrath 2 1 Cars]

Yeah im thinking i may get a 'spare' and also a spare fan!!

[Daxed 7]

It really is a great little refurb, well worth the time, along with the motor clean & lubricate.

[Ryan 99]

It never occurred to me to desolder the transistor before removing the PCB. But now you've said it it makes sense. It looks like the alloy plate will slide out of the plastic once it's desoldered.

 

Instead I ended up just sort of forcing everything apart and made a bit of a mess of the plastic.

[paul mcgrath 2 1 Cars]

I’m not sure exactly how he did it, he just said to strip it down you have to desolder stuff (i think he was talking about the heat sink) and then he said that all the stuff he didn’t desolder he resoldered. 

 

I went to see him a couple of days later and it was all fixed!!! Would have been good to see it in bits but hey ho. I gave him a print out of the upgrade off the website and he did the upgrade at the same time. 

 

I’m just made up that the fan works again ready for MOT on 3rd August. 

[Hakar 1]

My two cents.

I became a member because of having troubles with my interior heater blower.

After reading a lot topics, i decided it has to be the resistor, because sometimes it is blowing like a hurricane, sometimes it seems to be in a deep winter sleep.

The fan is running 100% connecting it to 12V.

I allready replaced another complete resistor out of my little parts stock.

First it seemed to work fine again, but a few days later it behaved the same again.

 

So it was time to try to fix the earth problem of the resistor, this should be the bad guy is most of the problems.

As always, my type of resistor is totaly different the all the other ones shown at this forum

 

this is how i did it.