So its getting cold and I took my little corolla to get gas. Its first time on the real streets in months. I went for a little drive to warm it up. I noticed that the heat doesn't seem to blow out like I remember it. It was like a big blast of heat as it would blow it out. Now its just not as powerful. You can feel the heat from the vents fine, but it used to sound kind of loud. There is antifreeze 50/50 mix in my system now. How can you check the blower motor if its working properly or if its wearing out?
you sure mice didnt get into your venting system and clogged up your fan and vents with their summer home.
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If you are referring to lack of air volume it could be the blower resistor. Can buy at NAPA for around $30. If it's the lack of heat then you probably have an air trapped in heater core.
Ok, so get this. I drove this thing to church today which was about 20-25 miles to and back. The car is fine. The heat is still doesn't blow out like I remember but it gets the car nice and hot, and the car is still idling up to 2000 and then bobbing up and down from 1500-2000 rpm while I'm braking. (The distributor I set back to advanced cause thats where I always remember it being ever since I owned the car.) Come about 6pm I decide to go to walmart. We had daylight savings so its dark out by then. I'm driving and its about 5 miles to walmart and look at the dashlights thinking, "I think I remember the lights being brighter than this too." As I'm almost there I notice the lights dimming and thinking, "Uh oh...the alternator...! God knows how old that thing is!" So I get to walmart with all the lights out but the car is still running. Pop the hood open and notice the plug the goes into the alternator has fallen out! So I plug it back up and push start the car(luck to have a 5 speed), and it runs fine. In fact the idling went away. It goes back down to about 800 like I remember. The lights are bright and the heat is running fine like before. After the car could start on its own, I even unplugged the alternator again just to prove to myself thats what it was. The idling went back up. So I plugged it up and walked into walmart thinking, "The car is fixed." What does the alternator have to do with the engine idling? So I get my stuff and walk out and start to drive off. I go to turn the heat on and nothing! No heat! No air! No blower motor going! Perhaps a fuse went, Ill have to check in the morning once its light out. How do you know if its the heater core? Atleast the car itself runs fine now but it sure won't be seeing the road once its REALLY cold out lol.
Behind the passenger side kick panel is a small fuse block. The resettable relay for the fan is also there. The relay has a small hole in the top. Use a small nail or paperclip to insert to see if you can push down to reset it. Check the fuses too as are probably for fan. Sounds like your alternator is possibly overcharging. Autozone/Advance do free charging system checks.
I checked the regular fuses and they were fine. I didn't know there was a fuse panel on the passenger side like there was the driver side. I went to this site. http://www.ehow.com/list_6068291_sym...lternator.html
It says the symptoms for overcharging are low electrolyte in battery, a heated, swollen or seeping battery, burnt bulbs and high gauge readings. I haven't had any blown bulbs and the car seems to start just fine but it talks about the high gauge readings and how higher readings should be when the car first starts up and then lower readings once its settled. Can I take a meter to the alternator? Positive to positive on the alternator and then ground the other lead to the car while its started.
First thing to do is pull passenger side kick panel and try resetting the circuit breaker . Do it by inserting a paper clip into hole and pushing in till clicks and check the fuses .That should get the blower etc. operational. After that drive to Autozone/Advance and let them run a charging system check at no cost to you to verify whether amps/ voltage output of alt is correct.
I hope that link works. I'm not really sure what that fuse is for. I used a voltmeter lead to stick it in the hole as you can see in the pic. Nothing happened. I could hear the heat "click" when I turned it on but that was all. So I went to advanced and they did the charging system check and my battery has about 4 volts out of its 12. Oddly enough the car starts fine. They said the alternator is working fine but the battery seems low. The guy didn't sound to certain about what he was talking about but he said it could be a short somewhere. That was the best explaination I got. Then I'm driving home...and the heat kicks on. I could turn it off and on. This is odd. Could that circuit breaker I was supposed to stick something in, could it be starting to fail? Or would it just fail and not work ever again?
The circuit breaker should be able to be reset numerous times. If it is tripping there is usually a large current draw somewhere. If the battery reading was that low how old is it and did you replace it? If you want to investigate your wiring here is a link to a diagram.
The battery is a year old. November of 2009. When i tried resetting it, I never heard a "click" or like I was pushing anything. It seemed like I was simply pushing the pin into the hole only to touch whatever is inside. Should I have felt something depressing? And no I didn't replace it because I wasn't sure if it was the battery itself that was just that low or if something was draining the battery. If something is draining th battery then wouldn't it be a bad idea to get another one? It hasn't been my main car since feburary so if I can test a few things first then I'll do that. That link is for a 89. Is it the same for a 91?
You may not have power leading up to the circuit breaker. If you can't push it in it hasn't tripped.There is a line that runs from engine compartment to the fuse block (passenger side) that is the source of voltage to the fan . There is also a voltage feed from the fuse block on left side so recheck the fuses there.
Here is a link to 90 wiring diagram.
The fuse box on the left side kick panel? I checked them and they are fine. Or do you mean under the hood on the driver side in those boxes by the battery? There was one or two of them that were labeled "A.C. Motor".
The circuit breaker gets it's voltage from the white wire which originates from the 100 amp fusible link. It's located in the small three fusible link black box attached to positve batt terminal. Remove positive terminal and check fusible link with ohmeter. If need to replace they are held in place by nuts on bottom side of black fusible link box. After reattaching pos cable trace voltage from there to circuit breaker. There is also a voltage feed red/blue wire from Junction block 3 pin A2( should be on drivers side) that energizes the fan relay to complete the circuit. It could also be as simple as a bad blower motor and /or blower resistor pulling too much current and tripping circuit breaker so check those first.
My dad was able to help this time. We took the circuit breaker from under the passenger kick panel and he said it tested fine. He wasn't sure what the black box next to it was for. Maybe a relay? We didn't get to the ones on the positive terminal cable but we were testing the ones which contains about 7 or 8 different fuses and such on the driver side under the hood and if your at the driver side of the car, facing the driver wheel the black box had two of those 7.5 fuses one labeled charge and another fan up or something like that. Those didn't read 11.8 like everything else did. Also we found that when the car is running, the cable on the alternator with that little bittie nut sparks. We took it off and tried to clean it and put it back on and now all the lights have little power and the car doesn't start at all. The only lights that come on, just barely, are the dashlights and when we tried to start it, they went out and the car did nothing. The battery read 11.8 and from the alternator to the battery read 11.8. We stopped there. Too cold here in Indiana. Any ideas of what else to do?
While I'm here Ill ask this also. Even though this is far from Toyota. I have a 89 buick century that has a stripped out bolt hole where the thermostat housing goes. The bolt will just keep turning while trying to tighten it. You can't pull it straight out so I know its threading atleast some. The other bolt goes in fine(since it has two bolts holding the housing on.) I even switched bolts and the same hole does the same thing. I've looked at alot of things such as heli coils but most everything says they wouldn't recommend using it on the engine itself. What can i do? I'd hate to have to buy another head.
Suggest you pull the alternator and take it somewhere to have it checked out. If it is sparking something must be shorted or burned out internally. Usually done free of charge at most auto parts stores. Before that check the large fuses attached to positive cable. For the Buick if it is a stud in block with a nut and the nut spins maybe stacking some washers to give the nut a tightening spot higher up on stud (where threads aren't stripped) to get a good grip. If it is a bolt that is threaded in block try using a thread tap on the threads in block and a new bolt. Another thought might be to wrap threads with some white plumbing teflon tape prior to assembly.
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