'72 CS, non-AC. My blower squeaks. Not anything loud, but it's there.

Does the fan have lubrication points of some kind, or am I looking at some kind of improvised solution here?

Thanks.

 

Nope, but if you remove the motor, you can squirt some aerosol grease (Würth makes a great one) along the shaft and into the bearings, which is often enough to fix it for a while.
The rear bearing can be hard to reach, and I've heard of people drilling a hole to access it, but I think I managed to grease mine once or twice in different cars - I just don't remember how.

Officially speaking, squeaking is considered to be a failure point, and the official recommendation is to replace it, but you should still be able to get a few years out of it.

- Eric

 

Hmm, well, I'll see what I can do. IIRC I glued the blower motor on, and the fender might need to come off. I'll see what I can do.

Cheers. :P

 

Given the effort necessary to access the blower motor, you're crazy if you don't just install a new one at the time. I'd also suggest replacing the heater core while you have access to the fasteners.

 

He does have to get replacements from overseas, though, which may alter his cost-benefit assessment.

- Eric

 

Don't worry as we age the ability to hear those hi pitch noises diminish. Just turn up the radio for now.


The amount of work required, to me, is not worth the effort to correct this in itself.

 

I guess it all depends on your tolerance for irritating noise. It would drive me crazy and I would order a new motor and replace it. I did that years ago on me 72 Cutlass.

 

Can I steal the blower from my AC unit?

The noise annoys me, and given that I drive this thing daily, AND I'm known as the guy that made his own American gas-guzzler all on his onesies and is crazy enough to drive it in weather other than sunshine, I'm subject to a lot of snide comments whenever something isn't absolutely perfect about my car.

I suspect I'm a victim of a bit of this stuff: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jante_Law

It'll (hopefully) be a long time before I lose enough of my high-pitch hearing. I'm only 23, after all.

Heater core isn't something I'm expecting to fail, but then I'm naive like that...

 

The heater and A/C use the same blower motor. You don't have to pull the fender but you to have to pull the fender well out. It is probably not as bad as it sounds. Put is on stands and pull the wheel where you have room to work. I think you should be done in 2-3 hours.

 

The one time I did this on an A-body, I already had the whole nose off, but it did take about 2 hours on my current B-body.

Things to watch out for:
If they haven't been off lately, the darned clip nuts that hold the fender liner in can break, spin, and drive you nuts.
New replacement nuts and bolts are cheap here and are highly recommended, along with a coat of Nevr-Seize or equivalent.

Be sure to clean all of the motor connections, including the ground, and maybe lube them up with some Vaseline, to prevent future problems.

Finally, if there's a little metal clip on a fan vane, don't mess with it - it's a balance weight.

- Eric

 

It's not the blower that's squeaking though, is it? Wouldn't it be the bearing that holds the fan?

 

Yeah but you can't take it apart, so it's a moot point.

- Eric

 

Gotcha.

 

You CAN remove the squirrel cage (usually), and may need to to put it on the new motor, but the cage/fan usually makes a grinding, whirring, or clicking noise, not the squeak of the bearings, and fan noise is usually due to debris rubbing against the fan, not to a problem with the fan itself.

- Eric

 

Hmm, fair enough.