Hello all, I was driving my 03 x-type with 155K miles in Utah heat the other day, enjoying my air-con, when the fan suddenly slowed down and then just died. No more air conditioning! My question: the fuse and relay seem fine, so is it the resistor, or the fan motor the likely culprit? Replacing the fan motor looks like a job I could do myself. Any thoughts on the culprit?

 

Gdt928, I would start with first removing relay R20 and looking on the relay. You should see the numbers 1 thru 5 on it. Locate pins 3 and 5 and note where those match up to in the fuse box. Now, using a short piece (6 inches/15cm) of wire, strip the ends so you can push them into the fuse box. Turn your car to the RUN position and turn on the dash fan to high (motor can be running or not, does not matter). With the wire installed, does the fan run? If yes, your relay is bad. replace the relay.

Now, turn the car back off and drop the blower motor or access the back of the A/C controls (which ever is easier). Now, again, install the wire to jumper around relay R20. Now, with the car in run (fan set to high), use a multimeter to measure the green/black stripe wire to chassis ground (push probe into the back of the plug on the blower motor). Did you get 0 VDC? If the blower motor is not turning, then your blower motor is bad. replace. If you got 12 VDC, then your A/C controller is bad. Since you are here, you will want to remove the resistors and measure from Pin 1 to Pin 2 to measure the resistance (set the multimeter on the 2K scale). You do not want 0 ohms, but you also do not want the multimeter to say "OL" either. It should be something around 30 ohms as I recall. But, getting anything even close is good.

If you suspect the A/C control module as being bad, before you buy a new module (which is a likely culprit), check the ground wire on the module to chassis ground (ie, black wire on pin 2 to chassis ground). If this wire has a problem or simply came undone, it will cause the same symptoms.

 

I had a similar problem with my 2002 X-type. What happened was water was getting into the cabin through the cabin filter area, and fried the fan motor I installed the cabin filter modification kit and replaced the motor. No more water into the cabin, and replacement motor ( from eBay) works as designed.

Be away there are two different types of motor for the X-type, with different connectors. The X-type with the automatic climate control is different than the motor with the manual controls.

 

Thermo, thank you for the very thorough diagnostic procedure. Interestingly enough I went out to start the procedure, and as I turned the car "run", the fan started working but not very well. I then read the post about the water getting into the cabin filter and it struck me that this problem happened after I had taken the car through a car wash, which I do often because of the air quality here in Utah. I'm going to be removing the cowl and the pollen filter and see if there's any moisture in the vicinity of the fan. If so, I will see about sealing the cow and replacing the blower motor, as I imagine if water has gotten into it, it damaged the motor. But again thank you very much for your time and your detailed procedures. I'll keep you both posted.

 

Attached is the technical bulletin to modify the pollen filter box.
Very simple to install the kit

 

Thank you very much! It's probably the very same issue you experienced.

 

I removed the cowl immediately after going through a wash. No water had gotten into the filter or the space under the cowl. The blower will go on reluctantly when set on max, but one the automatic climate control is engaged, it stops. The A/C won't kick on either, even if the fan is set on max. I will pull relays, etc., but I'm thinking bad blower motor. Can any of you folks tell me if the a/c module is part of that blower motor? Many thanks.