I'm a little confused about what seems to be a simple issue so here it goes:

I deleted my AC years ago and put in its place a non-AC box. I kept the motor from the AC system but bought a non-AC blower wheel because I needed a smaller wheel to make it fit in the non-AC box. I never really drove the car in the cold and it now had no AC so I never really turned the motor on. Well this year I got married and my wife likes heat so I turned it. It barely blew anything out of the vents. I thought it might be a blockage so I took everything apart and checked it out. No dice. I tried a bunch of other things and finally decided to reverse the polarity to the motor. (No idea how I got there...)

Guess what? Blows like a beast!

I thought maybe I switched the wires around by accident during one of my many motor swaps. Either way I thought, "wow, what an easy fix". So I started the car in preparation for a nice drive in the brisk weather and cranked the heat up all the way and.... the car died! Very long story short I blew a fusible link at the starter. I replaced it and the car started right up.

It was obviously from reversing the wires on the blower motor as I was able to duplicate the symptoms by turning the blower to full speed and burning another fusible link (fuse not in place for testing purposes).

If the blower moves much more air being wired backwards I have to assume the blower wheel is incorrect as spinning it "the other way" produces more flow. I tested this theory by going to the auto parts store and looking at a wheel for an AC car. It's much bigger (as we already discussed) but it also have the fins pointing in the opposite direction!!!

Now you know the back story so here's the question.. Am I right in my observations about wiring, and the wheel fins being opposite or am I missing something simple and what are you guys who deleted your AC running for a wheel???

 

Put the wiring back the way it was. Or every single time you engage the HI relay, the power wire to the starter will be jumped straight to GROUND and you WILL pop another fusible link.

1. The motor itself is obviously wired to turn the other way or the blower cage wouldn't be made backwards;
2. Of course the A/C blower pushes more air... The cage is bigger. For the simple fact that the blower has to push air through the evaporator before it gets into the car itself. And the evaporator is covered in a foam that acts as a barrier.

Finally got rid of the stinking A/C box a year before I took my 87 off the road... Now if I could just figure out why the stupid motor is so noisy, I'd be set. I have no air flow issues (except for the open hole in the bottom of the box where the blower resistors used to be that I haven't filled yet).

Get a non-A/C blower motor... I'd be willing to bet that thing is noisy as heck because the blower cage isn't turning very well... The motor shaft is longer due to the increased size of the A/C blower cage. Not to mention you've already solved your issue by checking out what direction the cage is supposed to be turned in. The way you have it, with the A/C motor, it's actually pulling air INTO the vents and not PUSHING IT OUT like it's supposed to (think of a reversible window fan... turn the fan on one way and it blows air into the room and blows air outside the other).

 

Thanks for the quick response. I think I need to be a little more clear on my findings/observations.

I bought a non-AC motor today to test and it seems both the AC and the non-AC motors turn in the same direction when wired correctly (read the way the car came). Getting a non-AC motor will not help this situation.

I guess the real question is: Are the AC and non-AC cage fins opposite of each other? I'd be very confused if that was the case but again wiring it backwards makes it blow a whole lot more or more correctly actually blow instead of suck... which is what it's doing now on many levels.

 

Are you sure you have the correct squirrel cage? I can only imagine you have one from a different car, if the fins are indeed backwards.

 

It's brand new from Auto Zone. I compared it with another one from another store and it's the same. I was thinking more last night. Would reversed fins really make it that much less effective? The air box couldn't possibly have different baffles or a different rout for the air could it? The box is out of an S-10 I believe. Pulled it many years ago.

If the air path is the same literally the only thing that's different from the AC setup is the cage leading me to believe the fin direction HAS to be the culprit. The question is what cage is everyone else who deleted the AC running??

 

Check out my thread.

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/afte...-c-heater.html

I bought this fiberglass heater box that uses the original a/c blower motor and cage.

 

Thanks bluegrassz

The picture confirms that my heather box maintains the same air flow routing which I kind of assumed was the case. That means the only difference is the cage and apparently the direction of the blades.... Now, let's see if we can get a picture of someone else's non-AC cage from a car that blows as it should...

I'll try and post a picture of mine tonight maybe along with an AC cage from the store...

 

Does anyone have the wiring diagram for a non-AC car? My Haynes only shows AC cars with motors with 2-prong connectors and not the 1-prong connector of the non-AC, 3-speed blower cars.

 

Sorry to keep updating my own thread but... I took a quick look an the O'Reilly parts page. They've got pictures of most parts. I wouldn't go so far as to take them as the final answer but... the picture clearly shows the non-AC metal wheel has the fins/blades oriented in the opposite direction of the plastic AC wheel!!! PLEASE, someone else confirm this!

 

ok, helps if I actually pick wheels for a 3rd Gen. They seem to be oriented in the same direction. SMH. Anyway, I'm going to the store tonight to see what the deal is. Either way I'm still confused as to why it blows so much better when it runs counter-clockwise...

 

Decided I'm just going to wire it to run backwards. It really pisses me off that I have to do this to make the car function the way it's supposed to but oh well. That's what us thirdgener's do I guess... I just can't figure it.