How to remove dash for blower motor replacement DIY

[RandallPhoto]

I figured I’d do this writeup since I didn’t see any existing and it would have been helpful. I had my blower motor go out and needed to replace it. I ruled out the FSU but unplugging the FSU and jumpering pins 1 to 2 and 4 to 5, and the blower would still not spin. After I removed the motor I hooked it straight to the battery and it would not spin either.

I found there was a difference between the regular and automatic climate control fans. All the parts catalogs I found listed 64118385558, but when I got it and the dash apart, it was substantially different in mounting and the electrical connector. I have the non-automatic climate control with 3 knobs instead of the push buttons with digital display. The proper part for my dash on realoem is 64118382305.

Some of these steps might differ slightly, especially when it comes to the Bowden cables. My car has the standard, non-automatic climate control (3 knobs, no digital display). Most of these steps will apply to both or be pretty close.


Start by lowering the steering wheel all the way down and out.
**Then disconnect battery with steering wheel down**
Remove the 3 wood trim panels by pulling straight out

Remove 3x T10 torx screws from top of instrument cluster and 3x phillips screws at bottom of instrument cluster



Pull out cluster trim panel, disconnect light switches and remove cluster trim panel

Remove 2x T10 torx screws from top of instrument cluster and pull out. Disconnect cluster wiring and remove



Remove airbag cover by prying from bottom edge. Think putty knife.



***make sure battery is disconnected!***
Remove 4 10mm bolts holding airbag down (circles), unplug wiring connector (arrow) and remove bag and bag cover/straps/horseshoe.




Remove HPS cover from pillar cover, then remove T25 torx screw (under HPS label, circled) and remove pillar cover from both sides pulling towards center of dash.





Remove center console carpet trim panels by removing 1 phillips screw from each side

Remove radio and mid, pull volume knob off loosen screw at bottom of volume knob and remove MID, then loosen 2x 2.5mm allen screws (arrows point to approximate location behind mid) and pull radio out.




Remove 5 Phillips and two thumb screws from above pedals on Drivers side. Unclip sensor and warning buzzer

Remove cover and Phillips screw under door vent piping on both sides



Unclip upper leather trim around steering column by using a screwdriver to pry up.



Remove plastic Phillips screw from under steering wheel and pull the lower steering column panel straight down and off. Then remove entire drivers side lower dash with lower steering column panel that stays attached to lower dash.

Remove 2 Screws from sides of radio opening and 3 screws that were under wood trim.



Drop glove box by releasing circlips on each side



Remove 3x Phillips screws above glove box and an additional Phillips screw from lower right side of glove box. Also, a 7mm bolt on the lower left of glove box and a Phillips screw that attaches the side of the glove box to the lower dash. (Side note, the 7mm bolt felt out of place since all other screws were phillips, not sure if someone replaced it somewhere along the line)





Then remove 1x Phillips screw from drivers side near the pedal and remove entire passenger/center lower dash which will also have the radio mounting attached to it.



Remove 2x phillips screws and 1x 13mm bolt from left side.



Remove 2x Phillips screws and 1x 13mm bolt from right side. Disconnect Bowden cable (the cable that goes from the vents to the vent flap, was a thick blue cable in my car) and remove entire upper dash with vents out the passenger side



Car should then look like this



Remove rubber mat over dash and Unclip 3 clips and Bowden cable and remove center air duct.



Unclip blower motor housing, 1 clips on bottom and 2 clips on top. Slide connector down to the remove from top cover and then remove housing cover




Remove 4x 10mm screws from blower motor and twist side plastic pieces and then pull motor out.



Old vs new



Installation is the reverse of this. 1 thing I would highly recommend is to plugin the airbag, instrument cluster and mid, connect the battery and make sure the blower motor works before putting the dash together. I had the blower motor wire snag when I was putting the cover back in and it made a zipping noise. I’d have been pissed if I got it all back together before testing to find out I had to remove it all again.

All in all this took about 5 hours to remove and reinstall

[rao]

Nicely done

[crdiscoverer]

Nice! Great job!!!


That doesn't look like a fun thing to do. Not looking forward to replace a bad blower motor.

[RandallPhoto]

Nice! Great job!!!


That doesn't look like a fun thing to do. Not looking forward to replace a bad blower motor.

Wasn't too bad at all, and honestly I'd rather tear down the dash than do suspension work. Much cleaner :P

[shaqdeez]

Luving the DIY instructions w/ pictures and identifiers (arrows,circles..etc). Just perfect.

[Gumbi4u]

We have done that job countless times. it may look hard but its very therapeutic. Take your time and it should be smooth sailing. Good writeup . I have done that job in about 3 hours. If it were my own car, I would take my time and do it over a weekend day taking numerous breaks.

[RandallPhoto]

We have done that job countless times. it may look hard but its very therapeutic. Take your time and it should be smooth sailing. Good writeup . I have done that job in about 3 hours. If it were my own car, I would take my time and do it over a weekend day taking numerous breaks.

Yea, it wasn't very hard at all, just lots of screws, and that's how I did it, just took my time on a saturday, documenting everything and taking pics

[jamesdc4]

Excellent job. Thanks for taking the extra time to do the write-up.

[rufryder]

wow! Very nicely done!

Ladies & Gents... now that is how a DIY should be written. Baby steps with pictures every step of the way!
Awesome!

[occhis]

Awesome job. My blower motor has been making noise ever since I bought the car 9 years ago. Still works fine and I have some hearing loss so I don't notice it much. No one else ever rides with me anyway. Have dreaded the day I would have to do that job, but now that I have a pictorial I'll feel more confident when the time comes.
How many hours did you spend doing it?

[RandallPhoto]

That's weird that it's in that font :P. I'll have to change that

Awesome job. My blower motor has been making noise ever since I bought the car 9 years ago. Still works fine and I have some hearing loss so I don't notice it much. No one else ever rides with me anyway. Have dreaded the day I would have to do that job, but now that I have a pictorial I'll feel more confident when the time comes.
How many hours did you spend doing it?

took about 5 hours total. Was actually pretty easy, just lots of screws

[roarf]

Nice job and thanks for the write-up! Mine is making a lot of squeaking/squealing and it's starting to get annoying. I think I may tackle this over the summer. One question though... are there any parts that you recommend I buy in advance that will need replaced, such as any clips/screws that are likely to get broken?

[feeshta]

I'm going to have to do this eventually. My blower motor squeals badly when it is cold out. Thanks for the writeup my friend, will save some time searching.

[STAGGERED M3]

Thank you.

[roarf]

Thank you very much for the DIY, pretty much spot on. I finally got around to doing this today, 4 hours start to finish. The only snag was trying to figure out how the heck the center vent disconnects from the rod that drives the flaps (the step after removing the dash and foam mat). For anyone else doing this, unclip the vent, then wiggle/pull the vent towards the right side of the car and it will just slide right off of the rod. Also, I broke both of my A-pillars. The plastic was extremely brittle and I snapped the single center clip/tab on both of them. Oh well, the fabric was coming off anyways, I'll probably just buy new ones at this point.

[jamesdc4]

Actually, there is another DIY on this, but I think the OP's is more comprehensive. I'll list them together in the DIY Quicklinks with a link to some notes on the procedure.

How to remove dash for blower motor replacement DIY
Blower Motor replacement DIY
Blower motor replacement notes

Thanks to Dorin (Doru) for the other two links.

[bmwildman]

How much more work is it to change the Evaporator ?

[DatTugrut]

How much more work is it to change the Evaporator ?

if it's similar to the e90's I believe you'd have to drop the steering column, remove the center console, and the cage to get to the evaporator at this point. You'd also have to empty the refrigerant and recharge the system.

[themamba24]

Drop glove box by releasing circlips on each side




Remove 2x Phillips screws and 1x 13mm bolt from right side. Disconnect Bowden cable (the cable that goes from the vents to the vent flap, was a thick blue cable in my car) and remove entire upper dash with vents out the passenger side

HEY MAN, great tutorial. This was perfect for me and exactly what I was looking for, I'm waiting to install the blower before I know everything is prepared for. I only ran into two minor inconveniences and it would be a huge favor if you guys could help me out some here.

1) When removing one of those "circlips" the small flap that goes over the gold protrusion (the flaps directly where the arrow is pointing) broke off. Do I need to replace it? Or should one good clip and a slightly defective one be enough to hold the Glove Compartment box?

2) When disconnecting the Bowden cable, I misunderstood what you meant and disconnected the cable from the vents leaving the cable still attached to the dash like so:



I was wondering where I would reconnect this Bowden cable (approximate location), and what tool I would need to do it.

If any more pictures would help with assistance I would be glad to shoot some more.

Thanks for any help.

[waehrik]

Thank you for the excellent guide. One half of my blower exploded a couple weeks ago and spit bits of itself out on the passenger side footwell. The scariest part was the loud CRASH from inside the dash when it happened. It had been making some rattling noise beforehand but was very quiet after it fully separated

It worked quite well too considering half of it was missing. I didn't notice a difference in airflow between the driver and passenger vents.

[BarryM]

Good to find this write up as my blower just didn't work one morning last week. I checked fuses 75 & 76 which are fine so then assumed the FSU so bought one and swapped it out but no luck, I just need to try powering the blower directly and after that I guess it has to be the fan. If anyone has any other suggestions before I strip out the dash now's a good time to shout

[BarryM]

Well I managed to power the fan directly by disconnecting the FSU plug and connecting pins 1&4 and 2&5 so that was good news, then re-connected the old FSU and everything is working as it should be albeit with an intermittently squeaking fan.

I'm thinking the squeaky fan means it's on it's way out and that I managed to kind of bump start it by jumping the power directly bypassing the FSU. I'll see how it goes but maybe I'm best to plan in a replacement as the lubrication threads I've read seem to be a bit hit 'n miss at the best.

[asnow85]

Outstanding post Randallphoto. Any chance you still have the photos? I understand it has been a few years since posting, but my blower went out on my '02and it looks like I will be performing this job soon.

[dxxxiiii]

Resurrecting this great DIY to ask a question.
Any of the off brand replacement blowers to avoid?
Genuine BMW are about $240.
Febi, Behr types are about $100.
Ebay Chinesiums are $50ish.(not actually considering these)
I've had bad experiences with URO stuff.
Leaning towards Febi or Behr, but I don't want to do this twice! I'll go oem if necessary, but I'd rather have the extra $100+ go in the gas tank or under the .

Thoughts?


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[effduration]

Resurrecting this great DIY to ask a question.
Any of the off brand replacement blowers to avoid?
Genuine BMW are about $240.
Febi, Behr types are about $100.
Ebay Chinesiums are $50ish.(not actually considering these)
I've had bad experiences with URO stuff.
Leaning towards Febi or Behr, but I don't want to do this twice! I'll go oem if necessary, but I'd rather have the extra $100+ go in the gas tank or under the .

Thoughts?

3 months ago, I used Behr (made in Germany) and it was fine. I would use it again. However for some reason one of the fans was pushed too far in on the shaft. I used a small puller to carefully pull it out. When you do replace your fan put both old and new sideways on a table, resting on one fan. Make sure the new one is the same width as the old one.