Before you replace the blower resistor ...

Great post!

Gonna add my experience to this thread as well..originally ask the question on the TW FB site which led me here. After learning of the resistor fault "problem" I kind of jumped the gun and ordered a new one on Amazon ($29). Only to discover that the connection is fried as well and ordered that shortly after ( Amazon $19). I replaced the resistor which was a pain in the ass but didn't want to risk swapping the connecter and have to do the resistor anyway. Both parts show burning and I have great pics but can't upload them at the moment. I will update after the connecter is installed. Thanks for the help guys!

 

New parts

 

The connector/Resistor is probably why it stopped working. Might as well pull it and clean it and take care of that plug at the same time.

 

Is there a more permanent fix to this problem? Anyone have the problem come back after putting the new connector in?

 

I'm on my 4th resistor and pigtail. I tried the AC Delco brand meant for GM and it failed as well. I went to Toyota and they gave me the resistor and pigtail for the 3rd Gen Tacomas and said that is what their manuals are now recommending. Replace the Delco junk with 3rd gen.

 

I am not on my 4th replacement set. The first crapped out around the 100k mark. I had some burning on the connector as well. About 10 months later, the resistor stopped again. Toyota replaced it as a defective part becuase it was within the 12 month period. The next one was around 25k later and now again almost 20k. I already ordered another off of Amazon. WHEN this one goes out I will definitely get the Gen 3. Does it fit the same pigtail connector or does that need to be replaced too?

 

I just finished fixing the fan problem on my 2009 Tacoma. I ordered the

$22 Dorman 973-582 HVAC Blower Motor Resistor Kit Compatible with Select Toyota Models

Dorman 973-582 kit (see photo below) from Amazon, which includes both the reisistor and cable. Unfortunately, the resistor didn't work, so I ended up using my old resistor, which was still good. It was the connector which was fried. The kit comes with a new connector with really long wires, and butt splices so no soldering is needed. I mapped the wires exactly as the old connector, but when I plugged in the new resistor, the fan only operated on medium-high, and the connector started getting very hot. I think the resistor wasn't manufactured correctly...maybe they got the PC board turned around. I plugged my old resistor back in and it worked fine. Here are some tips I learned the hard way.

Resistor and Connector Replacement Tips

1. When removing the old resistor, remove the back screw first. That way you will not be fighting the dangling resistor when removing the harder to reach back screw. I did the opposite and ended up dropping the screw down behind the carpet, which then slide under the floor insulation. The further I tried to reach for the screw, the further it would slide down, leading to more than a few expletives.
2. Just cut the wires off the old connector, leaving enough wire so you can tell which colors go to which pins making it easy to map the new wires with the butt splices. It's hard to get under dash to strip the newly cut wires, so make sure you have good strippers (everybody needs a good stripper ). See photos below.
3. After you have spliced in the new connector, TEST the new resistor BEFORE going through the trouble of mounting it. Again, I did the opposite only to find out the new resistor did not work I don't know if the Dorman product was bad, or if they just map the wires differently from the factory resistor. At this point I was too pissed and tired to bother figuring out what was wrong with the new resistor. So I put the old one back it and it is working fine so far.

Photos

The Dorman Resistor Kit from Amazon


A good stripper



A Better Stripper


The butt splice and crimping tool



New Connector Fully Spliced In



Plugged the Old Resistor Back In...Still Working

 

I am shopping at the wrong tool store. My strippers do not seem to be the same quality as yours.

 

sub'd for my future fix

 

OK, I am facing this now and besides this site, I stumbled on another one where somebody points out that "no Toyota did not suddenly fail to size their wires/connectors correctly on these vehicles" and "No, they are not suddenly making resistors poorly so that they burn out frequently"

The mechanic believes that the true cause of these burned resisters and connectors is an increased current draw beyond design capacity. And why is this? The FAN MOTOR ! It's bearings might be going or just dry, it might be failing or, in my case, full of junk inside the blower cage. MOTOR issues will cause it to draw more current.

This is why replacing the resister/connector may not fix the issue for long; the motor is still drawing too much current and stressing the new parts. So check your blower for trash inside and consider replacing the motor if you are going through resistors.

 

Well, all was fine with my new resistor and pigtail until today. (Ordered them from McGeorge Toyota, supposed to be OEM.) The fan motor stopped completely. I looked at the resistor and connector, and saw no burned pin per before. I gave the motor a thump and it came on, not for good though. I pulled the blower motor, and the wire harness looked pretty burned up on one side, as did the corresponding contact on the motor (see pic).

Also I pulled the cabin filter and it was really full of leaves and debris. Some very small amount had gotten in the fan blades and maybe? stopped the motor, causing it to burn up the harness.

Question: Am I looking at just replacing the motor and harness? I tried to open up the motor to clean out potential copper dust per the link called "Tacoma Fan Switch Not Working" linked above but I could not get the plastic housing off without damaging the plastic. Instead I cleaned the contacts as best I could and connected it back up and turned on the fan. It started but then died.

Any suggestions? I hate to bring it to the dealer, as they would probably slap a new motor and harness in and charge me for the labor to do it. I could buy a new motor for about $113 from the online parts dealer but do you think I could find that connector in my pic from Mouser or someone like that?

Is there a better way to proceed?

Update: I found some aftermarket blowers from around $40-$65 online, and I tested for voltage at the burned connector when turning on the fan. Zero voltage until I turned it to the highest setting - so now maybe the resistor is bad again. But it is HOT outside, and I could live with the motor coming on only on the high setting for now.

Any feedback is appreciated. And if anyone cares to recommend a good aftermarket source for parts...

 

OK, I was quoted $178 and $198 for the blower motor from 2 local Toyota dealers, so I bought one at Napa in town and in stock for $72. I picked up the new harness, which was actually a connector plus the contacts attached to wires, at a dealership.

I bought a new resistor at the dealership. It appears that Toyota has decided to redesign the harness and resistor, with a larger gage wire for the power. Hopefully this would eliminate the problem of arcing and burning up the pins in the connector.

As the pics show, the white wire is thicker, the connector has contacts in a 2 + 2 formation as opposed to 4 in a row, and the resistor has pins in a matching array. Parts numbers are:
resistor = 87138-04070
harness = 82141-04Q80

The T-SB the dealer gave me is the wrong one because it still shows the current part number for the wire pigtail as

$32 82141-04M40

82141-04M40, plus the wrong resistor part number. I will try to track down the correct one and post it here. I want it because as the pic shows, the wire colors do not match the existing harness and I want to know I am connecting it properly.

 

Wow I am getting nowhere trying to find out how to wire this correctly. I did find that there is a TSB # 184496 for a 2014 tacoma but googling has not helped find it. The dealership did not know any more than I do, as we both looked at the incorrect TSB they gave me, #0149-11 dated October 5, 2011, which they agreed give the wrong parts - the old ones.

Can anyone find me the TSB for the new parts? There is already another thread here where posters are guessing which wires go to which, and going trial and error. See this link: https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/fan-speed-switch-not-working.70275/page-17

Starting at post 334 on page 18. CudaRae says he got it finally (post 340) and would share it, so maybe he will answer my PM

 

He answered my PM and went back and included the diagram for matching the wires. See post 340 at the link above.

 

Another one bites the dust..

 

I fixed the problem for my truck, but still have one mystery. I pulled the blower motor and checked the voltage across the leads. I had voltage when the switch was on high, but showed no voltage at other switch settings. This caused me to believe that I had to replace the resistor and/or harness again although I had replaced both only about 7 months ago. The service tech I spoke to at the dealer confirmed this conclusion.

However, once I put in the new blower, it worked fine on all settings. Can anyone explain how I got no voltage when testing across the leads (except when set on high), but yet the blower worked at these settings?

Could be a gremlin...

 

My issue was intermittent at first and eventually just broke.

 

Having this same issue. Where should I start?

 

I fixed my blower resistor and it's connector by spraying DeoxIT contact cleaner in it, works fine now.