Figure 10.

Careful measuring of the fans' installation depth is crucial to centering them in their housings and preventing
interference with the intake guides.

8. Fashion a wire coat hanger into a holder for the fans. Place the left fan on the holder and immerse it
up to the top of the hub in the boiling water.

Figure 11. Boiling the fans before pressing them on their shafts makes installation easy...and precludes the expensive
breakage that can quadruple the cost of this repair!

9
9. Carefully stand the new motor on its right shaft, its left shaft upright. (I recommend you have an
assistant hold the motor to prevent its falling over.) Have your spark plug socket/extension ready.
After the fan has heated for about two minutes, quickly remove it from the boiling water, start the
fan’s inboard hub opening onto the shaft, and then press it down on the shaft to the marked depth
using the spark plug socket and extension as a mandrel. If the fan cools too quickly and gets stuck
on the shaft beyond what applying reasonable force can press it fully down, simply return that fan,
on the shaft, to the boiling water, heat it again for about two minutes, and then press it fully down
to its mark again using the mandrel. NOTE: If you install the first fan too deeply on the shaft past
the mark, wait until AFTER the second fan is installed and has fully cooled. Then heat up the first
fan again and use the counter-rotation technique to unscrew it back to the required depth.

Figure 12. An improvised mandrel presses the left fan onto its shaft without putting pressure on the motor's bearings.

10. Heat the second fan in the same manner as the first, but use the counter-rotation technique to
screw the second fan onto the shaft to the installation depth mark. Do NOT use the mandrel to
install the second fan. If you did, you’d be pressing down onto the fragile end of the opposite fan
rather than against the stout motor shaft as you did with the first fan. As the important final step,
bring the rotational alignment marks together to ensure the original factory balance is retained.

10
 Figure 13. When the second fan is counter-rotated onto its shaft, the important final step is to realign the two fans as you
marked them during disassembly. This ensures the factory balance is restored.

11. Inspect both fans to ensure they’re both installed properly—both to correct depth, left fan on left
shaft, ends installed outward, realigned, etc., just as you marked them in the first phase. Move all
the clean housing parts, mounting clips, and the new motor with fans attached back to the work
bench.

Reassembly of the Heater Blower Unit

1. Place the bottom housing on the work bench with its front facing you.
2. Reinstall the inner guides’ lower sections. (The inner lowers are half-round crescents, while the
inner uppers are squared off. The airfoils on all guides are offset toward their respective fans.)

11
Figure 14. New motor nestled into its pinned saddle; the four air intake guides are reassembled and ready to receive the
upper housing. (I actually found it easier to install the outer guides and the top halves of the inner guides in the upper
housing first before joining the halves, but either approach works.)

3. Place the motor and fans into the lower housing. The center grommet on the bottom of the motor
engages with a pin at the bottom left of the housing. Carefully seat it.
4. Connect the power cables to their respective spade connectors on the new motor. Secure the cable
to the motor with its spring clip and route the cable out of the lower center of the housing as it was
originally.
5. Install the center upper guides. Above photo notwithstanding, I actually found it easiest to do this
by pre-installing them into their plates in the upper housing rather than trying to blindly engage
them when lowering the upper housing onto the lower housing.
6. With both sets of lower guides in place, check the clearance of the inboard and outboard edges of
both fans with the edges of their lower guides. THIS IS CRITICAL! The axial (side-to-side) clearance
of each fan’s edge to each guide should be fairly equal to allow for future axial play when the motor
bearings wear. By NO means should any fan’s edge touch—or even nearly touch—a guide. If either
or both fans are too close for comfort, adjust their position on the shaft by returning to the kitchen
one more time, heating up the offending fan in the boiling water again, and using the counter-

12
 rotation method to move the fan in the desired direction to the optimum position—about 1/8”
(3mm) clearance from the edge of each fan to its respective air intake guide.

Figure 15. It's IMPORTANT to ensure each fan edge has at least about 1/8" (3mm) clearance from its guide. Despite careful
measuring and marking, I had to readjust one of my fans slightly outward on its shaft to better clear its inside guide.

7. If/when all fan-to-guide clearances are in order, replace the top of the housing onto the lower
housing. Spin the fans to ensure nothing is binding, and visually check to see both inner guides’ pins
have mated and that the outer guides’ flat sides are seated in the bottom housing.

13
Figure 16. Lower the upper housing, carefully seat it, and check for binding by spinning the fan. Note both outer air guides
and the upper halves of the two inner air guides are pre-installed in the upper housing.

8. Reinstall 8 small clips to their positions on the joined housings. Use snap ring pliers (or needle nose
pliers as before) to reinstall the two large center housing clips.

Figure 17. Install eight small and two large housing clips. The large clips should be spread by a pair of snap ring pliers to
make installing them easier and avoid stressing the plastic housing.

14
9. The heater blower unit now has a fresh, new motor, it’s been cleaned, its balance has been
restored, it’s been properly reassembled, and it’s ready to install back into your SL.

Figure 18. With a fresh new Bosch motor, the blower unit is ready for installation.

Test, Reinstallation of Heater Blower Unit

1. Return the newly rebuilt heater blower unit to the car and insert it into the well. Don’t fasten it
down yet, though, test it first.
2. With ignition OFF, Fan OFF, Climate Control push button “O” depressed, and the heater unit
back in the well, reconnect the heater blower unit’s resistor block receptacle to the car’s heater
blower cable plug.
3. Turn ignition key to Position II. Caution: DO NOT START CAR, as air cleaner is not installed and
air intake is covered.
4. Press fan speed button to HIGH.
5. Depress DEFROSTER button on push button unit. Ensure fan begins to run, that it pushes air,
that there are no abnormal sounds, and that its speed is high.
6. If unit successfully checks out, complete reinstalling the unit using the reverse of removal
instructions. Tighten the blower housing flared nuts very judiciously to avoid cracking the
plastic housing, and use blue Loctite on the threads to prevent them from coming loose. Note
that the top cover rubber gasket has several nubs that fit into holes along the front of the cover
mounting surface.

15
Figure 19. The top cover gasket must be installed only one way for these nubs to line up with their holes. When the cover is
screwed down, remove the engine air intake covering and reinstall the air cleaner.

7. You’re done! Head back to the kitchen and pop open your favorite beverage of choice,
rightfully proud of retaining the considerable amount of money you would have blown (pun
intended) for exchange fans, or worse, on a new or even used heater blower unit. (Might ought
to rinse out that sink and wipe off the stovetop between brews, too, to remove any evidence of
what you’ve been up to in her kitchen from the frau.)

Good road,

__________________

GlueckAuf
Sterling Heights, MI
1987 Mercedes-Benz 560SL Benzedrine
2002 Volvo S80 T6
2004 Litespeed Vortex/Campagnolo Record

16