Siemens blower motor FAIL

[user removed]

Made in china of course.

It was one of the few parts that had been replaced on the Sentra and it was a piece of crap.

When I got the car it would not go into highest speed on the heater blower unless you really pushed on the switch and then it was practically impossible to get it off of high speed.

I grabbed another switch from u wrench it with some other parts and when I pulled the old switch it had melted on highest speed.

Later after replacing the switch, I went to high speed immediately and it blew the fuse. My suspicion is that the motor was drawing too much current and overloading the circuit.

Today I got the rock auto replacement blower motor and installed it, Now I can go to max blower (at least so far) and the fuse has not blown.

Not only can a replacement part be bad but it can also create other problems such as a melted switch, blown fuses, overloaded wiring harness and even a wiring fire and a ruined car. In some cases, such as this one you can follow a chain reaction of failures back to the source, but in Virginiathe law limits a shops responsibility to only the parts replaced. In other states there are "contingent liability" laws that place responsibility on the shop and you never see these types of chain reactions using OE parts.

I think I would rather gamble with OE USED (23 yearsold!) than Chinese new.

On my 89 GS500E motorcycle, there are Chinese made valve shims coming into the market, that disintegrate and wreck the engine. I think this will only get worse before it gets better.

regards
mech

[Frank Lee]

They don't quite have that materials thing down yet. Or, they don't care.

[BrandonMods]

Originally Posted by Frank Lee

They don't quite have that materials thing down yet. Or, they don't care.

Sounds about right, its the same with chemicals the company I work for gets from Chinese based suppliers.

[Fat Charlie]

China makes real shoddy pieces of crap... like iPhones.

The company in China made exactly the part that its US customer specified. They said "ship me a container of crap I can push across my counter at an outrageous markup!" Don't blame the factory, blame the bean counters at the chain you were shopping at. They aren't prisoners to crappy factories, they're satisfied customers while their own customers blame the Chinese.

And yes, OE used can be a much better move than el-cheapo new. Years ago I had a guy at my counter complaining about cheap aftermarket blower motors that kept dying on him (three in the last year). I pulled mine and told him it was $150. That's when he really blew up- "What? They're only $50 downtown!!!" I smiled, said "And they don't last long, do they?" and put my box back on my shelf while he went to throw another $50 down the hole.

[Hersbird]

Bingo Fat Charlie! I always say that same thing. China makes what the parent companies order. There is plenty of top quality stuff coming from there and plenty of crap.
I also am impressed at how fast they get stuff here. I ordered some micro switches directly and got them in 10 days and my total cost with shipping was $3.80. I ordered something 10 days ago 3 states away through FedEx and I'm still waiting.

[user removed]

Originally Posted by Fat Charlie

China makes real shoddy pieces of crap... like iPhones.

The company in China made exactly the part that its US customer specified. They said "ship me a container of crap I can push across my counter at an outrageous markup!" Don't blame the factory, blame the bean counters at the chain you were shopping at. They aren't prisoners to crappy factories, they're satisfied customers while their own customers blame the Chinese.

And yes, OE used can be a much better move than el-cheapo new. Years ago I had a guy at my counter complaining about cheap aftermarket blower motors that kept dying on him (three in the last year). I pulled mine and told him it was $150. That's when he really blew up- "What? They're only $50 downtown!!!" I smiled, said "And they don't last long, do they?" and put my box back on my shelf while he went to throw another $50 down the hole.

I put 3 blower resitors in the Ranger, in a year, parts from oreilly with lifetime warranty. When I sold it the gent who bought it went to Ford and bought one. Want to bet it's still working?

The point of the thread is, consider the cost versus the potential issues when buying replacement parts, From 60,000 hours experience consider a used OEM part before you buy cheap crap and consider the consequences seriously. You just spent two days replacing something buried by idiot engineers who never replaced a part on a car in their life, only to have the part fail almost immediately.

regards
mech